Is there discrimination against women? That depends on whom you ask.
Even though statistics show most of the Israeli public supports women retaining custody of the children after a divorce, more than half of Israelis believe women are discriminated against.
The 64% of Israelis who do not believe women are discriminated against are young religious men, with a high school education or less.
The new statistics are from the Safina Research and Development Center's survey for International Women's Day.
According to the survey, most of the Israeli public does not support the recent law proposals regarding divorce. Most of the respondents said if the couple does not agree on child custody, the woman should receive the children. This majority included more than half of the survey's male respondents.
In addition, none of those surveyed said they believe the father should be the one to raise the children. However, 70% of respondents believe that in the case of divorce, both parents need to be equally involved in raising their children, and only 25% believe the mother should raise the children alone.
Among religious respondents, 60% believed the mother should get sole custody if the parents could not agree on a shared custody arrangement, and 4% believed the father should receive custody of young children. Over half of the male respondents said the mother should have custody of children below the age of six years.
One third of the Israeli public believes the parents' income is the most important factor in determining how much child support should be paid by the father to the mother. Most of these respondents believe child support should be based more on the income of the paying party than of the custodial/ recipient party. The second most important factor, they believe, is how much it actually costs to raise the child. One third of respondents did not have an opinion on the matter.
Regarding the integration of women into combat units, 60% of respondents said they were in favor of the decision, and 25% said they were against it.
What motivated those against women in combat service?
The main reason respondents (48%) gave is that combat units' conditions are not appropriate for women. Closely following this were the belief that the physical conditions were too difficult for women (47%) and that the service itself may damage a woman's body (46%).
A full third of respondents said they prefer to integrate haredi soldiers into combat units instead of women, and only 8% said the reverse. Half of respondents did not prefer one sector over the other.
40% of respondents supported removing women from certain units in the army in order to ease the integration of haredim and encourage haredi men to enlist.
The IDF has insisted on increasing the number of mixed gender combat units, even lowering acceptance standards, despite research proving women in combat units are more prone to physical injuries and mixed units suffer reduced combat capability.