Introduction

Several researchers in the field of family policy have noted the rapid changes in policy toward families in almost all welfare states in recent decades, adapting it to new family and employment patterns (see for example Kamerman and Moss, 2009; Ferragina and Seeleib-Kaiser, 2015; Naldini and Long, 2017). Israel, however, remains an outlier. Although Israeli family and, most notably, employment patterns have thoroughly changed, no less than elsewhere, family policy in general and leave policy specifically have undergone only minor changes. This chapter will examine the changes (and failed attempts to change) in leave policy in Israel between 2007 (when the provision of leave was the same as in 1954) and 2017, and which culminated in a largescale public protest, in order to understand why the rapid and massive changes in employment and familial patterns were not matched by changes in leave policy.

The chapter begins by providing, in broad brush strokes, some background on relevant features of Israeli society, before describing family policy in Israel in general and the evolution of leave policy in the years 1954–2007 as an element of this broader policy. Next, the chapter outlines three changes in leave policy that occurred between 2007 and 2016, leading to an analysis of the process of change in 2016–2017, which began with a Facebook protest and ended (for the time being, at least) in a policy change in March 2017.

A final point needs to be made about the scope of this chapter. Its focus is Israeli leave policy, which, in broad terms, covers the area held by Israel prior to 1967, plus inhabitants of eastern Jerusalem and the Golan Heights and Jewish inhabitants in the West Bank. Palestinian inhabitants of the West Bank and the Gaza strip have access to the leave policy of the Palestinian Authority, which is independent of the Israeli programme and is not included in this chapter.

Characteristics of Israeli society

Several characteristics of Israeli society are essential to understanding the development of its leave policy: familialism, increasing participation by women in the labour market, and the society's heterogeneity. Other relevant characteristics of Israeli society, in particular the effects of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and the neoliberalisation of Israeli economic and social policy, will be touched on in the course of the chapter.