How businesses can support social change: The LGBT+ strike in Israel

Over the weekend, Israel came to a standstill. Businesses closed, planes were delayed, highways and roads were taken over. The LGBT+ community stood together as one and defiantly refused for their rights to be taken away.

Last week, conservative Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu walked back a promise he made to the LGBT+ community to support legislation that would allow access to surrogacy for same-sex couples. Under apparent pressure from Orthodox Jewish coalition partners he changed his mind at the last moment and voted against the legislation. In response, hundreds of gay men and women took to the streets on Thursday demanding they have the right to start a family. The outrage snowballed as gay men and women, and straight alleys, expressed their disbelief and anger.

Eyal Lurie Pardes, a protester draped in a rainbow flag, chanted: “We will not remain silent!”

“Look me in the eyes and tell me I don’t deserve to be a father!” he said.

Former Israeli lawmaker Nitzan Horowitz explained, “Although Israel has a very liberal image concerning gays it’s not the case when you look at the Israeli law.”

The protests grew, and on Sunday (a working day for Israel), businesses threw their support behind the community as more and more LGBT+ people called in sick so they could take to the streets. Many of the country’s largest corporations told their employees they would not penalised if they took the day off to protest. Companies such as Bezeq, Cellcom and Motorola; pharmaceutical giant Teva; TV providers Yes and HOT; Facebook Israel; credit card companies such as Leumi Card and Isracard; pharmacy company Super-Pharm; Clal Insurance; airlines El Al and Israir; construction engineering company Electra; supermarket chain Sufersal and many others.

"What started out as 800 angry Israelis on Thursday snowballed into a mass strike of LGBT+ workers across the entire country by Sunday."

Even the Ichilov Hospital at the Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Centre allowed non-essential employees to join the protests.

"In light of the requests from gay member of our staff and in solidarity with the community's struggle for equal rights, the hospital will allow its employees, who wish to participate in Sunday’s demonstrations, to be absent from work,” said the official statement. "The management of the medical centre will ensure that the patients are not affected on that day."

"I thank the management for cooperating and on Sunday I will not go to work,” said Dr. Roy Zucker, a doctor at the hospital's Infectious Diseases Unit. “Doctors provide services to citizens on a daily basis … and all we ask for is to have basic rights—the ability to raise children, get married and other issues that haven’t been on the agenda until now."

What started out as 800 angry Israelis on Thursday snowballed into a mass strike of LGBT+ workers across the entire country by Sunday.

60,000 people took to the streets in Tel Aviv alone. The Ayalon Highway was shut down – one of the busiest highways in the city. Israel Airports Authority issued a statement about delayed and even cancelled flights.

Chen Arieli, chairwoman of the LGBT Association and one of initiators of the strike, noted the momentous importance of the event: "It was a historic day that signals what’s in the future… We will not rest this weekend, this is the first time that the LGBT community in Israel says no—no to discrimination, no to violence, no to legislation aimed against us, no to ignoring our rights.”

Others pointed out the brazen hypocrisy of the government – which was all too happy to take in revenue from the hugely successful Tel Aviv Pride, but still refused to grant its own LGBT+ citizens basic human rights. Elad Nahshon, who was awarded the medal of honour by the president of Israel for his service in the IDF said: "I do not intend on paying hundreds of thousands of shekels for a surrogacy procedure abroad at the expense of savings for the future, and why am I denied the basic rights in my country? The country benefits from LGBT tourism with millions of dollars in revenue and it should fully support the community that put Tel Aviv on the map as a preferred LGBT tourism destination like Berlin and Madrid.”

Some companies have taken it a step further and offered to pay for Israelis wishing to undergo surrogacy. Microsoft’s Israeli R&D Centre said: “The current text of the surrogacy law excludes the LGBT community and denies them the basic human right to establish a family.

“This is a regrettable and unequal law. Starting today, every one of our workers who decides to set up a family using surrogacy will receive NIS 60,000 irrespective of gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, age, or marital status. Everyone!”

Following the strike, Israel’s Prime Minister has said he was only trying to ensure the main legislation – which specified single mothers – would pass. He has suggested he might support separate legislation that would boost LGBT+ rights regarding surrogacy.

How effective the strike was in terms of bringing about rights for the LGBT+ community will be seen in the coming months, but the message of the event was strong: the LGBT+ community has significant economic power to leverage social change, and businesses have the ability to facilitate that power.

"The LGBT+ community has significant economic power to leverage social change, and businesses have the ability to facilitate that power."

Companies like Microsoft, which were instrumental in the Israel strike, have offices all over the world, in places that have archaic and cruel laws regarding LGBT+ people. Can you imagine what would it be like if Microsoft encouraged their workers in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia to strike for LGBT+ rights? Or in Dubai? Or Mumbai? Or Moscow?

The LGBT+ community has come a long way since Stonewall. According to LGBT Capital our estimated household worth is $16 trillion globally, with more than $5 trillion in the US alone. While the spending power of the LGBT+ consumer segment is $3.5 trillion p.a. globally.

We make up a sizeable portion of the economy and with that we have sizeable power. Businesses across the globe are invested in us as employees and as consumers and they can help us bring about desperately needed social change. Whether by putting pressure on governments, facilitating strikes, or incorporating LGBT+ people into their healthcare. What happened in Israel proved the collective power of the professional LGBT+ community, and the change companies can help bring.

By Tim Gibson

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