Sexual Harassment, Men’s Attitudes, the Authorities’ Responsibility (Police, Courts, Welfare), Men’s Organized Violence Against Feminists
WP Sessions 2014
Incarceration of women – professional and humane issues
The 86th session took place in December 7th at the Moreshet House in Ramlah.
Greetings:
Warden Tafesh Mikbel – Commander of the Central Region
MK Aliza Lavi – chairwoman of the Committee for the Advancement of the Status of Women and Gender Equality
Dilemmas regarding the incarceration of women – Commander of the Prisoner Ward, Warden Ofra Klinger
Sentencing considerations – taking gender into account – Supreme Court Judge (retired) Edna Arbel
Women’s prison – Issues regarding the concept of incarceration – Commander of Neve Tirtza prison, Lieutenant Colonel Sarah Friedman
A play by women prisoners and a discussion with the audience – “Till Death Do Us Part”
Closing words:
Esther Hertzog – Women’s Parliament
Representative of Israel Prison Service – Chief Warden Aharon Franco
Women and men fight violence against women
The 85th session took place in November 28th in Pardesiya.
On the occasion of the Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, the Committee for the Advancement of the Status of Women and Gender Equality in Pardesiya Local Council is hosting Women’s Parliament for a special session.
Greetings:
Professor Esther Hertzog, coordinator of Women’s Parliament
Tal Gorki, head of Pardesiya Local Council
Racheli Balali, deputy head of the local council and chairwoman of the Committee for the Advancement of the Status of Women
“Speak bare lips” – Screening of segments from the play, Pardesiya Community Theater, directed by Michal Miron Galpaz
Overt war on covert violence – Lilach Shem-Tov, mother of Omer, Roni and Or – who were murdered by their father
Panel moderator: Vered Swid, General Director of the High Authority for the Advancement of Women
Panelists:
Tal Gorki, head of Pardesiya Local Council
Ruth Resnick, founder and chairwoman of the “No to Violence Against Women” Association, Israel Prize winner
Dr. Chen Nardi, therapist and moderator of men’s groups, partner at the Dialog Institute, founder of the New Man Movement
WP Sessions 2012
Vicious Circles of Violence
The fifth session took place in November in Kfar Saba. It was hosted by Yehuda Ben Chamo, the mayor, and with the cooperation of Shelly Amramy, a council member and Nesia Shtrasburg, the mayor’s councilor on women’s issues. The session was dedicated to the international day of the struggle against violence against women and thus its subject was: “Women, men and the police trapped in the vicious circles of violence”.
Hadas Shteif convened the discussion and the panelists were: Dr. Suzi Ben-Baruch, Chief Superintendent Sigal Bar Tsvi, Adv. Rachel Toren, Adv. Roni Aloni-Sadovnik. Commissioner Yochanan Danino opened the session, describing how the Israeli police cope with violence in general and violence towards women in particular. In the last part of the event Linor Abergil told the audience how she coped with the rape she went through after being elected as Miss Universe in 1998.
Danino pointed out that about 20,000 files of violence among spouses and about 4500 reports of sexual assault are being opened annually. He informed the audience that the police employs some 6000 police women (about 15% of the police force – E.H.), in a variety of roles and ranks (yet the percentage of female officers is very low E.H.). The description of the Commissioner was questioned by some of the panelists. It was said that thousands of women who suffer from their spouses’ abuse are afraid to protect themselves, because they are afraid of being locked up in jail, as it happened to Karmela Buchbut (whose son killed the abusive husband). Israeli police and the judicial system, so it was argued, are discriminating among men and women with regard to self-defense, as it came out from Shai Dromi’s case (the courts decided that Dromi was entitled to shoot and kill a burglar on his property, as an act of self defense – E.H.).
Another topic that came up in the discussion was girls’ vagrancy, which makes them an easy prey for pimps and women traffickers. Most of them are on the verge of self destroyal and harm themselves by using drugs, alcohol and prostitution.
The question of gender difference in examining the functioning of police station officers was raised by the only woman who serves as a police station commander. Chief Superintendent Sigal Bar Tsvi suggested that the closing down of a psychiatric hospital, where abuse of patients took place for a long time, which she led, might indicate women’s more sensitive attitude to suffering.
A critical claim was expressed about the police use of warfare apparatus which was applied in the occupied territories and which has been transferred into Israel. This, so it was claimed, was applied instead of developing strategies that strive to tackle social phenomena.
WP Session 2007
Men Confronting Violence
The second session took place in November 2007, in Bat-Yam. The gathering was hosted by Shlomi Lachiani, the mayor, and was convened by Yuval Dor (composer and singer). The other participants were: Uri Buskila (the vice mayor), Dr. Chen Nardi (the movement for equality and peace between men and women), Rony Weinberg (High-tech worker), Said Machamid (singer) and Ben Dror Yemini (journalist).
The event took place on the annual international day of the struggle against violence against women. The subject was discussed from men’s perspectives. The platform offered to men implied the expectation that they should take responsibility over men’s part in violence in society and that they should be involved in the efforts to eliminate violence. The speakers described their personal experiences and thoughts about violence and oppression of women: preventing Arab women’s higher education as an act of violence; liberating the woman within the man as a process of liberation from chauvinism; talking as a means for overcoming anger and for preventing the use of violence; the implications of using violent language and of perceiving sex in terms of subjugation and occupation.
WP Session 2003
Misogyny and Violence Against Women in Israel
The session took place in December 2003 in Giv’atayim. Anat Saragusti convened the discussion and the panelists were: Dr. Erella Shadmi, Shira Ohayon, Prof. Smadar Lavie, Raghda Masalha, adv. Smadar Ben-Natan and adv. Dana Savorai.
This gathering took place on the background of increasing anti-women racial expressions and violent acts against Jewish and Arab women in the country. The main implication of the discussion was that acts of hatred directed at any group of women hits all women, the better off, like attorneys, the female teachers, who are attacked physically in schools and economically by being fired and law pay; the single parent mothers, who are robbed of their vital allowances by the family court system, and the young women who are channeled into prostitution and pornography.