Women in governments of Israel
[5] Gender roles tend to influence both the positions which women in government receive and the bills which female representatives introduce.
[6] Due to the religious nature of the state, traditional gender roles, and political selection processes female politicians face different obstacles on their path to government than their male counterparts.
[9] Colette Avita was considered to have the potential to be elected to the position in 2007, but she failed to gain the votes to beat her opponents Shimon Peres and Reuven Rivlin.
[6] Additionally, in the governments themselves, women have often been appointed as cabinet ministers in positions that follow the ideology of traditional female roles.
[7] For example, when Aliza Bloch was running for mayor of Beit Shemesh in 2018, she refrained from using images of herself on campaign posters in order to avoid alienating religious voters.
Bloch won this election, but only due to a unique coalition of support including secular, orthodox and ultra-Orthodox voters along with soldiers from the area.
[8] Herzog argues that this minimum quota is not only very low compared to population, but also that once it is met there is little incentive for more women to be included on the list of candidates.
[9] During the Yishuv period, women encountered many obstacles when attempting to gain entrance into the National Council, which was the effective government at the time.
Despite her lesser status and the continuous resistance of the ultra-Orthodox, Rahel Yanait Ben-Zvi played an important role on the council.
[7] In much of the Yishuv period, the number of female representatives on the National Council remained small, and no women were chosen to be a part of any executive committee until Henrietta Szold in 1931.
The fact that Golda Meir was able to obtain high positions within the Israeli government is cited as an example of how women in Israel have opportunities to rise in politics.
[11] However, Herzog argues that the fact that Meir has been the only female prime minister, and one of only a few women to rise to a high political position in the government indicates that her time in office did not represent a broader trend in increasing equality.
[11] After the 1973 elections, Golda Meir resigned from her position as prime minister as the result of protests after the Yom Kippur War, and Yitzhak Rabin was chosen to succeed her.
She held this position for 5 months, until she resigned in protest over the appointment of Yitzhak Rafael as the Religious Services Minister, despite the fact that he was suspected of having accepted bribes.
[13] Due to the strong influence of religious parties in this Knesset, when female parliamentarians did advocate for issues involving women's rights they were often ignored.
[13] Additionally, the drive to capture the religious votes caused Labor and Likud to take a step back from positions supporting women's rights.
[12] Although no women occupied a position in the government itself, Shoshana Arbeli-Almozlino of the Labor party was selected to be the chairperson of the Economics Committee.
Although the committee has had to face ideological disagreement among some of its members, it has had numerous achievements in promoting laws against discrimination, and protecting the rights of women and other minority groups.
Led by Ruth Colian, the party hopes to bridge the gap in representation of issues relating to women in the Haredi community, while still maintaining an ultra-Orthodox, religious perspective.
Shaked, who has expressed the belief that the courts of Israel carry out a left wing ideology, has been firm in pushing candidates whose views are more conservative.
