The 18th annual Gay Pride Parade in Tel Aviv on Friday was expected, as it always does, to draw thousands of Israelis and a large number of guests from abroad to march in the colorful parade and express this minority group's mixed feelings: pride over the community's achievements mixed with frustration over the discrimination still inherent in today's laws (on issues such as surrogacy, same-sex marriage, etc.) and a demand to honor every person's right to choose whom to love. The parade was sponsored by the Tel Aviv Municipality and Mayor Ron Huldai. Along the streets of this tolerant, multi-cultural city, Israeli flags waved alongside Gay Pride flags. This parade is a symbol of a true social revolution. It is the trademark of modern liberalism. The first step toward this revolution was the 1988 revocation of the law forbidding homosexual intercourse in Israel. The Knesset then decided to revoke Article 351 of the penal code, which had made consensual sex between two men a crime carrying a 10-year sentence. But, oddly, if you peruse both the government-sponsored and the private bills submitted that year, or the minutes of the Knesset meetings around that time, you will not find any mention of anything like that ever happening. How is that possible? In 1951, then Attorney General Haim Cohen issued a directive not to implement Article 351, explaining that it was his duty not to honor an immoral law. But the criminal prohibition, alongside the hefty sentence it carried, still remained like a stain in the law books. This was not the case in the U.K. or the U.S. In the 1960s and 1970s, homosexuals there were hunted by both the police and the legal system with an intensity that is difficult to fathom. When my wife and I arrived in London at the end of the 1950s, such a hunt was underway and the suspects who were rounded up were thrown in jail, and some even committed suicide. Alan Turing, the English computer genius whose profound contribution led to cracking the Nazi code during World War II, was tried for having consensual, private intercourse with another man. He was faced with a choice: prison or chemical castration. Shortly thereafter he took his own life, a victim of legal madness. Israel never took part in such oppression, with the exception of the military, which viewed homosexuality as a security risk. Ultimately, however, Yitzhak Rabin did away with discrimination against homosexuals in the military. Still, this shameful law was nothing less than an outrage, and there was always a concern that a subsequent attorney general would dust Article 351 off and infuse new life into it, putting homosexual suspects on trial. This article encouraged contempt and homophobia toward people with a different sexual orientation, who were often described as "perverts." Removing this article from the penal code was imperative; it should never have been there in the first place. The turning point came at the end of 1986, when the Justice Ministry wanted to institute reforms on rape-related crimes. A bill was submitted to amend the penal code. The bill was approved in its first reading on Sept. 11, 1986. It was then handed over to the Knesset Constitution, Law and Justice Committee for further approval. I was a member of the committee at the time. Amid discussions of the bill, I realized that it was a perfect time to revoke Article 351, which I, too, believed to be immoral. All my previous efforts to revoke the law through the Justice Ministry had failed. I spoke to my colleagues Shulamit Aloni, Mordechai Virshuvski and David Libai about my idea, and of course they gave me their warmest support. I approached the committee chairman, Uriel Lynn, and suggested tacking Article 351 onto the rape bill. Lynn, a liberal man by all accounts, immediately agreed. In those days, the members of the committee did not think of themselves as being bound by coalition discipline. The majority of the committee members, from both the Left and the Right, were in favor of revoking the law, but the ultra-Orthodox members voiced their opposition. National Religious Party MK Avner Shaki vehemently opposed revoking the article, citing "Jewish morality" as his justification. Since Shaki found himself in the absolute minority on the issue, he submitted a document expressing his reservations, with the sole aim of passing the bill without the clause pertaining to revocation of Article 351. On the day of the vote, for some reason, Shaki did not show up at the Knesset plenum to present his reservations. The committee's proposal to revoke the article won overwhelming support, with only the religious and ultra-Orthodox MKs voting against it. Lynn says that it was clear to everyone involved that the committee would not leave the article in the books. Formally, the amendment was inserted in a last minute, roundabout way. But when it came to substance, everyone knew and wanted the reform. Aloni even spoke about it expressly. Thus, in a roundabout but intentional fashion, the article prohibiting homosexual intercourse was revoked, and the rest is history. There is an important lesson to be learned from this reform: The Knesset was largely in favor of liberal reform. There was also an overwhelming majority in favor of an amended human rights bill that I copied from a bill submitted by Dan Meridor, then the justice minister, which was initially quashed by religious ministers in the Ministerial Committee for Legislation. In its preliminary reading, this far-reaching bill, submitted in 1989, was supported by a large majority of MKs from both the Left and the Right. Only the religious, ultra-Orthodox camp voted against it. Passage of the bill was made possible after then-Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir complied with my and Meridor's request and withdrew the demand for coalition discipline. The MKs united behind human rights, regardless of party affiliation, because without coalition discipline they were free to vote what their hearts instructed them to vote without fear that their votes would harm the coalition. These two instances prove one thing: The existing political coalition system is preventing the Knesset from passing liberal initiatives. This system gives the religious and ultra-Orthodox parties almost absolute veto power that can override the wishes of almost the entire Knesset. If it weren't for the roundabout, incidental insertion of the amendment to Article 351, the prohibition, first introduced in Mandatory Palestine, would still be on the books to this day. These days, it is highly unlikely that the Knesset would ever be able to revoke such a law. All this is history, but there is a lesson for the future about the character of the State of Israel. Prof. Amnon Rubinstein is a former education minister and MK and an Israel Prize laureate.
