page_title: Jewish feminism
section_title: Israel
hierarchical_section_title: Jewish feminism / Israel
caption_attribution_description: English: Women of the Wall prayer group
context_page_description: Jewish feminism is a movement that seeks to make the religious, legal, and social status of Jewish women equal to that of Jewish men in Judaism. Feminist movements, with varying approaches and successes, have opened up within all major branches of the Jewish religion.
  In its modern form, the Jewish feminist movement can be traced to the early 1970s in the United States. According to Judith Plaskow, the main grievances of early Jewish feminists were women's exclusion from the all-male prayer group or minyan, women's exemption from positive time-bound mitzvot, and women's inability to function as witnesses and to initiate divorce in Jewish religious courts.
  According to historian Paula Hyman, two articles published in the 1970s were trailblazers in analyzing the status of Jewish women using feminism: "The Unfreedom of Jewish Women", published in 1970 in the Jewish Spectator by its editor, Trude Weiss-Rosmarin, and an article by Rachel Adler, then an Orthodox Jew and currently a professor at the Reform seminary Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, called "The Jew Who Wasn't There: Halacha and the Jewish Woman", published in 1971 in Davka.
context_section_description: From 1918-1926 women in Palestine fought for representation in the Yishuv movement. This was seen as the first wave of feminism, before the state was established.
  In 1947 David Ben-Gurion agreed that the authority in matters of marriage and divorce would be invested in the hands of the Chief Rabbinate of Israel, and an agreement was signed stating that (among other matters), known as the "status quo letter". In 1953 the Knesset enacted the Rabbinical Courts Jurisdiction (Marriage and Divorce) Law, 5713 – 1953. Section 1 of the Law states, "Matters of marriage and divorce of Jews in Israel, being citizens or residents of the State, shall be under the exclusive jurisdiction of the rabbinical courts." The substantive provision of section 2 of this Law further states: "Marriages and divorces of Jews shall be performed in Israel in accordance with Jewish religious law" (din torah). However, a Muslim woman in Israel may petition for and receive a divorce through the Sharia courts without her husband's consent under certain conditions, and a marriage contract may provide for other circumstances in which she may obtain a divorce without her husband's consent. A Muslim man in Israel may divorce his wife without her consent and without petitioning the court. Christians in Israel may seek official separations or divorces, depending on the denomination, through ecclesiastical courts.
  In 1969, Golda Meir was appointed Israel's first female Prime Minister, during a time when women made up less than seven percent of the Knesset.
  In 1972 marks the creation of the first radical women's movement in Israel.< This period marks the beginning of second wave feminism in Israel. During the Yom Kippur war in 1973, women were not allowed in Military leadership, the civilian administration, and war production. However, women found other ways to become more actively engaged. Overall, the 1970s were a time of major growth and transition for feminism in Israeli society.
  In 2006, Israel's Supreme Court ruled that women should be allowed to deliver eulogies and that the burial societies, or chevra kadisha, should not impose gender segregation in the cemetery. The ruling was in response to an incident in Petach Tikvah in which a woman was stopped from eulogizing her father. However, the court's ruling was not backed up by the Religious Services Ministry until 2012, when Israel's Chief Rabbinical Council ruled that women can deliver eulogies at funerals, but that it is up to the community rabbi to decide on a case-by-case basis.
  In 2010, Israel passed the Civil Union Law, allowing a couple to marry civilly in Israel if they are both registered as officially not belonging to any religion.
  On 28 September 2010, the Israeli Supreme Court outlawed public gender segregation in Jerusalem's Mea Shearim neighborhood in response to a petition submitted after extremist Haredi men physically and verbally assaulted women for walking on a designated men's only road. However, in January 2011, a ruling of the Israeli High Court of Justice allowed the continuation of the gender segregation in public buses on a strictly voluntary basis for a one-year experimental period.
  In 2013 the Israeli Orthodox rabbinical organization Beit Hillel issued a halachic ruling which allows women, for the first time, to say the Kaddish prayer in memory of their deceased parents.
  Also in 2013, the minimum marriage age in Israel became 18 for females and males.
  Also in 2013, the Religious Judges Law in Israel was amended to say that at least four women must be included in the religious judges' nomination committee, including a female advocate in the religious courts, and that the total number of committee members shall be eleven.
  Also in 2013, Israel's Chief Rabbinate promised to remove the obstacles preventing women from working as supervisors in the state kosher certification system, and Emunah announced the first supervisor certification course for women in Israel.
  Also in 2013, the Minister of Religious Affairs and Chief Rabbis issued statements telling ritual bath attendants only to ins
caption: Founding members of Women of the Wall in Jerusalem
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