Second-class Jews?
Op-ed: One cannot overstate the magnitude of the injury that is felt by millions of Jews throughout the world when the president of the State of Israel decides to exclude them.
I am permitting myself to call you by your personal name, Mr. President, because the decision that you made you did not make as the president of the State of Israel, but rather as a private citizen.
You allowed your own personal proclivities, your own outlook on religion, to control your action as president of the state of the Jewish people. And such things must not be done. Certainly not by you, a leader with an exceptionally presidential courage, a fearless democrat. It is heartbreaking, Rubi, precisely because of who you are, a president whom so many of us (myself included) admire.
The story is as follows: About a month ago, the mayor of Rehovot canceled a bar/bat mitzvah ceremony for children with disabilities, simply because the ceremony was to be held in a Masorti synagogue. He ruled that it was to be held instead in an Orthodox synagogue, presided over by an Orthodox rabbi.
This offensive and hurtful incident (hurtful primarily to the children involved) roiled the Jewish world. The Ministry for Diaspora Affairs (which cannot be suspected, God forbid, of being Conservative) entered into the matter because of its responsibilities vis-à-vis the Diaspora, and with professionalism sketched out a proposed compromise: The President's Residence would host the ceremony, which would be presided over jointly by a Conservative and an Orthodox rabbi, according to an outline that would be agreed upon by the two rabbis.
It wasn’t a simple matter for the Masorti Movement to agree to this compromise (after all, does a Conservative rabbi need the "hechsher" of an Orthodox rabbi?) But a compromise is just that – a compromise, and it was appropriate for the welfare of the children, for the respect due the President, and in order to promote social peace in Israel.
Subsequent to the decision to compromise, there was a long working meeting at the President's Residence involving all the interested parties, in which all of the fine details of the ceremony were dealt with. But just then, without warning, the President's Residence reversed its decision and ruled that only an Orthodox rabbi, by himself, could preside over a worship service there.
There is no other way than this to describe what happened: The president adopted, de facto, the position of the mayor of Rehovot. All the parties involved in reaching the compromise solution –among them senior representatives from several government ministries – bowed their heads in embarrassment. Even they were astonished.
One cannot overstate the magnitude of the injury that is felt by millions of Jews throughout the world when the president of the State of Israel – the head of state, the president of a country that is attacked from all sides by those who would boycott it, and that (with full justification) calls upon the Jews of the world to stand by it – decides to exclude them.
And the exclusion is, no less, of Conservative Jews, members of a movement that was Zionist from its inception, a movement whose leaders also serve as leaders of the many Jewish organizations in North America: AIPAC, the local Federations, Hillel, and many others. This was one slap in the face too many.
Mr. President, not a single line of your important address at the Herzliya Conference made it into the prominent world press. Everyone reported only this: Your decision to exclude a Conservative rabbi from co-officiating with an Orthodox rabbi at a worship service in the President’s House. The Forward, the Washington Post, the New York Times, and many more.
Such a pity, for there were so many eminently quotable lines in that seminal address. As, for example, this one: "Equity and equality: In order to guarantee that there is a partnership among us, we will have to ensure that not a single citizen is discriminated against – or discriminated for – on the basis of membership in a certain group." Have you failed to practice what you preach?
Rubi, as a "Beitarnik," you have a deep understanding of the cri de coeur that arises from those who are excluded. "There is no redemption for the world if I am not a part of it," wrote Ze'ev Jabotinsky in a speech that you surely know by heart.
That is why you did not hesitate for a second when you decided, despite criticism, to travel to a joint Jewish-Arab conference at Givat Haviva. Because the injustice of discrimination from which the Arab citizens of Israel suffer doesn't let you sleep at night. Literally. I admire you for that. But tell me: Is there no similar compassion for Jews?
Yizhar Hess is the executive director of the Masorti Movement in Israel.
