Shades of Rosa Parks! In a move eerily reminiscent of Jim Crow days in the American South, more and more bus lines in Israel are telling women to move to the back of the bus. It's not racism though; it's sexism and the reason for it is purely religious. Here, in a story released by the American Jewish news service, JTA, is one woman's experience of it:
Three years ago, a 57-year-old grandmother got on a bus in Israel departing Rechovot for Givat Shmuel and sat in a vacant seat in the front.
Shortly after taking her seat, the woman was approached by a fervently Orthodox man who demanded she move to the back of the bus with the rest of the women.
Unbeknownst to the woman, who asked JTA to be identified only as H., she had boarded one of the so-called mehadrin (super kosher) bus lines, on which the predominantly ultra-Orthodox, or haredi, ridership imposes sex-segregated seating. The man told H. that segregated seating had been sanctioned by the rabbis and by Egged, the state-owned bus company that operates the line.
H., who is herself religious, refused, prompting a barrage of verbal abuse from the man. "With the exception of being physically harmed, I was hurt in every manner," H. told JTA. "He called me every name imaginable. I was shocked, and I didn't know how to respond to him."
The man harassed her for the entire ride. Nobody, including the driver, came to her aid.
The sexually-segregated bus phenomenon is a relatively new one in Israel with the first such line appearing only 10 years ago. It is growing fast and an estimated 100 segregated lines are now operating mostly on routes that have large ultra-orthodox or Chasidic Jewish riderships. In religiously conservative communities, segregation of the sexes is a requirement for modesty and it's common to see men and women waiting for the bus in seperate groups and then seating themselves seperately, men in front, women in the back, all in an effort to avoid even the suggestion of physical contact. A woman like H. who for any reason fails to obey the rules, may find herself subjected to angry abuse.Egged, the government-owned transportation company that operates the buses, does not formally have mehedrin lines but they don't interfere with the codes imposed on women by their ultra-orthodox riders either. A good part of the reason for this is that, though the ultra-religious are a small minority of the Israeli population, they wield political power well out of proportion to their numbers. That's due to the parliamentary form of government in Israel. The larger political parties seldom win a majority of seats in the Knesset (Israel's parliament), so they have to woo small, splinter parties with cabinet posts and legislative promises; all in order to form a coalition large enough to govern with.
Still, women like H. are fighting back. Her affidavit has been joined to others in a petition to Israel's supreme court to ban gender-based segregation on Israeli public buses. The petition was filed by IRAC (the Israel Religious Action Center), an organization associated with the Jewish Reform movement.Since the bus company Egged is government-owned, the court has deferred issuing any rulings until the the Transportation Ministry makes it clear what the government position on the matter is. The ministry is currently reviewing a committee's recommendation on it. Avner Ovadia, the Transportation Minister's spokesman, said, "We're listening to everybody and will make our decision soon."
Photo Credit:
1) Ultra-Orthodox Israeli woman (photo by Julia Holoff at julialovesisrael.blogspot.com/)
2) A typical Israeli bus... with 3 inch armor covering it (photo from unc.edu)
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Comments
The picture you have of an "Ultra-Orthodox Woman" is representative of perhaps 10 women in the entire Ultra-Orthodox Jewish community. A simple Google search for the term will yield a proper picture. I wonder why the editor chose the most extreme example he could find - one that is not at all reflective of how people actually dress.
Rabbi Ben Greenberg
Chaplain, Harvard University
Happy New Year, Rabbi (and Hugh).
I do not mean in any way to challenge your knowledge - I simply do not know, and am asking this question for my own clarification. I would have made the same mistake.
I did google "Ultra orthodox Jewish woman' in images, and found photos and text about the 'rules' - saying that "they must cover their heads and arms and legs in public, wearing hats or wigs, long sleeves and long skirts and nylon stockings." (here is one example: sunshinecd. blogspot. com /2008/07/ ultra-orthodox.html -remove spaces.)
My question is - how is this image so very different? Some of the images I saw appeared to be somewhat more modern clothes, but essentially the same type of outfit to my unpracticed eye. Thank you in advance for your response.
Carol
Hello Rabbi. I didn't choose the most extreme example of female dress I found. I chose the first. Do a google image search of "ultra-orthodox jewish women" and you'll see. It was one of the clearest images (which, along with copyright concerns and identification of the Israeli origin of the photo, is why I used it) but it wasn't atypical. Check the daylife .com, or UK Times Online pictures on the same google page for similar images of dress and the picture of the "chareidi women" from muqata. blogspot. com, for one that is even more extreme.
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