WUNRN
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/15/jerusalem-mayor-battle-orthodox-billboards?newsfeed=true
ISRAEL - ULTRA-ORTHODOX OBJECT
TO WOMEN'S IMAGES ON BILLBOARDS
Female models erased from advertisements across city after religious lobby brands the images as offensive. Jerusalem mayor battles ultra-orthodox groups over women-free billboards.
Phoebe
Greenwood in Jerusalem - 15 November 2011
Ultra-orthodox
groups have been blamed for a rising trend which has seen posters featuring
women being defaced. Photograph: Baz Ratner/Reuters
Jerusalem's secular mayor, Nir
Barkat, has pitted himself against the city's swelling ranks of ultra-orthodox
extremists by demanding that local police enable women to reclaim their
position in the public domain.
Over recent months, women's faces
have disappeared from billboards across the city amid mounting pressure applied
by the powerful ultra-orthodox lobby, who find the female image offensive.
Several
advertisers have erased female models from their posters in
Companies that do not fall in
line with the standards of the extreme ultra-orthodox have frequently fallen
victim to direct action. Across
On Sunday, Barkat wrote a letter
to district police commander Niso Shaham in which he said: "We must make
sure that those who want to advertise [with] women's images in the city can do
so without fear of vandalism and defacement of billboards or buses showing women."
Police have confirmed an increase
in vandalism on the borders of
Rosenfeld added that despite
being pelted with stones, police officers made several arrests in the orthodox
Meah Shearim neighbourhood last week.
But
activists claim the battle over
Activist Hila Benyovich-Hoffman
was spurred to take action by reports that nine male cadets in the Israeli
Defence Force had walked out of an army event in September because women were
singing. Four were expelled from an officer's training course for refusing to
apologise.
"This was the final straw
for me, that these cadets could humiliate female soldiers because some rabbi
has told them that a woman's voice is indecent. The army used to be a source of
pride because women served alongside men as equals. But more and more, rabbis
are influencing army behaviour," Benyovich-Hoffman said.
She organised a series of
demonstrations last Friday in which hundreds of women gathered for
"singalongs" in Tel Aviv,
It is not just secular Israelis
that have been moved to protest. Members of the Haredi ultra-orthodox community
themselves are reporting a rise in assaults on women. One orthodox website
reported this week that three orthodox girls had been physically attacked in
The Israeli Religious Action
Centre (IRAC) was founded more than a decade ago to take on the fight against
gender segregation, which is illegal in
"I feel like a fire fighter
– this issue spreads and spirals like a fire," saids the IRAC's director
Anat Hofman. "But the fact that our case load is increasing is a good
thing – it means more people are sensitive to the problem and are prepared to
stand up against it."
Tsur said: "We are talking
about a very extreme group of people who don't recognise the authority of the
city, the police, the government or the high court. It is critically important
that we don't let this minority dominate."