Q&A: Prayers in Tel Aviv
Prayers in Tel Aviv
Question
Fanny, I assume you heard that the Tel Aviv municipality decided to cancel gender-separated prayers in Dizengoff Square. Of course the condemnations were quick to come, and people were saying things like “Nazis,” “haters of Israel,” and so on. What I don’t understand is that the religious are trying to do exactly the same thing in Jerusalem with the Pride Parade, and the only reason they keep failing is because of the High Court of Justice, which this very government is trying to weaken. And in general, these things don’t happen in a vacuum. People forget that a year ago there was a government here that tried to pass crazy religious laws. Does the Rabbi think it is reasonable, from their perspective, to ban prayers like these against the background of religious attempts to cancel other things and supposedly fight the secular public since the beginning of the judicial overhaul? And regarding the Muslims’ gender-separated prayer, I think it’s obvious why no one interferes with them, because as I said, separation itself is not the main issue here, but rather the attempt by religious people to restrict the secular public in a variety of areas.
Answer
You’re mixing together several different levels of discussion. If the idea is to go to war indiscriminately, that’s one matter. Maybe there is some justification for that because of parallel moves from the religious side. But if the claim is that this is a correct step in the name of liberalism, which is supposed to prevail in the public sphere, that is nonsense. It is clear that there is intense hatred there, and it is also clear that it has good reasons.
Discussion on Answer
I didn’t say it was in the name of liberalism. I discussed two possibilities and said what I think about each of them. Beyond that, note that in Tel Aviv there are plenty of residents who do want gender-separated prayer in the street. In Bnei Brak there are no Reform Jews.
I didn’t understand—this isn’t really in the name of liberalism. Just as the Bnei Brak municipality and the Petah Tikva municipality presumably would not approve Reform prayers in the city, like at the Western Wall and basically anywhere in the country, so Tel Aviv also has the right to forbid Orthodox prayer in the street, especially when there are claims that the people organizing these prayers are figures close to Smotrich and Ben Gvir.