In 1991, Israel celebrated its inclusion in the circle of enlightened nations. This was at the beginning of the era of hope for human rights during which, in 1992, Basic Laws were enacted.
At a ceremony at the United Nations, Israel signed international human rights conventions, including the "Convention for the Removal of Discrimination against Women". This convention had already been recorded at the beginning of the seventies, which was when the western world signed it. Other countries, including Israel, signed later. Today, an absolute majority of nations are signatory to the convention.
Signatories? Yes. Enacting appropriate laws? Usually. Implementing and giving them effect? Not always. In Israel? No. Not yet. This is the picture emerging in conversation with Dr. Ruth-Halperin Kaddari, author of the periodical report required for the UN expert commissions. A lawyer by profession, she specialises in family law and feminist criticism of jurisprudence. Taking her doctorate at Yale University, she specialised under the guidance of Supreme Court judge Aharon Barak. She lectures at the Bar-Ilan University and at the Herzliya Multi-disciplinary Centre.
Together with a research team from the Bar Ilan University, Halperin-Kaddari is currently preparing the next report, due out this year. But the reports are written in English, and, possibly for that reason, are not sufficiently accessible. The government is obliged to have them translated and distributed, and also, of course, to discuss them and make corrections where necessary. This has still not been done. Nor have the final conclusions of the UN commission on the 1997 report yet been disseminated.
Thus "Even though Israel assumed commitments and fulfilled them, it did not utilise the potential for a comprehensive self-examination or for taking action", the report's author states. "One gains the impression that the government merely intended to check off its international commitments, but nothing more. And it is a fact that the UN conclusions are still in the same condition as when they arrived: bound up in sealed files".
Lack of Statistics
No official preparations are underway for the big women's congress due to be held in Beijing this summer, as it was in 1995. No discussions are in progress. Nothing.
What has changed? "Not a lot has changed", says Halperin-Kaddari. "On the judicial and legislative level there have been changes, such as the emendatory preference law, the law for the prevention of sexual harassment, the National Authority for the Advancement of Women's Status, and, on the face it, in that the UN commission's principal recommendations have been implemented. But this can hardly be said to have changed anything in living reality".
The National Authority headed by Neomi Leeran is supposed to outline general policy, determine reforms, examine money transfers to women and men and the gender distribution of National insurance payments, examine the application of the minimum wage, and supervise the implementation of women's legislation. But it is not happening. One reason, possibly the most important, is that the budget the Authority gets does not make these things possible.
But, the women's organisations say, also apparently because women who have 'made it' promptly stop concerning themselves with such matters. They feel it would be inappropriate for them to deal in feminism. They simply come to resemble men more closely. Since being founded, the Authority has not come close to a genuine discussion of the influence of assistance in the form of home help or a long school day on enabling women to go out to work and improve their economic situation. Not one word has been said as to the demand that payment to a child minder be recognised for tax purposes.
Lack of government awareness of discrimination against women also creates a data problem. The convention demands that all figures in any official statistical examination be subdivided to apply separately to men and women. The Central Bureau of Statistics does not do this in its reports. Neither does the National Insurance Institute (NII) research department. The poverty report contains a reference to children, and to the elderly, but not to women as an independent category. Halperin-Kaddari: "We have a severe shortage of official data, despite the fact that the feminisation of poverty is a distinct phenomenon in the western world, and even though it is even now obvious that poverty among women is disproportionately high in relation to their part in the population.
"On the face of it, women's share in poverty in Israel does not appear disproportionately large. Women make up 52% of the population and take a 54% share in poverty. But we are talking statistics, whereas it is known that Israel has a group of women that must cope with extremely serious emotional problems, such as women who are single parents, female new immigrants from the Commonwealth of Nations and from Ethiopia. The NII, however, has no official data on the poverty rates among such families. It is not a matter of resources, it is only a matter of awareness".
Equal in law, not in fact
The view Halperin-Kaddari takes of the situation of women in Israel is two-layered. There is the layer relating to the basic existential needs of health, life expectancy, education level, participation in the labour force; and there is the more advanced level relating to representation in public life, political status, power, labour market status, and the division of wealth in society.
Halperin-Kaddari: "One can clearly state that on the base level, Israel is in a good position, and also, great progress has been observed in the fifty years of the State's existence. But this does not carry over to the advanced level. Women do not form part of the leadership, are not placed in power positions in politics and places of employment. High basic education does not translate into career and senior positions. In the academic world, only 8% of women are tenured professors, while in recent years, more women than men received BA degrees, reaching 40% at the doctorate level. And this phenomenon relates only to the past decade. In my assessment, it could take decades more until women come to take their fair share as tenured professors, mainly because the academic world operates very slowly, since there are power struggles and since the Old Boys network is almost the same as in the military.
"The truth is that we need not get over-enthusiastic about the fact that we are in a better position as to the base layer. It did not happen by conscious effort, nor did it come about out of goodwill towards women. It happened merely as part of the general progress and the advance that Israel has made as a welfare state. Women advanced simply as part o the general advancement, but the moment things apply specifically to women, everything comes to a halt".
It is true that women's basic situation ostensibly looks good. But here, too, the facts speak of severe discrimination against women that is actually becoming worse. For example:
Life expectancy: in international indices, Israeli men are far better positioned than Israeli women. UN statistics for 1994 show that among twenty-four developed nations, Israeli men took 3rd place and Israeli women took 16th, all without taking into account that this is a country frequently at war, in which mainly men are injured.
Integration into the world of finance: wage differentials continue very high. In 1997, women earned on average 63% as much as men. This week, in honour of International Women's Day, the Central Bureau of Statistics published a report saying that in 1998, the average income of a woman in Israel was 61% that of the average wage of a man.
Public service: in 1997, women held 60% of public service jobs, but at senior levels, on 15% were women. It was recently reported that women's share in senior posts has fallen to 13%.
Dismissal of pregnant women: the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs has a special inspector to whom employers are legally obliged to turn in order to obtain special and exceptional permission to fire pregnant women. In 1994, he approved 44% of applications. In 1998 he approved 55%.
Social power: the UN has an information bank (Human Development Report) annually summarising human development worldwide. In 1995, a summary was also drawn up on the basis of gender and on the basis of women's gender empowerment. One hundred and seventy-five nations took part in the survey (http://www.undp.or/hdro). In the human development index (a combination of life expectancy, education and living standard), Israel ranks in 23rd place. Israeli women, too, take 23rd place. But in a measurement of relative social empowerment, Israeli women in 1997 took 30th place, whereas in 1999 they had slipped to 37th place.
Men's Religion, Men's Army
Halperin-Kaddari: "It is true that the glass ceiling has not been breached. Israeli women are not managing to break through these invisible barriers. We have advanced legislation on labour, employment, parenthood, mainly because there is no alternative, since Israel wants to present itself as being part of the enlightened western world. But in actual practise, the situation is not good. Laws are not enforced. Women do no go to court to sue for the enforcement of laws because it is too costly. They have no budgets. There are no special women's support apparatuses.
"When a women suffering on-the-job discrimination seeks to complain, she risks immediate dismissal and severe injury to her livelihood. Works committees, mostly male, give no support.
"And as if all that were not enough, the 'Achilles Heel' of women in Israel is family law, in which the legal level is not good, either. The fact that religious law governs divorce and marriage results in discrimination against women. Women can be refused a divorce, and must buy their personal freedom with money. This greatly affects their standing, economic position and relative power in the family and in society, which is in any event problematic.
"There is another greatly exacerbating factor in discrimination against women, and that is the army. Very large resources are applied to defence at the expense of social allocation capability and primarily at women's expense. Most importantly, a military career is men's strongest springboard into political and economic positions. This does not apply to women. It is true that a revolution is beginning but it will take a very long time, decades even, until it may be at all possible to speak of the utilisation of female human potential.
Published by Israel's Business Arena on 9 March, 2000>