Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin denounced violence and discrimination against women in remarks this week at a gathering marking International Women’s Day.
Addressing female civil servants in Jerusalem on Monday, Rabin said women still had a long way to go toward achieving equal rights.
Rabin also called for more action in the struggle to achieve equal rights for women.
Nava Arad, the prime minister’s adviser on women’s issues, said at the gathering that the groups who need the most attention are battered women, single parents, unemployed women and women who are paid less than male colleagues for performing the same work.
She said some progress for women has taken place in the business sector, including recent legislation calling for the appointment of women to the board of directors of state-owned companies.
“Since then, there are 116 women on boards of directors,” Arad told Israel Television. “But I am looking for hundreds of women” to be appointed to these bodies.
The Center for Aid to Sexually Abused Women published statistics this week showing that 60 to 120 women are sexually abused in Israel every day, but that only 10 percent to 20 percent of them report these incidents to authorities.
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