Former Infrastructure Minister Joseph Paritzky has come under fire for the sexist comments he made about MK Ayelet Shaked (Habayit Hayehudi) ahead of her appointment as justice minister. "For the first time in Israel we will have a justice minister who can be featured on the calendar at the car repair shop," Paritzky wrote on his Facebook page on Wednesday. The final phase of the coalition building process was especially intense this week after it became clear that Habayit Hayehudi was demanding the justice portfolio. Ultimately, following around-the-clock negotiations aimed at meeting a legal deadline, Shaked managed to secure the position of justice minister. At 39, Shaked will be one of the youngest people to hold the position of justice minister. Paritzky was elected to the Knesset some 10 years ago, as a member of the now-defunct Shinui party. The party campaigned as the champion of secular Israelis and was constantly at loggerheads with the religious parties over the role of religion in Israeli life. On Thursday he once again took to Facebook to attack Shaked, alleging that she was "fascist, anti-democratic and an opponent of gay rights." Meretz Chairwoman MK Zehava Galon attacked Paritzky on Thursday. "Shaked's views are diametrically opposed to mine, but the reaction to her appointment as justice minister has crossed all political lines, because of the chauvinism we have witnessed," she told a local radio station in southern Israel. Paritzky responded to the criticism on the same station, saying, "Shaked's picture appears in magazines on a daily basis. It's not as if she has never posed for the camera as a would-be supermodel to show how pretty she was; and she is very pretty indeed -- just like many of the women in the Third Reich."
