ISRAEL
A Labour Court ruling that Israeli ultra-orthodox candidates for the Public Service cannot be segregated by sex is being resisted by religious scholars who say that no Court can countermand the word of God.
Sephardi Chief Rabbi, Yitzhak Yosef (pictured) ruled the separation of the sexes was not a religious custom but an imperative.
Rabbi Yosef said that if the ultra-orthodox, or Haredi, were to enter the Public Service, there should also be sex segregation at work, in the army and in academia.
In her Labour Court ruling, Judge Rachel Barag-Hirshberg said the need for a segregated course was not proved.
Her determination was given added force when, after the ruling, many Haredi candidates for the program said they were willing to study with women.
Rabbi Yosef said because the Public Service cadets’ course “includes personal and group processes that require great closeness between colleagues, it cannot be coeducational”.
“This is an issue that touches on the fundamental observance of Torah by any believing person,” Rabbi Yosef said, implying that those Haredi who were prepared to study with women were not really Haredi.
Observers said that if the Labour Court ruling was overturned, it wouldn’t stop with training courses, and would also apply to the workplace — attending meetings with women, taking orders from women and providing services to women.
Jerusalem, 18 April 2018
