Girls and boys may sit together, after all, on the benches of a religious school in the Ramot neighborhood in Jerusalem — despite a Ministry of Education directive to separate the sexes — the High Court of Justice has ruled.
The court issued over the weekend an “order nisi,” which obliges the Ministry and the principal of the school to explain within 15 days why they should not reverse their decision to separate the sexes at the request of parents who opposed the separation.
The separation order was issued at the end of the last school year, following the holding of a referendum among the parents. But the appellants argued that the decision was made as a result of growing radicalism within the national religious public, and of an unauthorized statement by the Parents Committee that many of the parents backed the separation.
The appellants argued that the referendum was conducted hastily, with only half of the parents receiving it. Moreover, the parents maintained, because the school has always had mixed education, any changes in its character required a vote by an absolute majority. A matter of such importance, said the parents, should be decided in a secret ballot, without the intervention of the Education Ministry or the school principal.
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