|
Dana Pleads Not Guilty
She may be the toast of Europe, but the Israeli t* singing sensation's "toast" to 2 cafe waitresses led to assault and disorderly conduct charges
June 9, 1998
Israeli transsexual Dana International, who last month won the 25-nation Eurovision Song Contest, on June 9 entered a plea of not guilty to assault and disorderly conduct charges in a magistrate's court in Rehovot, near Tel-Aviv. Both charges stemmed from a November 1995 performance in a cafe, where it's alleged the singer pushed one waitress and threw a bottle of water at another. The next hearing in the case will be in January 1999.
Dana's Eurovision-winning song "Diva" is being released in Britain today. In Israel, rather than rushing to release an album of new cuts to ride the Eurovision p-r wave, Dana is issuing a greatest-hits compilation called "Ha'osef" ("The Collection"). Rather than displaying her versatility of performance in various languages and genres, it's just plain fun dance music from "Diva" through "100% Gever" ("100% Man").
And speaking of "100% Man," Rabbi Eliyahu Abergel reportedly said June 5 that Dana can pray with the all-male minyans of Orthodox Jewry, on the grounds that to be born a male is to be a man for life. What Dana's reaction to this judgment was, we have not yet heard.
NewsPlanet
|
