Israel's defence minister Wednesday demanded a rabbi heading an institute that prepares young Jews for their military service resign after he made offensive comments about women in the army.
"I demand your resignation. If not, I will have to cancel the recognition of the institute as a pre-military institute," Avigdor Lieberman wrote to rabbi Yigal Levinstein in a letter released by his ministry.
The Bnei David institute, which says it prepares young Jews spiritually for their compulsory military service, responded that it would not interfere in the "freedom of expression of our rabbis and students".
Levinstein caused public outrage after he criticised women being part of the army in comments reported by the media last week on International Women's Day.
He said Jewish women who joined the army left "no longer Jewish", and asked "who would accept to marry" a woman who had served in the armed forces.
Lieberman said Wednesday the rabbi's comments had "insulted soldiers, including the women who fell on the front". 
His institute, which is based in the Jewish settlement of Ely in the occupied West Bank, says it aims to train a religious elite within the army.
Military service -- two years and eight months for men and two years for women -- is compulsory for most Jewish Israelis.
According to an army spokesman, 2,200 practising Jewish women serve in the army compared to just 937 in 2010.
The Israeli infantry includes three mixed-gender battalions.
A minority of conservative rabbis who belong to the religious nationalist movement believe women should not do their military service as unrelated men and women should not mix.
The same rabbi last year caused an uproar when he described homosexuals as "perverts".

Source:  AFP