Editor –
Joel Katz
*Special edition
on Women of the Wall & Anat Hoffman's arrest coming soon
Yoni, a local resident recently returned from reserve duty,
gave a ride to a “Yerushalmi” Jew from the hassidic enclave of Ramat Beit
Shemesh Bet and was shocked to hear that his passenger did not even not know
that his country was at war.
“Vos?” he asked Yoni in Yiddish.
“We are at war?” There are those among the Israeli-born
haredim who do not listen to the radio, read newspapers or own a television.
Young
Americans who served in the IDF but live in the States are arriving in Israel
to join their combat units.
Twenty-four-year
old Shmulik Lazaroff, one of 11 children in his family, grew up in Houston,
Texas, where his parents serve as Chabad emissaries. Five years ago, he
immigrated to Israel and began rabbinical school studies. Soon, he was drafted
into an infantry unit, and got to know Aud and others at the Michael Levine
Center.
“The Lubavitch
rebbe said that 'whoever serves in the IDF gets his place reserved in the world
to come.'” And he definitely wants to serve. “God willing. I will return to my
unit,” he says.
Shalom Lakein, 21,
from Brooklyn, was having the same thoughts. Lakein is also a Chabadnik, and
one of six brothers, three of whom have served in the Israeli army. Lakein, who
served in Golani, was released from the army four months ago. Now he wants back
in.
Amid all the
Facebook posts about the heart-rending violence taking place at this moment in
Israel and Gaza, this
photo of a bomb shelter door in Ashdod leapt
out. It says that the bomb shelter is only for men and boys.
New
immigrants from Ethiopia get a severe reality check mere days after their
arrival in Israel as bombs fall around their absorption center. Despite the
shock, they're adapting quickly and looking to pitch in.
Chief Rabbi Amar: “Just like the People of Israel did not
travel while the pillar of cloud was in the encampment and rested above the
Tabernacle, so too today the People of Israel feel safe because of your
presence here, and will not wander or escape while you are guard the people
dwelling in Zion.”
By
Rabbi Michael Boyden
The
writer is director of the Rabbinical Court of the Israel Council of Progressive
Rabbis
My
own experience on the municipal front in Israel is that there is nothing like
concerted pressure from our friends in North American when it comes to forcing
city officials to respect the rights and needs of all religious streams.
In an entirely different context, the European Central Bank has
forced the Greek government to take unpalatable steps to bring about economic
reforms as the price for a bailout. Is it too much to hope that North American
Jewry will employ similar tactics when it comes to coercing Israel to live up
to the ideals upon which it was founded?
By Rabbi Naftali Rothenberg
The writer is the rabbi of Har Adar and a senior
research fellow at the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute
In an era characterized by an endless
variety of modern and haredi Orthodox communities, do the wars against Reform
Jews mean anything? Is it
possible that inciting statements are made in order to serve the battle between
Orthodox groups for internal needs of de-legitimization?
In this era of empowerment, is it not time for Orthodoxy to
forsake the expressions of weakness which it was characterized by up to 40 or
50 years ago, and stop responding out of unjustified fear?
The Orthodox activists' struggle against Reform Jews' right to be
recognized by the State is wrong or hypocritical, or both. It also contradicts
Israel's essence as the Jewish nation state and a democratic state, which must
make room for all factions, communities and streams.
"I've
learned that there are 50 shades of black," Anat Hoffman said, speaking of
her attempts to assert her religious rights with Jerusalem's ultra-Orthodox
religious establishment. "Most ultra-Orthodox can tolerate a group of
women praying once a month at the Kotel. If you can't, don't come between 7 and
8 in the morning 11 times a year."
Like
Hoffman, Rabbi Uri Ayalon, CEO of the pro-pluralism Hatnua Yerushalmit, said
the growing ultra-Orthodox population in Jerusalem is not forcing a liberal
retreat from the city. His organization bought space for 140 outdoor ads
depicting female activists, to prove there would not be a backlash from
ultra-Orthodox Jews for displaying pictures of women.
"Only
four were damaged," he said. "What's happening in Jerusalem is not
being done by the ultra-Orthodox, but by what we think they will say and do."
Hoffman,
who also leads the Reform Movement's Israel Religious Action Center, said she
wished Israel reflected the diversity of her GA audience.
"This
is how Israel should be - a supermarket. All forms of Judaism legal. All state
funded, or all not state funded. May the best rabbi win."
By Anshel Pfeffer
So
where is the discrimination?
[Reform President Rabbi Richard] Jacobs is
presumably referring to the fact that only Orthodox marriages, divorces,
burials and conversions are officially recognized by the central government,
and outside a small handful of municipalities and local councils, only the
Orthodox streams receive public funding.
This is discrimination, but not
against non-Orthodox Jews. Rather, it's in favor of a bloated and corrupt
Orthodox establishment. Some may see this as semantic hairsplitting, but I
think there's a fundamental difference.
By Gusti
Yehoshua Braverman
I have no guarantee that my tax money which is distributed among clerics will be transferred, at least in part, to the Reform congregation to which I belong;
... the
only rabbi who can preside as the rabbi of a locality - whose salary is paid
from my tax money - is an Orthodox rabbi, who for the most part will want to
keep me out of the public space;
... my
children, when they marry, will not be able to have their nuptials performed by
a Reform rabbi - male or female - and be recognized by the state as married.
By Rabbi
Uri Regev
I don’t believe
that there can be a serious and responsible grappling with the challenge of
Jewish Peoplehood without confronting the reality that Israel stops this
plurality at its borders, let alone celebrating it.
From the fact
that no non-Orthodox rabbi can officiate at a legal wedding in Israel to the
arrest of Anat Hoffman for wearing a talit and reciting the Sh’ma at the Kotel
– how can we speak of affirming Jewish Peoplehood without strongly confronting Israel's partial function as an antidote to this goal.
By Elan
Ezrachi, PhD
Instead of
focusing on the centrality of Israel and the impulse of cheering everything
that Israel does, Jewish Peoplehood celebrates the plurality and dynamism of
Jewish life around the world with Israel as a major hub of Jewish cultural
creativity, a hub that is in constant interaction with Jews around the world.
Instead of a
model that displays actors on the stage vs. spectators, Jewish Peoplehood talks
about partnership, engagement and dialogue as organizing principles of
contemporary Jewish life.
The state does not
accept the Egged bus cooperative's decision to bar all advertisements
with pictures of people from its buses in Jerusalem, the government told the
High Court of Justice last week.
"The companies thought that by not publishing ads with men,
either, they solved the problem,"[Yerushalmim attorney] said. "The
state is telling them they haven't solved the problem. But now I want to
understand what the state is doing about it. Does it intend to revoke the
license, or impose sanctions to enforce its decision?"
Yerushalmim
director Uri Ayalon agreed. "We'll continue to fight until it's possible
to publish ads with women," he said.
"People
realize that my kitchen is Glatt kosher, only I don't have a certificate from
the rabbinate. Yet the fears that I would be harmed by the lack of a
certificate proved unfounded. I have kippa-wearing diners who tell me they come
because I display a kashrut certificate from conscience, and not that of the
rabbinate."
Rabbi David Stav, chair
of Tzohar: "Without a chief rabbinate, the rabbi believes the
Jewish People would “have been split into two to three nations,” because of the
issue of Jewish identity. “Nobody would have recognized the [other group’s]
Jewish identity.”
The upcoming end of current Chief
Rabbi Yona Metzger’s term provides “a real window of opportunity that is open
now, and will be closed for 10 years if we don’t take it today, and if it will
be closed for 10 years, I guess it will be closed forever.”
The prenuptial “Agreement for Mutual Respect” [which]
obligates, under Halacha and general Israeli law, a recalcitrant spouse to pay
additional support payments once the other spouse has initiated the divorce
process and efforts toward marital reconciliation (if so desired) have failed.
What needs to be prevented is yet another
“creative formula” that will leave the inequity undented. Gradually increasing
the numbers of conscripted ultra-orthodox youths is likely the best available
option, which could also be imposed at random. A net could be cast
unpredictably and whoever is caught in it must serve or face personal
consequences.
The deterrent value of possible punishment cannot be
underestimated and might facilitate the conscription of greater
numbers of eligible haredim.
A consumer
boycott of the group's Shefa Shuk outlets by their target market, the
ultra-Orthodox community, since the start of 2008 led to more trouble for the
company.
Through no
fault of Vurembrand, the boycott was called against David Wiessman in reaction
to Dor Alon's acquisition of the 24/7 chain AM:PM which, as the name indicates,
operates on Shabbat.
The target
chosen from among Wiessman's operations was Shefa Shuk, where sales and profits
began plummeting. Only 10 of its original 40 outlets remained viable when, in
September 2011, they were renamed Zol B'Shefa. They currently include 17
stores.
By Haviv Rettig
Gur
And finally, the GPT suffers from JFNA’s own lack of clarity
about its purpose.
Is JFNA a trade
association that offers services to constituent federations? A Jewish
“government” or representative that lobbies in Washington and Jerusalem? A
professional advisory (or even decision making) body where federation dollars
are divvied up and shipped to projects and organizations?
This
program is designed for Israeli educators seeking to implement pluralistic
Jewish education in Israeli educational institutions and is organized in
conjunction with a M.A. degree in Jewish Education from the Melton Centre for
Jewish Education at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.
A
renovated cinema is the centrepiece of the controversial church's attempt to
rebrand its image internationally, writes Matthew Kalman in Jaffa, Israel
Editor –
Joel Katz
