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From a long article in the latest New Republic, about the prospects for women’s equality in Israel.

… But perhaps the highest-profile example of the renewed fighting feminist spirit in Israel has been the stunning success this year of Women of the Wall (WOW), currently led by Anat Hoffman… The group has been conducting women’s prayer services on the first day of the Jewish month at the Western Wall for 25 years, arousing the fury of the ultra-Orthodox authorities tasked with overseeing the holy site. WOW draws worshippers from all strands of religious practice; some members dress in traditionally male ritual garments — such as a yarmulke, tallis, and phylacteries — and also sing aloud. These practices run counter to ultra-Orthodox tradition, and more than one woman has been arrested because the law supported the Haredi view that the Western Wall is in effect an ultra-Orthodox synagogue, and the failure of worshippers to respect “local custom” at the site was a criminal act.

[T]his spring, WOW scored substantial political and legal victories. The Jerusalem district court ruled in the women’s favor. And Israel’s attorney general decided in May not to appeal that ruling. As a result, for the first time, at WOW’s monthly prayer meeting in May, police actively protected the women worshipping at the wall and instead arrested Haredi protesters who threatened them. One of the real surprises of WOW’s new legitimacy is the support it has amassed from not just the previously indifferent secular public — three female Knesset members joined the group in prayer over the spring — but from an increasing number of modern-Orthodox women.

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UD, Women of the Wall rally

SONY DSC

last March, in Washington DC.

Margaret Soltan, August 5, 2013 10:45AM
Posted in: democracy

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