ISRAEL: But what about Crocs?

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Israel’s parliament opened its winter session today and lawmakers were thrown quickly into debate over the hot-button issue of . . . jeans.

A new dress code imposed by Speaker Dalia Itzik to improve the image of the legislature, or Knesset, came under fire after an aide to another lawmaker, Shelly Yacimovich, was denied entry for wearing jeans.

Yacimovich, a former journalist and member of the left-leaning Labor Party, mocked Itzik’s initiative, saying that “dealing with the material from which one’s pants are made is a rather negligible matter.”

“The honor of this Knesset will not be established by new carpets or flower arrangements,” Yacimovich said. “Perhaps the Knesset speaker would be better off occupying herself with more profound matters.”

Israelis are defiantly informal. Jeans and sandals are common in the workplace, including government offices, and neckties rare except at official functions. Itzik, a stylish dresser with a spiky coif, has been among those arguing that a dress code would lend the often-raucous Knesset a more dignified air.

But this is Israel, and the restrictions seem relaxed by Western standards. A Knesset statement warned journalists they’d be banned if they wore “unbecoming attire,” such as tank tops, shorts, jeans “and — for women — short T-shirts that expose the midriff.”

— Ken Ellingwood in Jerusalem