Former Lawyer Sues Israeli Airline for Making Her Move Seats
A retired lawyer, who fled the Nazis when she was growing up in Belguim, has sued Israel's national airline for gender discrimination. Eighty-one year old Renee Rabinowitz claims El Al airlines asked her to move after an ultra-Orthodox Jewish man complained that sitting next to a woman went against his beliefs, the Guardian reports. Rabinowitz is now working with the Israel Religious Action Center, which fights to end gender segregation enforced on behalf of ultra-Orthodox Jews. "The man had no other reason to complain than my gender  and that's unlawful discrimination," Rabinowitz, who is also Jewish, told the paper. "It's no different than if a person of another religion had said I don't want to sit next to a Jew.' And I don't believe El Al would move a person in those circumstance.", The company has insisted it did not engage in discriminatory practices, telling Rabinowitz's lawyer in a letter that they had investigated the incident and flight attendants had made it clear she was not obligated to move. The airline said it had also offered the woman a 200 voucher toward her next flight. Rabinowitz has said it is the principle, not the money, that matters to her. The Guardian