A girl can leave (work at a club) whenever she wants."Īgam insisted she would rather work in a club with rules and staff who provide protection rather than dance for men at private homes "without any control on who we meet".Eric Sanders, a retired New York City Police Officer, is a civil rights attorney who is suing New York City and the NYPD in state Supreme Court alleging the city unlawfully targeted and closed Sin City, a Bronx strip club. Some wore cat masks at the demonstration in Tel Aviv to demand the bars reopen. Not everyone, however, thinks Segev's achievement was positive.Īgam, a dancer with jet black hair who asked that her last name be withheld, was among a group of women who joined a protest in February against the club closures. "We didn't close all the strip clubs in Israel and prostitution still exists," he said.īut converting a symbol like the Pussycat into an NGO hub could be a catalyst for broader social change. "We are not naive to think that those phenomenon (of prostitution and sexual exploitation) are going to disappear from the face of the Earth," he said. That was a victory for activists like Segev, who argued the Pussycat's transformation into a venue for social change "gives people a lot of hope". Some sought permits to reopen, vowing to prohibit lap dances and private rooms, but those plans have been placed on hold by the pandemic. The stage was the business card for the private room," she said.Īfter the Pussycat closed, several other Tel Aviv clubs followed suit.
"If there is no private room, the girls will not dance on the stage. The demise of Tel Aviv's strip clubs was accelerated in 2018 when Israel's parliament, the Knesset, passed a law banning brothels.īut the final straw came in April last year when the public prosecutor issued a directive to clamp down on lap dances, arguing they could in some cases be viewed as prostitution.Ī former strip club employee, who requested anonymity, said lap dances were an essential part of a stripper's income, offering them a chance to earn substantial tips.
"It was the same story in all the clubs."
When women "took the key for the private room, the receptionist would give them a condom", she said.
SIN CITY STRIP CLUB TV
The lounge "welcomed TV stars and army generals", according to Segev's audio tour.Īctivists insist the lounge was nothing but a brothel.Īyelet Dayan of Israel's task force against human trafficking, said private lounges at Tel Aviv clubs were all venues for illegal prostitution. VIPs who wanted to avoid being spotted could use a discreet staircase connecting a basement parking lot straight to the private lounge. Segev now offers audio tours of the site telling the club's story, which he said raises awareness about sexual exploitation.ĭuring a tour in February, before Israel went into coronavirus lockdown, an area once inhabited by pole dancers hosted a support group for young mothers working in high-tech, as their babies were parked nearby.Īnd right next to what was the "private lounge", Eritrean refugees were learning the basics of Israeli cuisine.įor strip club aficionados, the Pussycat had several classic features: pleather chairs, small booths for lap dances and a mirrored cloakroom. "They gave up millions of shekels every year in order to get the club out and us in," Segev told AFP, calling the decision "truly admirable". When a real estate company bought the site that hosted the Pussycat last year, Segev convinced the firm to allow the space to be converted at least temporarily into a hub for social activism.
SIN CITY STRIP CLUB SERIES
The Pussycat, which faced a series of legal challenges over alleged prostitution, "couldn't be fixed", Segev told AFP. The transformation of the Pussycat was the work of activist Yakir Segev, a former member of Jerusalem's city council and business executive now devoted to social causes. That was a victory for some anti-prostitution campaigners, while others insisted that properly managed strip clubs allowed women to make good money in a safe environment. The club's demise was partly sealed by legal changes cracking down on alleged prostitution, developments which forced the closure of all of Tel Aviv's strip joints.
Now, the eye-catching round mirrored building near the beach that hosted the club since it was founded in 2000 has been converted into a centre for social activism, opening its doors to community programmes. Tel Aviv's Pussycat used to bill itself as the premier strip club in the Middle East, allegedly popular among Israeli TV stars and military brass for its notorious private lounge.īefore its closure last year, the Pussycat was a magnet for hedonists in the Mediterranean commercial hub sometimes dubbed Israel's "Sin City" and known for beachside cocktails and hipster bars.
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