Skip to main content

Haredi Parties Threaten to Walk Out

CBN

Share This article

JERUSALEM, Israel -- American Jewish leaders welcomed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s response last week to a statement by Religious Affairs Minister David Azoulay, who said Reform Jews aren’t Jewish.
 
Conservative and Reform Jews make up the largest percentage of the American Jewish community.
 
“A Reform Jew, from the moment he stops following Jewish law, I cannot allow myself to say that he is a Jew,” Azoulay told Army Radio, saying they’ve “lost their way." He later modified his statement. Last month he called Reform Judaism “a disaster for the people of Israel.”
 
Netanyahu said his comments didn’t represent the government’s position, calling them “hurtful.” 
 
“I have spoken with Minister Azoulay to remind him that Israel is a home for all Jews and that as minister of Religious Affairs, he serves all of Israel’s citizens,” the prime minister said in a statement.
 
American Jewish leaders, such as Anti-Defamation League National Director Abe Foxman, decried Azoulay's remarks.
 
“One would hope that a minister charged with administering religious affairs would be a voice for respect and tolerance of the religious views and traditions of others,” Foxman said.
 
Meanwhile, barely two months after the new Israeli government was sworn in, the coalition’s ultra-Orthodox factions are threatening to walk out if their demands are not met, potentially bringing down the 61-seat government, a tactic they’ve employed in the past.
 
Shas and United Torah Judaism say Netanyahu agreed to all their demands during coalition talks and they intend to see he sticks to his promises irrespective of other pressing budgetary needs.
 
Economy Minister Aryeh Deri is working to roll back cuts to government stipends for large ultra-Orthodox families and allocations for yeshivot (Torah seminaries).
 
The coalition also recalled a conversion bill passed by the last government, which would have broadened the process for Israelis not meeting the criteria of Orthodox Judaism.
 
Jewish Agency Chairman Natan Sharansky expressed deep regrets over the decision, saying the agency would use “other means” to continue the historic “ingathering of the exiles.”
 
“The Jewish Agency for Israel deeply regrets the cancelation of the government's decision from less than a year ago regarding the establishment of local conversion courts,” Sharansky said in a statement.
 
“We cannot accept the fact that a matter so vital to the future of the Jewish people and to Israel's existence as a Jewish state is subject entirely to the configuration of the coalition at any given time and to government decisions adopted and then canceled after each election cycle,” he said, adding that JTA “must act through other means in order to preserve the State of Israel's Jewish character and continue the historic process of ingathering the exiles.”
 
In a Facebook post, Education Minister Naftali Bennett, chairman of the Jewish Home Party, said “All Jews are Jews…whether conservative, reform, orthodox, haredi or secular. And Israel is their home. Period.”

Share This article