Israeli Standard 5568 is the legal and technical foundation for website accessibility in Israel. If you run a site that provides a service to the public, a shop, a restaurant, a clinic, a professional practice, this standard most likely applies to you. This guide explains, in plain language, what the standard requires, who it covers, and how to check whether your site meets it.
What Israeli Standard 5568 is
Israeli Standard 5568 ("web content accessibility") is an official standard of the Standards Institution of Israel, adopted as part of the Equal Rights for Persons with Disabilities Regulations. Instead of inventing a separate Israeli rulebook, the standard adopts the international WCAG 2.0 guidelines from the W3C, and defines level AA as the required conformance level.
The practical meaning: when people talk about "meeting Standard 5568," they are really talking about conforming to WCAG 2.0 AA.
Who the standard applies to
The standard applies broadly to sites that provide a service to the public. This includes, among others:
- E-commerce sites and online stores
- Sites of service providers such as doctors, lawyers, and consultants
- Sites of restaurants, cafes, and local businesses
- Government sites and public bodies
The four principles of accessibility
WCAG, and therefore Standard 5568, is built on four founding principles. An accessible site is one that is:
- Perceivable the information is presented in ways users can perceive (alternative text for images, sufficient color contrast, captions for video).
- Operable the site can be navigated and operated, including without a mouse, for example by keyboard alone.
- Understandable the content and operation are clear and predictable.
- Robust the content works with assistive technologies such as screen readers.
What level AA requires in practice
Level AA includes concrete requirements, for example:
- Color contrast of at least 4.5:1 between text and background
- The ability to enlarge text up to 200% without loss of content
- Full keyboard navigation
- Alternative text (alt) for every informative image
- A correct, hierarchical heading structure
How to check compliance
An accessibility audit combines automated tools with manual review. Automated tools detect some failures, but not all. Some requirements, such as the logic of the navigation order or the quality of the alternative text, require a human check.
Summary
Israeli Standard 5568 is not needless bureaucracy, it defines a clear standard that makes websites usable for the whole public, including people with disabilities. For a business owner, meeting the standard is both a legal obligation and an opportunity to widen the customer base. The first step is knowing where your site stands today.