Dispute Rages Over Awarding of Prize to a Top 10 ‘Big Mouth’

To her supporters, Shulamit Aloni is a hard-charging, acid-tongued feminist crusader who has campaigned for decades in behalf of civil rights and her leftist, secular vision of Israel.

To her critics, Aloni is evil incarnate.

And so a decision to grant her Israel’s most prestigious award has infuriated the right-wing politicians and religious leaders who are the richest recipients of Aloni’s scathing, pointed criticisms.

The National Religious Party, a member of the governing coalition, went so far as to petition the Supreme Court to yank the Israel Prize given to Aloni in late February for lifetime achievement. The court last week rejected the demand.

“Giving Shulamit Aloni a prize for life achievement rewards her for a career of causing disputes and hurting Jewish values,” said Shaul Yahalom, a National Religious Party legislator.

But the independent committee that bestows the coveted award cited Aloni’s “strong heart and clear voice” in fighting for respect and equality.

At 71, Aloni is retired from formal politics, but she remains one of Israel’s most colorful and controversial figures. Dubbed the spiritual mother of the Israeli left, she does not hesitate to offend and provoke. The liberal Haaretz newspaper last year voted her one of the Top 10 “biggest mouths” in Israel. Writer Zeev Chafets this week said Aloni would make a good candidate for president--”if the president’s role is to incite civil war.”

“I didn’t work for 40 years to get a prize,” Aloni said this week in her raspy, world-weary voice, dismissing the efforts of her critics. “I was doing what I thought was right. If I wanted everybody to love me, I would have done nothing.”

Long before it was a notion accepted by most Israelis, Aloni advocated independence for the Palestinians and the exchange of land for peace. She was an early fierce critic of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and she called for a compromise on Jerusalem, a city disputed by Israelis and Palestinians.

Through the years, she has especially outraged the religious establishment by fervently promoting secular over Jewish law. She campaigned unsuccessfully to remove rabbinical control over marriages and allow civil weddings. She protested kosher dietary laws and urged an end to bans on public transportation during the Sabbath.

She once compared right-wing leader Benjamin Netanyahu, a former prime minister, to Italian dictator Benito Mussolini, and branded settlers in the West Bank and Gaza Strip as “Jewish terrorists.” Religious party members of parliament she called “fundamentalists.”

When she made many of her blistering comments, Aloni was not a gadfly activist but a member of the government, where she held positions as minister of education, culture and communications.

In fact, she was in the eye of the storm that nearly swamped the government of late Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. As Rabin’s education minister in 1993, Aloni tried to reduce the influence of ultra-Orthodox Judaism in school curricula. Incensed, the ultra-Orthodox Shas Party, which was part of Rabin’s government, threatened to quit just as Rabin needed stability to finish peace negotiations with the Palestinians.

A compromise was reached in which Aloni left the Education Ministry and took a lesser government post.

Aloni’s religious critics have labeled her a Jezebel who is a threat to the Jewish nature of Israeli society. But she sees her work as a struggle to make Israel a free, secular democratic state.

A lawyer by training, she introduced the concept of consumer rights and free legal aid. She helped build a leftist political bloc that has held seats in the Knesset, or parliament, since the early 1970s. She performs “alternative” wedding ceremonies to challenge the rabbis.

Aloni, easily recognizable by her head of Orphan Annie blond curls, said she is still disturbed by what she sees as the undue influence wielded by the religious right. But she is encouraged by a growing awareness among Israelis about their rights and the freedoms they deserve.

“I’m very unhappy with what’s going on in the country, but I’m optimistic about the natural vitality of the people,” she said. “There is a disconnect between the people and the government, which is manipulated by a minority of greedy religious parties.

“If you look at the government and the legislature,” she added, “it is all very backward. But if you look at what the public feels and demands, it is very positive, and I am optimistic.”