Lgbtq rights in isreal

Recent surveys in Israel have revealed a mixed response towards LGBTQ+ rights and issues.

Survey results from 15 LGBTQ+ Equaldex users who lived in or visited Israel.

Perceived Safety*
Absence of verbal harassment
Absence of threats and violence
*Survey results represent personal perceptions of guard and may not be indicative of current actual conditions.

Equal Treatment
Treatment by general public
Treatment by statute enforcement
Treatment by religious groups

Visibility & Representation
Representation in entertainment

Culture
Interest groups and clubs

Services
Support and social services

History

Homosexual task in Israel

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Homosexual task in Israel is legal.

LGBT people regardless of gender are allowed to participate in such acts once old enough according to the law.

In 1953 the police was ordered to refrain from enforcing the law against gay acts by the Israeli government.

In 1963 Israel's Extreme Court decides that individuals who dedicated consensual homosexual acts privately couldn't be punished and even before that there are no records of punishments by civilian courts against people who involved consensual homosexual

Timeline of LGBTQ rights in Israel

1963: Justice Haim Herman Cohn discourages the enforcement of British Mandate-era laws regarding consensual homosexual acts by denouncing the laws as “outdated.” Cohn was author of The Methodology of the Talmudic Rule (1933) and was Israel’s representative to the UN Human Rights Council (1955-1957 & 1965-1967).

1968: Tel Aviv’s first gay bar opens in a private apartment, the harbinger of other gay clubs to follow.

1975: Israel’s first organization for the protection of LGBT rights is founded.

1979: Israel’s first Gay Pride event is a protest in today’s Rabin Square.

1986: Sex reassignment surgery is permitted and recognized.

1988: Same-sex sexual relations between consenting adults are decriminalized under Amendment 22 of Israeli Penal Code.

1992: Discrimination in employment on the basis of sexual orientation becomes illegal.

1992: Stepchild adoption and limited co-guardianship rights are introduced for non-biological parents.

1993: Homosexual, lesbian and bisexual Israelis can serve openly and equally in the IDF.

1993: First Pride Parade takes place in Tel Aviv,

1994: Unregistered cohabitation is legalized.

1998: A trans woman,

Compare LGBT Rights in Israel & Palestine

Equality Index?

64 / 100

19 / 100

Legal Index ?

76 / 100

29 / 100

Public Perspective Index ?

51 / 100

8 / 100

Homosexual activityLegal
Since 1963Varies by RegionSame-sex marriageCivil unions (marriage rights)
Since 2022UnrecognizedCensorship of LGBT issuesNo censorshipVaries by RegionRight to change legal genderLegal, but requires medical diagnosis
Since 2014IllegalGender-affirming careLegalRestrictedLegal recognition of non-binary genderNot legally recognizedNot legally recognizedLGBT discriminationIllegal in some contexts
Since 1992Illegal in some contextsLGBT employment discriminationSexual orientation and gender identity
Since 2015No protectionsLGBT housing discriminationNo protectionsNo protectionsSame-sex adoptionLegal
Since 2023Single onlyIntersex infant surgeryNot bannedNot bannedServing openly in militaryLegal
Since 1992N/ABlood donations by MSMsLegal
Since 2021LegalConversion therapyBanned
Since 2022Not bannedEqual age of consentEq

‘No pride in occupation’: gender non-conforming Palestinians on ‘pink-washing’ in Gaza conflict

When Daoud, a veteran queer activist, recently walked past rainbow flags hung for Pride month in the old port city of Jaffa, a historic centre of Palestinian culture, he was overcome by a wave of revulsion.

The most famous symbol of LGBTQ+ liberation has been so co-opted by the Israeli state that to a gay Palestinian like him it now serves only as a reminder of the horror unfolding just 60 miles south.

Last November, Israel’s government posted two images from Gaza on its social media account. One shows Israeli soldier Yoav Atzmoni, in battle fatigues, in front of buildings reduced to rubble by Israeli airstrikes. He holds a rainbow flag with a hand-scrawled message: “In the name of love”.

In the second he poses beside a tank, grinning as he displays an Israeli flag with rainbow borders. “The first ever Self-acceptance flag raised in Gaza,” the caption for both images reads.

At the day, Israeli attacks had killed more than 10,000 Palestinians in Gaza, including more than 4,000 children, according to Gazan health ministry figures. The toll has now risen to over 37,000, and more than a million people are on
lgbtq rights in isreal

Israel: Netanyahu rebukes far-right ally for anti-LGBT comments

Orit Struck, a Religious Zionist, said her party would seek to allow discrimination against LGBT+ people in places like hospitals.

Designated Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a uncommon rebuke of his modern coalition allies on Sunday, December 25, for saying they would advance laws allowing discrimination against LGBT+ people, pledging there would be no harm to their rights by his upcoming government.

Mr. Netanyahu is set to form the most ultranationalist and religious government in Israel's history between his Likud and several openly anti-LGBT+ parties. This has raised fears among Israel's LGBT+ collective that the new government, expected to take office in the coming week, will roll back gains made for LGBT+ rights in Israel in recent years.

Orit Struck, a Religious Zionist member of the Knesset, Israel's parliament, said her party seeks a change to the country's anti-discrimination law that would include permitting people to avoid acts that proceed against their religious views – including discriminating against LGBT+ people in hospitals. Ms. Struck said in an interview on Sunday with Kan public rad