An effort continues to build which calls out EL AL Israel Airlines for allegedly harassing or allowing the harassment of female passengers to change seats on flights. —
“Stop the bullying, intimidation, and discrimination against women on your flights!” states the Petition on change.org.
The movement is seeking other passengers who have witnessed gender discrimination due to the refusal of Haredi Orthodox Jews to seat themselves next to women, regardless of the assigned seating prior to boarding.
The main trigger for this latest trigger to action seems to stem from a recent EL AL Airlines flight from New York to Tel Aviv, as reported by numerous media outlets including Huff Post. In general, passengers reported that the flight was first delayed by Haredi Orthodox Jews refusing to sit next to women, offering them compensation to move seats, and later taking to standing in the aisles for the majority of the flight in lieu of sitting next to the women.
Those calling out EL AL Airlines for allowing gender discrimination against women are pointing to U.S. federal law to back the prohibition of such behavior.
49 U.S. Code § 40127(a) Persons in Air Transportation.— An air carrier or foreign air carrier may not subject a person in air transportation to discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, religion, sex, or ancestry.
Solution?
Would select gender-segregated rows or seats be a possible solution to this problem?
(Where would they be? Extra cost allowed?)
How should an airline balance a passenger’s religious accommodations with other passengers’ rights from gender (or other) discrimination?
More information:
Jewish Voices Together Facebook Page
Petition
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@travelblawg
facebook.com/travelblawg
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I don’t see this as a religious vs civil rights issue. It is purely economic. When one books and pays for a particular seat on an airline, they have a right to that seat unless there is a safety concern, e.g. aisle seats. If they are asked to move for any reason, they can choose to accommodate another passenger or not. To delay a flight so passengers can engage in musical chairs is unacceptable. To allow passengers to intimidate others for their own satisfaction is unacceptable. Solution? If one needs to ensure they are not seated next to some particular… Read more »
The Haredi should charter planes or start their own airline. If El Al caves to instituting separate sections, hypothetically, what happens when the main mixed cabin is full and the only seats left for a family of six, four of them women, traveling last-minute on bereavement fares, are in the men-only rows. Crazy scenario, but it could happen!