7/18/23, 1:49 PM The Israeli Activist Leading a Women’s Movement Against the Judicial Overhaul and for Equal

ul and for Equal Rights - Israel News - Haaretz.com

The Israeli Activist Leading a Women’s

Movement Against the Judicial Overhaul
and for Equal Rights
Bonot Alternativa (Building an Alternative) has become the most visible
group at Israel's pro-democracy protests and is leading a national
women's strike this week. Moran Zer Katzenstein explains how a
movement she founded impulsively exploded onto the world stage

Allison Kaplan Sommer

Jul 17, 2023 Follow

Moran Zer Katzenstein would love to take credit for the stroke of
marketing genius that vaulted her organization to the forefront of
Israel’s pro-democracy protest movement.

After all, she founded Bonot Alternativa (Building an Alternative) at

the height of a successful career in marketing, including stints at
Coca-Cola and Google, and most recently as a senior director at the
gaming giant Playtika. However, the idea of protesting dressed as
handmaids – wearing the garb of the heroines of the Margaret
Atwood novel and television series “The Handmaid’s Tale” – was
the suggestion of another woman in the then-relatively small
collective.

Zer Katzenstein, 40, was still a busy full-time high-tech executive

and mother of three school-aged sons when the protests against
the Netanyahu government’s plans to weaken the judiciary began
in Tel Aviv last January. She ran her group with an open-minded,

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wide-ranging brain trust with shared responsibility for coming up

with new campaigns and executing them.

“I said that anyone could suggest an idea and if it follows our

values, the group member can take it and try to promote it,” she
recounts. “When a member – her name is Shira Dunevich – asked
if we should demonstrate with ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ costumes, I
have to admit I wasn’t even sure if it was such a good idea. But my
rule has been that I don’t stand in the way of any ideas. So I said it
was fine if there was anyone who wanted to execute it, and three
women volunteered to take it on.”

The enthusiastic volunteers bought some of the costumes in a party

store and feverishly sewed the rest. In the first protest to take place
in Jerusalem, 21 handmaids marched from the Supreme Court
building to the Knesset. Photos of them went viral, as did those of a
subsequent demonstration in which more than 100 women in
bonnets and cloaks circled the famous fountain in Tel Aviv’s
Dizengoff Square – creating a dramatic aerial image.

From there, the growth of the group has been nothing short of
explosive. The handmaids quickly became a regular feature at
protests across the country, representing new chapters of Bonot
Alternativa. Thousands more wear the group’s red T-shirts,
making a visual impact at every demonstration they attend.

100,000 women in 80 cities

The group was hardly the first to use the outfit as a form of protest.
They were inspired by handmaid demonstrators at the U.S.

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Supreme Court last year protesting the decision to overturn the

constitutional right to an abortion. Handmaids have also made
appearances at protests in Britain, Ireland, Italy and Argentina.

But the Israeli handmaids have shown up in the greatest numbers

and garnered the most attention in the international media and
across social media. This peaked when Atwood herself tweeted
about the phenomenon, pronouncing a video of the women –
marching precisely as they do in the Hulu television series –
“astonishing.”

The publicity has been rocket fuel for Bonot Alternativa. Just six
months ago, the group had an official membership of 400, which
“we thought was pretty nice for a women’s organization,” Zer
Katzenstein smiles. Today, their ranks include 100,000 women
across 80 Israeli cities. Most are able to mobilize at a moment’s
notice, participating in protests against the judicial overhaul and
other women’s issues – including a national women’s strike
planned for this Wednesday.

“It’s amazing. But it also feels like a massive ship that needs to
move really fast,” says Zer Katzenstein, who has since quit her job
and is working as a full-time volunteer trying to steer the vessel.

The group currently has only one paid employee, running almost
completely on volunteer energy. Aware that this won’t continue
indefinitely, the group is actively crowdfunding online and
soliciting support at the demonstrations. Zer Katzenstein also set
out for New York last week to “build relationships” and fundraise

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to help create an infrastructure that matches the movement’s

current size.

In a stroke of bad timing for her, the trip was scheduled precisely as
the protest movement reignited following the Netanyahu
government’s renewed efforts to push through the first of its
judicial “reforms.” She spoke to Haaretz by Zoom as she followed
events anxiously from abroad, concerned about increased
incidences of violence at the demonstrations, which peaked on last
week’s “day of disruption.”

She was worried because a founding principle of the group is not to

put its members in physical danger, so that women of all ages and
backgrounds would feel comfortable participating. By design, the
group does not participate in potentially dangerous civil
disobedience acts like blocking traffic.

While none of her organization’s members were physically harmed

last Tuesday, “in a way I feel responsible for every woman,” she
says. “For example, when we heard a woman was arrested who we
didn’t know, we got involved to see what we can do to get her freed
as fast as possible and not be left behind. There are tens of
thousands of women wearing our T-shirts now and we’ve seen a lot
of violence from cops against women, shoving them and throwing
them down.”

While in New York, she was invited to speak at a local protest in

front of the Israeli consulate – one of the many demonstrations
initiated by the Israeli expat community in the United States.

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“It was a case of being in a position where I could never imagine

life would take me: standing at a protest saying ‘Good evening, New
York.’ I felt like the Israelis abroad really want to do something –
they need to do something. And now I feel I understand them. I was
in New York and everything was happening in Tel Aviv. All you
want to do is grab a flag and go protest, but you are here – far away.
So for a day I realized what they were feeling and I understood how
frustrating it is. They really want to help and they are so engaged,
even from here. And it’s very emotional. These are very emotional
days for all of us.”

Unexpected journey

Zer Katzenstein’s unexpected journey began when she impulsively

founded the group following a shocking gang rape that took place
in the resort city of Eilat while she and her family were vacationing
there in August 2020. Although she had always advocated
informally for women, she had no background in political activism.

“I felt like I couldn’t just write another angry post on Facebook, so I

decided I would start this group of women to think about what we
can do” to protect women’s rights and promote their advancement.

The group began its activities with demonstrations across the

country protesting sexual violence and other forms of violence
against women, calling for government action. They drew 5,000
people at their largest protest in Tel Aviv. Zer Katzenstein chuckles
at the number, noting that 5,000 people was an impressive figure
at the time. Today, after seven months of mass demonstrations, the
proportions have changed.

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What distinguishes Bonot Alternativa from other groups, she says,

is that it has always aimed to be an avenue for “regular women” to
work together to fight for rights, equality and representation, and
to combat violence against women.

Having grown up in a modern Orthodox home, Zer Katzenstein was

particularly interested in creating a space in which religious
women would be comfortable cooperating with their secular
counterparts in advocating for rights and freedoms.

The group launched a campaign against the pay gap between men
and women, equality between male and female athletes and, in
their most high-profile effort until the handmaids, protested at a
Tel Aviv concert by the singer Eyal Golan – whose career has been
overshadowed by allegations of serious sexual misconduct.

At first, as a nonpartisan group that prided itself on drawing

women from the left and the right, she says she hesitated as to
whether Bonot Alternativa should be an official participant in the
pro-democracy demonstrations. But she soon realized that the
issue transcended any right-left divide. The turning point came
when Supreme Court President Esther Hayut delivered a
memorable speech in January, calling the overhaul a “mortal blow
to democracy.”

“I remember I stood there with my husband in the kitchen and he

told me: ‘You have to go into this. It’s something different,’” Zer
Katzenstein recalls.

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Even today, the group has not been focused on the judicial overhaul
to the exclusion of other issues. It has spoken out on the legislative
efforts of ruling coalition parties to reduce the presence of women
in the public domain, increase gender separation and has warned of
possible future measures to limit the right to abortion.

Bonot Alternativa’s 100,000 members are leading this Wednesday’s

national women’s strike with the message: “We cannot be erased
and excluded from the public sphere.” In a press statement, the
group noted that “the government of Israel is shackling women to
the Chief Rabbinate. The government of Israel voted against equal
representation for women on party slates for the Knesset. The
government of Israel voted in favor of dissolving the Authority for
the Advancement of the Status of Women. The Civil Service
Commission, under the auspices of the Israeli government, has
forbidden the publication of tenders using female-form language.
The government promotes legislation that will erase 51 percent of
the citizens in the country who are women.”

The group is also encouraging women to run in Israel’s municipal

elections this October, to generate greater female representation in
local leadership.

A message for American women

Zer Katzenstein is familiar with people pointing out the irony that
an organization dedicated to empowering women and encouraging
them to speak out is best known for the image of handmaids who
are oppressed and silenced in Atwood’s works.

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“It is a contradiction,” she nods. “My answer to such comments is

that we are not handmaids. And what happens in the series is that
regular women lose their rights – and it shows how it can happen
overnight. And so, we don’t do it because we think we are
handmaids. It’s because we want to issue a warning and wave a red
flag and say: ‘We will not agree to be handmaids and Israel will not
be Gilead.’ This is our message.”

In her conversations with women in the United States, Zer

Katzenstein says she hopes to do more than simply ask for money
and support. Her group’s experiences, she says, give her something
to offer American women, who have plenty of challenges to
contend with as well.

“It’s not like I’m coming here and showing them the Torah, but I
think there are a lot of things we can do. I think Bonot Alternativa’s
DNA can work everywhere. And it isn’t just about supporting
women’s rights: it’s about the power of women, as a group,
working together and working for one another. In Bonot
Alternativa, there’s no such thing as saying there isn’t anything
you can do about a given situation – because there is always
something you can do. And when women understand that, and they
realize that they have support, that someone has their back and
together they have each other’s back, they understand you can
really do things, move things and you can change things. That
realization is truly an ‘aha’ moment.”

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