One big step for Deri, one small step for womankind
Op-ed: Israel Prize winner Adina Bar-Shalom, who could have had her choice of any party and seen haredi women follow her in droves, has chosen to remain second fiddle in Shas, the party founded by her father that does not permit women MKs.
With Shas on the brink of a split in its ranks, party leader Aryeh Deri on Sunday played one of the strongest cards in his hand – Adina Bar Shalom, the daughter of the late Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, a woman of many achievements and talents who founded the Jerusalem Haredi College and was awarded the Israel Prize for her special contribution to society and the state.
On Sunday, the woman who against all odds managed to break through the iron ceiling the ultra-Orthodox society imposes on its women and afford Haredi women the opportunity to escape the cycle of darkness and ignorance announced her support for the Shas chairman and the establishment of a women's council in collaboration with his wife, Yaffa Deri.
This is a big step for Deri, who said just recently of Bar Shalom that had she told her father about her intentions to enter political life, she would have been banished from his home. Bar Shalom responded at the time to Deri with words that even Tzipi Livni wouldn't dare to utter – and, as is well known, Livni doesn't hold back much.
"He hasn't been in my father's house for 13 years," Bar Shalom said then of the Shas chairman and her father's protégé. "What does he know about my father; apparently he doesn't know him at all."
However, securing the support of Bar Shalom – one of the most influential women in the ultra-Orthodox community – for the party founded by her father wasn't Deri's only significant achievement; he managed also to dissuade her from joining one of the other parties that wanted to see her on their lists.
Deri knows all too well that Bar Shalom's presence in Moshe Kahlon's party, for example, would have prompted a large number of ultra-Orthodox women to vote for Kahlon instead of Shas. And Shas officials, as we all know, are very eager to secure the votes of their women for parties in which the women themselves are not permitted to run for election.
One can say therefore that Bar Shalom's decision not to vie for a Knesset seat despite her good chances in any party of her choice is a big step for Deri, who secured two achievements for the price of one: He blocked Kahlon, who already constitutes a threat to Shas, and dealt a severe blow to his great rival, Eli Yishai, who is searching right for his political path and needs all the support he can get.
One big step for Deri – but one small step for women. The image on Sunday of Bar Shalom, a petite and delicate woman, sitting alongside Shas' charismatic and wide-bodied leader spelled surrender. And indeed so, Bar Shalom surrendered the opportunity to become the first ultra-Orthodox woman to break all conventions, and thus pave the way for hundreds of thousands of women towards an objective that has yet to be achieved.
Instead of showing them that they must and can aspire to the greatest heights, she has taken on a disappointing role. A women's council whose task it will be to advise the men of Shas, and under the patronage and watchful eye of the chairman's wife to boot, is – how should I put it – somewhat beneath Bar Shalom.
One woman whose actions have been commendable is former Labor leader Shelly Yachimovich, who is dealing with the changes in her party, with which she certainly can't be comfortable, in an exemplary and admirable fashion. One shouldn't undervalue the encouragement and backing that Yachimovich is offering her successor, especially when one recalls how other former party chairs have treated their successors. Yachimovich's behavior is not only respectable; it's smart too.
The same cannot be said for another woman who graced the headlines on Sunday – Tzipi Livni, who appeared on Saturday night on the "State of the Nation" television show. The things Livni said about the prime minister under the cover of the satirical show were in bad taste – not to say downright rude. Someone who has hopes of being prime minister in two years would be wise to begin behaving appropriately.
There's a big difference between visiting pubs in an effort to draw in young voters, as Livni did during the previous election campaign, and sitting smug and arrogant in a television studio and voicing rude and improper remarks about a prime minister in whose government she had served until just a few days earlier.
Her attempt to be part of the panel and try to be funny stirred discomfort at best. And if she thought that she'd be able in this manner to enlist even a single vote for her and Isaac Herzog's joint party, it's a shame she didn't think twice. It's still not too late to apologize.
Whereas Bar-Shalom and Yachimovich managed to set aside their egos, the only ego Livni managed to set aside was that of Herzog. Let's just hope she doesn't set aside his gentlemanliness and pleasant demeanor.
