Editor – Joel Katz
Religion
and State in Israel is not affiliated with any
organization or movement.
Special edition on Women of
the Wall coming soon
The sides
also agreed to advance legislation for equal share of the national burden. ...
Under the
proposal, compulsory army service for men will be shortened from three to two
years. Soldiers who continue to a third year will receive minimum wage and a
grant for future academic studies.
The
agreed-upon outline for equal share of the national burden also states that
each year some 1,800 "diligent" yeshiva students will be eligible to
receive a special grant, but yeshiva students between the ages of 21 and 26 who
will discontinue their studies after receiving an exemption from army service
will be fined.
Ultra-Orthodox
recruits aged 21 and under will have the option of deferring their army
service. They will later be divided into three categories: Those who serve in
the army; those who will perform national service and those who are classified
as "persistent" yeshiva students.
By Nehemia Shtrasler
Only when
the ultra-Orthodox are in the opposition will Finance Minister Lapid be able to
cut the huge budgets they receive, both for their yeshivas and in the stipends for
married Torah learners. ...
Only when
the ultra-Orthodox are in the opposition will Lapid be able to replace the
criterion for receiving state-subsidized housing from “years of marriage,” the
criterion outgoing Housing and Construction Minister Ariel Atias tailored for
the ultra-Orthodox, to “utilization of employment potential,” which is more
just and suited to secular and religious Zionist citizens. …
Only when
there are no ultra-Orthodox in the government will it be possible to impose on
them the core school curriculum and conscription into the Israel Defense
Forces.
By Yuval Elizur
Let one thing be clear: all
this political maneuvering has very little to do with the influence of religion
on life in Israel. That will continue to be substantial.
Even with the
religious parties in the opposition, Israel will be still a country where most
yeshiva students will not serve in the army, the Sabbath will be an officially
enforced day of rest, and only kosher food will still be served in the army.
There will still be rabbinical marriages although civil
marriages may finally be possible through a series of
interim arrangements.
But whatever the shape —
and stability — of the ruling coalition that finally emerges, the veto power of
the rabbis has been blunted and may finally be broken.
By Susan Hattis Rolef
It is
difficult to know what will happen. Will the haredi parties undergo a
metamorphosis?
Will the traditional Ashkenazi haredi leadership give way to a
more pragmatic leadership, that will also represent the interests of the so
called “modern haredim,” who are trying to make their out of the haredi ghetto?
And what will happen to Shas after Rabbi Ovadia, who will probably no longer be
with us for the elections to the 20th Knesset?
Alongside
the Haredi world's struggle against their inclusion in the military draft and
matters of principle regarding religion and state, there is another price no
less painful they will pay as the incoming government takes office: When they
take their seats on the opposition benches, they will be lamenting not only the
"harm" the new government will do to the Torah world but also more
temporal, material losses.
The public
conversation about equal sharing of the civic burden and the exclusion of the
Haredi parties from the developing government coalition appears to be the start
of a similar process for the Haredim.
Their community will increasingly have to
accept work, national and military service and modern education. Along the way,
there will probably be a culture war, with some factions of Israeli society
becoming radicalized.
Technion
officials realize that Haredi students have a third-grade knowledge of math and
don't know English at all.
“They come to us with no knowledge,” said Muli
Dotan, the head of the Technion’s pre-academic department, which runs the
special program.
This lack of knowledge presents a tremendous obstacle.
This lack of knowledge presents a tremendous obstacle.
Under the
plan, only those who fully exploit their earning potential would be entitled to
a range of government benefits, among them allowances. The treasury is now
examining where these conditions can be applied and plans to lay out proposals
for the new Finance minister and government.
The
assumption is that a government without ultra-Orthodox parties provides a
historic opportunity to fix Israel's allowances system and increase incentives
for working by slashing payments.
Attorney General Weinstein decided that
the courts that take action against community members who file a case in state
courts or provide testimony to Israeli police could be found guilty for
obstruction of justice, deposing testimony, or harassing witnesses.
According to Rabbi Regev, "The time has come for the ultra-Orthodox rabbinic authorities to understand that Israeli law applies to them as well.
Their attempts to thwart legal proceedings in State courts will ultimately
summon them into those same courts that they so disdain.
No one has the right
to threaten or blackmail individuals who for using the State's judicial system.
Hiddush will continue to act against these criminal occurrences."
Adina
Bar-Shalom, the eldest daughter of Shas spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef,
said on Tuesday that the lack of English and Mathematics education in haredi
schools was a serious obstacle in increasing the numbers of haredim in higher
education.
“It’s not
possible to learn English or Math in a one-year pre-college preparatory
course,” said Bar Shalom. “More than 50 percent of students who come to us do
not succeed in English.”
She
continued saying that this failure caused many students to drop out of college
altogether.
A group of
senior national religious rabbis led by Kiryat Arba’s chief rabbi, Dov Lior,
sent a letter to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and the leaders of all
political factions calling on them not to “harm” the ability of Torah students
to continue their studies.
The warrants are the
first on-the-ground consequences of the expiration last year of a law that
allowed ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students to claim a de facto exemption for military
or national service.
Until a replacement
law is passed, which won’t happen until a new government is formed, the Israel
Defense Forces has begun sending draft notices to the ultra-Orthodox under a
universal draft mandate.
Many Haredi teens have
said they would go to jail rather than serve in the army, which is considered
verboten among certain religious sects.
By Mordechai Kremnitzer
IDI Vice
President of Research Prof. Mordechai Kremnitzer critiques several aspects of
many of the current proposals for integrating the ultra-Orthodox into the army
and calls on the Israeli public to stand firm on its demand for an arrangement
that is fair and equitable.
By Rabbi
Natan Slifkin
I'd like
to propose a plan. It's something that would still be seen as innately unfair
by those who do not believe that charedim learning Torah contributes to
Israel's national welfare, but at least they ought to see the value in reaching
a mutually acceptable compromise.
And it's something that ought to be
acceptable to charedim. The reason is that it is the approach of the father of
the yeshivah world, Rabbi Naftali Tzvi Yehudah Berlin of Volozhin, otherwise
known as the Netziv.
By Moshe
Averick
It is
time for the Israeli government to confess its sins and accept the
orthodox/Hareidi community for what it is.
What could be more absurd than a
group of people tripping over themselves while trying to make peace with those
who have been violently trying to destroy us for the past 70 years, and yet are
unable to reach out and make peace with their own brothers?!
http://blogs.rj.org/rac/
By Anat Hoffman
Lin Dror and her fiancé,
members of a Reform synagogue in Mod’iin, have decided that they do not want to
leave their country to marry.
Next Thursday, March 21, 2013, they will marry on
the steps of the Knesset in a ceremony officiated by Rabbi Kinneret Shiryon from
Kehilat Yozma, and Rabbi Gilad Kariv, head of the Israel Movement for
Progressive Judaism (IMPJ).
By Arie Hasit
At first
glance, Benn's article seems to attack all rabbis and the rabbinate as a
profession, but a close reading makes clear that he intended to say that there
are no moderate Chief Rabbinate rabbis, and there will be no such moderate
rabbis so long as the Chief Rabbinate is part of a political system with
coercive power.
At the end
of his editorial, Benn writes that "those who wish to observe halakha can
choose their rabbis and go on their way". The Israeli public has already
internalized this instruction and is choosing its rabbis, many of whom are not
affiliated with the Chief Rabbinate.
By Rachel Levmore
[T]he private member’s bill to be put before the Knesset, which was
initiated this week through the first cooperative legislation between the Yesh
Atid and Bayit Yehudi parties.
In their joint venture, MK Aliza Lavie (Yesh
Atid) and Shuli Mualem-Rafaeli (Bayit Yehudi) related to the selection process
for the State Committee for the Appointment of Dayanim (Rabbinical Court
Judges). ...
The bill
proposed by MKs Lavie and Mualem-Rafaeli expands the number of members of the
Committee for the Appointment of Dayanim from its present 10 (which is in and
of itself a problem as it is an even number) to 11 members.
By Rabbi Nathan Lopes
Cardozo
Our chief
rabbis have not yet realized what Benedict already understood.
They too are
sandwiched between a new religious Jewish world and the old manifestation of
Judaism.
They have not yet recognized the fact that a vast new horizon has
opened up, which demands a new and bold religious Judaism that will inspire and
make itself and halacha (Jewish law) desirable to the Israeli
mainstream.
Rabbi Stav
told Arutz Sheva that he is hoping "to release" the position
of chief rabbi "from the political powers that held that position for the
past few decades."
He was referring to the fact that hareidi rabbis held the post for the last two terms of ten years each.
Bennett is
different from his predecessors at the top of the National Religious Party.
On
the one hand, he was the first to shake off the deeply-rooted Haredi
patronizing attitude toward the national-religious community and is also
playing a central role in what is viewed as an anti-Haredi move.
On the other
hand, he never studied in yeshiva and does not speak with the basic Torah
vocabulary of his NRP predecessors, even those who were no great scholars.
By David M. Weinberg
Ultra-Orthodox
leaders are in an uproar because religious Zionists got the upper hand in the
recent elections, and will probably be part of the next government while haredi
representatives won’t. They’re yelling about the destruction of the “world of
Torah” that will result from the societal reforms that Bayit Yehudi insists
upon.
So here’s
a news flash for my haredi brethren: You do not possess exclusivity on “the
world of Torah,” and in historic perspective, you may yet come to thank Bayit
Yehudi for nudging you to a better place.
“This
incident shows how difficult it is for many women to obtain a halakhic divorce,
allowing them to remarry,” said Ben-Dahan. “The culprit in this case is
actually considered a solid member of the community, who preferred to sit in
jail for years rather than give a divorce to his wife!”
“I believe
that if we make things harder for them they will be more amenable to granting
the get. I intend to introduce legislations in the coming days that will
prescribe much harder conditions for such prisoners. I believe that with proper
legislation we can solve many of these cases,” he added.
By Rina
Ne'eman
Apart from
being morally repugnant, Israel’s obstinate failure to embrace Jewish religious
pluralism must be seen as foolhardy and a strategic liability....
It is time
for Israel to recognize that Reform and Conservative Jews are not a
watered-down form of the real thing. We are not “lesser than.” We are as
passionate about and committed to our practices as the Orthodox are to theirs.
The
relationship between Israel and the overwhelming majority of world Jewry that
does not identify as Orthodox cannot continue to be one of unrequited love. It
is time to fully recognize us and to accept us as a real, vibrant and equally
genuine part of the Jewish State.
The
Hiddush plan posits a new Basic Law: Freedom of Religion and Conscience, to be
added to the 14 existing basic laws.
This law would stipulate that any school
that does not teach a full core curriculum in compliance with Education
Ministry rules would be denied public funding.
The law would also categorize
the exclusion of women as a criminal offense, provide equal stipends for each
child rather than discriminating in favor of large families, and cancel
subsidies for nonworking young men studying in yeshivas.
By Rachel Azaria
How will
we justify this vast gap between their lives in the secular, day-today world
and their lives in the place dearest to us – our traditions, the synagogue, and
our community?
These are the questions that as religious feminists we are
asking ourselves on International Women’s Day.
But it is clear that these
questions should also concern the entire religious community, including the
rabbis who lead it. The challenge can and should be dealt with, and there is no
doubt this will happen sooner or later.
And the
sooner the better!
“Maybe
Ruth was Boaz’s wife, but that’s not enough of a reason to have a street named
after her. Also Rachel – she didn’t do what he father wanted her to do, she had
a mind of her own.”
The same goes for a number of other streets in the capital.
That is, on the few streets that are actually named for women, says Rachel
Azaria, a Jerusalem City Councilwoman who joined the students on their protest
campaign.
Opinion: Beyond the Internal Partition (English
translation)
By Vered
Noam
The
segregation of women from synagogue activities does not only hurt women but
also hurts the place itself, which loses its authenticity and lives in a gone
reality. A call for integrity and softness.
Our
spiritual lives are divided by a partition, just like a synagogue. We push to
the other side of that internal partition all the vital foundations of healthy
critical thinking, compassion, and common sense.
Spiritual
experience demands openness and listening, both inward and outward. How can we
sing Lord’s song with a clenched fist?
By Michael
Freund
So no more
excuses! The call of Jewish destiny and the cry of previous generations must no
longer be ignored. It is time for American, Canadian, Australian, British and
other Orthodox Jews to set an example for their brethren, leave behind the
exile and finally come home.
“Most Jews
in the world now live in developed western democracies, where there is little
pressure to emigrate,” said DellaPergola, an expert on Jewish demography.
“Economic crises or anti-Semitism do enhance Jewish migration, but not to the
point that we have witnessed so many times in the past.”
By Rabbi
Jill Jacobs
We are
increasingly unwilling to give the Israeli government a pass on the standards
to which we hold the rest of the world. And we believe that the relationship
between Israel and Diaspora Jews should be a two-way street, in which we each
acknowledge that we have much to learn from the other.
Nefesh
B’Nefesh conducted a week of aliyah mega events and fairs in six major cities
across North America together with the Jewish Agency for Israel, Keren Kayemeth
LeIsrael, JNF-USA, and Israel’s Ministry of Immigrant Absorption.
Olympic
gold medalist Aly Raisman will compete at the Maccabiah Games in Israel this
summer.
Editor – Joel Katz
Religion
and State in Israel is not affiliated with any
organization or movement.
All rights reserved.
