Israel Expands Surrogacy Rights to LGBTQ Parents
Policy follows through on Supreme Court ruling issued last year
BY MATT TRACY
In accordance with a Supreme
Court decision last
year, Israel’s health minister
announced that LGBTQ
parents in the nation will be allowed
to have children through
surrogacy.
“Full equality. That is the simple
demand and it is the goal of the
LGBT struggle, the long struggle
of my community,” Israel’s out gay
Health Minister Nitzan Horowitz
said, according to the Associated
Press. “Equality before the law and
equality of parenthood.”
The law paves the way for queer
couples, single fathers, and transgender
folks to have kids through
surrogacy, which is when an individual
carries a baby for a couple
or individual who cannot birth
kids of their own. The implementation
of the new policy, which takes
Israel Minister of Health Nitzan Horowitz (left) announced that surrogacy rights would be extended to
queer prospective parents.
effect January 11, marks the conclusion
of a legal process that unfolded
over the course of the last
two years. In 2020, the nation’s
Supreme Court ruled that a surrogacy
EMMANUEL DUNAND/POOL VIA REUTERS
law in Israel discriminated
against gay couples because it allowed
single women to utilize surrogacy
but not queer couples.
Israel’s Supreme Court then
FAMILIES
directed lawmakers to come up
with new legislation without the
discriminatory provision, but that
never came to fruition. In July of
2021, the Supreme Court stepped
in and declared that the law, in
six months, would expand to allow
LGBTQ couples.
Surrogacy laws vary around the
world — including on the issue
of whether foreigners can utilize
surrogacy services. In the United
Kingdom (UK), for example, surrogacy
is legal — including for LGBTQ
couples — but the law lacks
enforcement of agreements and
bans third parties from setting
up profi table surrogacy arrangements,
according to NGA Law, a
UK law fi rm specializing in surrogacy.
Germany bans all surrogacy
agreements, while Canada
only allows surrogacy when the
surrogate is not paid for carrying
the baby.
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