ISRAEL: Activists Call For Canceling Tel Aviv Pride Over LGBT Tourism

[LebaneseDude 6,146]

Via Haaretz

In protest over the wide gap between the resources allocated to attract gay tourists to the country and the limited support for local LGBTQ organizations, members of Israel’s gay community are calling to cancel this year’s Tel Aviv Gay Pride Parade.

The call comes following the Tourism Ministry’s announcement this month that it would invest 11 million shekels (more than $2.9 million) in a campaign to attract tourists coming to Israel to participate in the parade. As part of the campaign, the ministry will set up an international competition whose winners will be flown to Israel in a plane specially painted in gay pride colors. State support for LGBTQ organizations, meanwhile, amounts to 1.5 million shekels a year.

The Tourism Ministry’s announcement caused outrage in the gay community. In a popular Facebook post, gay activist Netanel Azulay asked of the community to unite and announce that “it would not allow the government to profit at its expense and won’t allow the government to use it and lie to everyone that LGBTQ people have it good here.”

The Tel Aviv municipality, which organizes the parade, clarified that it will take place as scheduled on June 3, and will mark the empowerment of women in the LGBTQ community. The municipality estimated that 180,000 people will take part in the parade, among them 30,000 tourists.

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Basically Israeli activists are mad that the government is investing a lot in LGBT tourism while continuing to treat LGBT people as second-class citizens while failing to fund LGBT organizations and such.

[River 127,314]

Honestly, I was always against the pride in TLV because it never really screamed "give us rights" but was another party and another way to **** a hot tourist.. I always went to the prides in Be'er Sheva, Haifa and Jerusalem... all the homophobic cities..

It's their fault that they let it happen tbh and I told it to all my friends in the associations and now they are angry at me haha

 

[TiphEret 1,320]

I went to the pride in Tel Aviv a few years and it's true it's a huge party where many people that are not even LGBT come to have fun (and that's fine by me). This one teenager told me it's the biggest party for her after Purim! So I understand that for the organization it's seen as a more than a party and that the gvt is hypocrite by what it promotes and its real action towards LGBT.