Editing El Al (section)

===Treatment of female passengers===
In September 2014, it was reported that there have been repeated incidents where some ultra-Orthodox male passengers refused to sit next to female passengers, sometimes delaying flights. As a result, a petition was initiated with [[Change.org]] to pressure El Al to alter their policy of allowing ultra-Orthodox passengers on flights to negotiate switching seats. The petition reads: "Why does El Al Airlines permit female passengers to be bullied, harassed, and intimidated into switching seats which they rightfully paid for and were assigned to by El Al Airlines? One person's religious rights do not trump another person's civil rights."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/.premium-1.618140|title=Petition asks El Al to get tough on ultra-Orthodox "bullying and harassing" of female passengers|date=29 September 2014|work=Haaretz.com|access-date=24 April 2015}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Sullivan |first=Gail |date=26 September 2014 |title=Ultra-Orthodox Jews delay El Al flight, refusing to sit near women |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/09/26/ultra-orthodox-jews-delay-el-al-flight-refusing-to-sit-near-women/ |access-date=24 April 2015 |newspaper=The Washington Post |issn=0190-8286}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://nypost.com/2014/09/26/ultra-orthodox-jews-delay-flight-refuse-to-sit-next-to-women/|title=Ultra-Orthodox Jews refuse to sit next to women, delay flight|work=New York Post|date=26 September 2014|access-date=24 April 2015}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |last=Sherwood |first=Harriet |date=2014-09-30 |title=Israeli airline urged to stop 'bullying' of women by ultra-orthodox passengers |language=en-GB |work=[[The Guardian]] |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/30/israeli-airline-ultra-orthodox-men-bullying-women |access-date=2023-09-25 |issn=0261-3077}}</ref>

Following the incidents, Iris Richman, founder of Jewish Voices Together, a group created to address issues of religious pluralism in Israel and the U.S., encouraged passengers to protest this behavior through the US government, referencing "49 U.S. Code § 40127 – Prohibitions on discrimination: Persons in Air Transportation". According to this directive, she wrote, "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." Richman contacted the U.S. Department of Transportation, Aviation Consumer Protection Division, and stated the department "is willing to investigate any situation where any employee of a carrier – i. e., a [[Flight attendant|steward/ess]] – participated in asking someone to change a seat because of their gender".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jewish-world-news/.premium-1.618630|title=El Al "gender discrimination" may violate U.S. law, claims N.Y. activist rabbi|date=1 October 2014|newspaper=Haaretz|access-date=24 April 2015}}</ref>

In November 2014, Tova Ross, in ''[[The Forward]]'',<ref>{{cite web|url=http://forward.com/about-us/?attribution=home-footer-links|title=About Us|website=The Forward|access-date=2016-06-16}}</ref> disagreed that this is discrimination against women. She wrote, "... If we [women] want the right to pray and practice and dress in the ways we see fit, why do we cast such caustic aspersions on the premise of a man who calmly asks to change his seat in order for him not to stray from his preferred religious outlook?" ... "A favor for a fellow human being, no matter how archaic we may deem his beliefs. We are indulging a request that we may neither understand nor agree with, but if it doesn't really put us out, if the flight isn't full, and there is in fact someone who will easily volunteer to switch seats, then what is everyone's colossal problem with the mere premise?"<ref>{{cite web|url=http://forward.com/sisterhood/208468/dont-judge-hasidic-seat-switchers/|title=Don't Judge Hasidic Seat-Switchers|website=The Forward|date=4 November 2014 |access-date=2016-06-16}}</ref>

El Al said that it would not put a policy in place to handle situations where male Haredim refuse to sit next to female passengers, but would instead attempt to satisfy passengers involved in such incidents on a case-by-case basis.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.haaretz.com/news/national/.premium-1.618517|title=El Al won't put in place policy on ultra-Orthodox men who refuse to sit by women|date=30 September 2014|newspaper=Haaretz|access-date=24 April 2015}}</ref>

In February 2016, [[Renee Rabinowitz]] filed a successful lawsuit against El Al, after being involved in an incident where an ultra-Orthodox man refused to sit next to her on a flight from [[Newark International Airport]] to Tel Aviv and the flight attendants asked her to move seats.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/27/world/middleeast/woman-81-to-sue-israeli-airline-over-seat-switch.html|title=She Was Asked to Switch Seats. Now She's Charging El Al With Sexism.|newspaper=The New York Times|date=27 February 2016|access-date=1 March 2016}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|url=http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4771534,00.html|title 	=El Al lawsuit could set gender discrimination precedent|publisher=Y Net News|date=27 February 2016}}</ref> Later in 2018, the airline decided to immediately remove any passengers who refuse to sit next to a woman.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/el-al-faces-boycott-after-moving-women-ultra-orthodox-jewish-n886521|title=Israeli airline to remove passengers who refuse to sit next to women|work=NBC News|access-date=2018-06-27|language=en-US}}</ref>