A beach of their own: The creation of the gender-segregated beach in Tel Aviv. Issue 1 (2nd January 2016)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Weiss, Shayna
• Is Part Of: Journal of Israeli history. Volume 35:Issue 1(2016)
• Page Start: 39
• Page End: 56
• Publication Date: 2016-01-02
• Subjects: Israel -- gender segregation -- Orthodox -- Tel Aviv -- beach; Zionism -- History -- Periodicals; Israel -- History -- Periodicals; Jews -- Palestine -- History -- Periodicals; 320.54095694
• DOI: 10.1080/13531042.2016.1140882
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1353-1042

Abstract

Abstract: This article examines the struggle for gender-segregated sea bathing in Tel Aviv from the first calls for gender segregation in the 1920s until 1966, when the city of Tel Aviv established a beach for men and women to swim separately. The most effective demands for gender segregation were framed in a civic and not religious discourse. Rather than claiming that gender-segregated swimming was against Jewish values, the ultra-Orthodox party Agudat Yisrael effectively argued that a lack of separate swimming violated their rights as taxpayers who had the right to bathe in the sea just as any other Israeli citizen.