A house divided

Editorial

Diaspora Jews need a voice in Israeli public policy, a groundbreaking new report urges. The Jewish nation must take Jews living outside Israel into consideration when making crucial decisions, said The Jewish People Policy Planning Institute in its first annual report. The institute is a think tank funded in part by the Jewish Agency and headed by former U.S. Middle East envoy Dennis Ross.

Commenting on the report, Israeli Justice Minister Yosef "Tommy" Lapid of the secularist Shinui Party said a first step to bridge the widening gap between Israel and the Diaspora would be to lessen Orthodox power in the Jewish state. "The new generation of Jewish intelligentsia in America, 85 percent of whom are Conservative or Reform, are being alienated from Israel because the country does not recognize their rabbis," Lapid reportedly told fellow Cabinet members.

Those are fighting words in a nation in which Orthodox rabbinic authorities wield a monopoly on family law - marriage, divorce, death, conversion, validating Jewish identity - and profoundly impact issues ranging from immigration to public transportation, from where to live to where to pray, from education to the peace process.

Since the founding of the Jewish state, Conservative and Reform Jews have been fighting for equal status, and for the right of their professionally educated, experienced rabbis to perform weddings, conduct funerals and otherwise serve congregants.

The Masorti Movement (Conservative) and Israel Movement for Progress Judaism (Reform) for decades have struggled for full recognition. And while they have failed to break the domination of traditional authority, both organizations have faithfully served non-Orthodox Jews living in and visiting Israel, reached out to immigrants and secular Israelis, and provided resources to congregations, youth programs and schools.

"A house divided against itself cannot stand," Abraham Lincoln warned in 1858. Our young American nation nearly destroyed itself seven years later in a civil war.

Ancient Torah and continually evolving Jewish law, united with 4,000 years of Jewish history and the reality of contemporary Israel, are the inheritance of all Jews. It is time for Israeli decision-makers to embrace every Jew. Perhaps as an internationally united people we can more effectively tackle the external dangers that threaten our existence, beginning with Israel's neighbors in the volatile Middle East.

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