Israel to let Haredim run, but not enforce, gender-separate buses

[Scurrilous]

<snip>

"Transportation Minister Yisrael Katz (Likud) said on Sunday that Israel would allow the ultra-Orthodox community continue to run their private bus lines segregated by gender, but could not officially recognize the practice on public bus lines.

The minister was responding to a petition sent by the Israel Religious Action Center and a women's rights group to the government and to the Egged and Dan transportation companies.

Katz declared in his response that Israel does not disapprove of buses which separate between men and women to accommodate the Hardi community, but that segregation could not become institutionalized.

The minister added that buses should be permitted to hang signs explaining the ultra-Orthodox community's request to separate seating between men and women, however the request could not be enforced if passengers chose not to adhere to it.

Kats also said that violence and the disruption of order on segregated buses must be stopped, and instructed professional security forces on the matter.

Currently, there are 56 segregated bus lines operating throughout the country, a total of 2,108 buses a day. All the buses will be permitted to remain segregated so long as they choose to, but passengers will not be forced to adhere to the decision, only to respect it at will."

more

[IndianaGreen]

1. The Taliban are not unique to Islam

We can also find them in Christianity and Judaism.

To think that it was women which gave birth to these misogynist scum. The world would have been better off if their mothers had strangled them with their umbilical chords.

[Ozymanithrax]

2. The Taliban is also alive and well in the Southern Baptist Convention...

right here in the good old U.S.A.

[Ken Burch]

3. In other words, they're caving to the women-hating crazies

A supposedly "secular" state is going to sit back and do nothing, ever, while misogynistic zealots beat up women for getting on the wrong bus.

Nice.

[Scurrilous]

4. Hotline founded for women offended by 'kosher' buses

Groups fighting separation of sexes on buses say they will use special means to battle haredi inequity

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3835932,00.html

<snip>

"Jerusalem-based organizations battling the so-called "kosher" bus lines – lines which require the separation of men and women – have established a hotline catering to women forced to sit at the back of the bus.

Founders of the hotline have begun to advertise it using flyers and signs hung throughout the city, which promise "never before attempted means" to battle discrimination in the ultra-Orthodox sector.

The organizations say that in recent years discrimination against women has been on the rise. "In sacred places like the Western Wall women cannot fulfill their religious obligations as they wish, and even on some of the sidewalks in Jerusalem," the ads say.

Yuval Yavne, an activist in the forum established by the organizations responsible for the hotline, says he and his colleagues "want the picture displayed in full".

"This is not just about buses in which women are forced to sit in the back, but also about sidewalks, places of prayer, and many other locations. The removal of women from the public sphere under the guise of halachic ruling is dangerous to democracy and Israeli society as a whole," he added."