Nostalgia Sunday – Working Women

May 3, 2009 - 4:40 PM by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: General, History and Culture, Nostalgia Sunday 

They promised equality but didn’t deliver. The status of women in Israel has been discussed, researched, analyzed, and — if you look through the Labor Movement image archive, categorized, too. Under the heading “Women Workers” are photos of women standing shoulder to shoulder with their male counterparts in the field…
women_field_workers

…but also rattling those pots and pans…
women_kitchen_workers

…and fulfilling other traditional women’s roles.
first_childrens_house

The ideal of women, standing alongside their brothers in arms, was usually just that.
mapam_border_defense_poster

Just as often, images of women’s work had something to do with an apron…
histadrut_election_poster

…in a poster that is spookily reminiscent of this ad for laundry soap!
ama-ad

women_voter_blessing_posterDespite its ambivalence, Labor Zionism always recognized the power of the female voter — “Who brings a blessing upon the family and the nation”.

Through organizations like the Israel Women’s Network (IWN), Israel’s foremost non-profit organization dedicated to women’s equality and rights, things are slowly beginning to improve. IWN has initiated laws such as the Sexual Harassment Prevention Law of 1998, the 2005 law establishing a Commission for Equal Employment Opportunities; fought discrimination in the workplace; helped women who have been refused divorce and/or custody; aided victims of sex trafficking — and there is much more to do.

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Statuary Style

November 8, 2008 - 11:13 PM by · 1 Comment
Filed under: General 

Jews aren’t big on statues – you won’t find too many bronzed generals on horseback in Israel – although I actually found one, of this guy (http://tinyurl.com/6bu5mp). What monuments there are dedicated to a person or group are generally abstract sculptures, where you can kind of make out the human form (http://tinyurl.com/553nyu), or completely symbolic, like http://tinyurl.com/5vfzux. The long ingrained strictures against graven images run deep in the Israeli psyche, to the extent that you won’t even find images of people on Israeli coinage (a special edition of a five shekel coin with the blurred image of Maimonides raised some eyebrows a few years ago, though).
donquixote110708.jpg
There does seem to be one outlet for statuary that appears to be acceptable in Israel – sculptured topiary, made out of a bushes and shrubs. I’ve seen “statues” of birds, rabbits, cows, even people. And then we have this prime example: Don Quixote (know as “Don Kishot” in Hebrew) in a Petach Tikvah high tech center. The Spanish hero sits atop a horse – much like this “real” statue (http://tinyurl.com/6j6luh). Next to Don at this industrial park (not seen) is a topiary of his sidekick, Sancho Panza. Topiaries don’t seem to have raised the hackles of those most likely to feel uncomfortable with statues (religious Jews), maybe because their not “etched in stone,” so to say.

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