Women in Israel have obtained a degree of equality and emancipation greater than that prevailing in any other nation in the world, Mrs. Beba Idelson, deputy speaker of the Israeli Parliament, tonight told 1,000 leaders of Pioneer Women, the Women’s Labor Zionist Organization of America, at the opening session of a two-day conference at the Statler-Hilton Hotel here, marking the 35th anniversary of the organization.
Mrs. Idelson reported that, in Israel’s most recent national elections, women cast 47 percent of the total number of ballots, and that 75 percent of the eligible women voters actually went to the polls. She added that a “remarkably high percentage” of the Arab women in Israel exercised their prerogative to vote. Mrs. Idelson heads the Moetzet Hapoalot, the Working Women’s Council of Israel, counterpart of Pioneer Women in America.
Other speakers to address the conference include Levi Eshkol, Israel’s. Minister of Finance; Avraham Harman, Israeli Ambassador to the United States; Rabbi Irving Miller, chairman of the American Zionist Council; Mrs. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Mayor Robert F. Wagner and Binyamin Eliav, Israel Consul General in New York.
In observance of the anniversary of Pioneer Women, which was founded in 1925, Mayor Wagner issued a special proclamation congratulating the organization “on this significant milestone in its history.” Mrs. Sidney A. Leff, national president of Pioneer Women, presided at today’s session which was opened by Mrs. Israel Goldstein, national chairman of the anniversary committee.
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