Conversions to Judaism as well as
identifying who is a Jew have long been
controversial issues in Israel. Currently there is
a bill in the Knesset about conversions in Israel.
Not surprisingly, this is a very heated subject
for those in Israel as well as in the Diaspora.
Because of the importance of this issue, the
Israel section this week is devoted to the
conversion issue.
The Middle East section
this week focuses on giving an inside view into
Iran. The first article from the Washington
Institute gives a recap of an event with a former
member of the Revolutionary Guard. A second
article from the Atlantic describes how almost of
every aspect of life, even ones haircut, are
determined by the government.
Today's "In
Brief" section looks at an archeological find in
Jerusalem as well as the renovation of the Israel
Museum in Jerusalem.
|
|
Sincerely,
Batya
Abramson-Goldstein
Executive Director
Jewish Community
Relations Council of St. Louis
|
| Israel
|
Fresh
Anger From Diaspora Over Bill On Conversions
The Jewish
Week
Gary Rosenblatt
July
14, 2010
It's hard not to be
cynical about the latest conversion controversy in
Jerusalem that threatens to further divide an
already fragmented Jewish People for no reason but
one: internal Israeli politics. Indeed, just about
every seemingly illogical legislation or decision
in the Jewish state comes down to a matter of
gaining, or in this case holding onto, political
power.
That's why the
Netanyahu government risks further alienating an
American Jewish community whose support it needs
more than ever, and only days after a
fence-mending White House meeting between the
Prime Minister and President
Obama.
If the Knesset
continues to move ahead, as indicated this week,
and pass legislation giving the Orthodox rabbinate
a monopoly on conversions in Israel, the great
majority of American Jews - as well as their
establishment charitable organizations, most
notably the leadership and supporters of Jewish
federations - will consider themselves
second-class citizens officially in the eyes of
the Jewish State. As a result, their support could
well diminish.
Make no mistake, the
non-Orthodox American Jewish leadership is angry,
and feeling betrayed, after being assured they
would be consulted and their concerns addressed
before action was taken on this Knesset bill.
Jerry Silverman, the professional head of the
Jewish Federations of North America, wrote an
unusually blunt and irate letter to Prime Minister
Netanyahu this week, expressing "deep shock" and
urging him to block the bill sponsored by David
Rotem, a member of Foreign Minister Avigdor
Lieberman's hard-line Yisrael Beiteinu
party.
Read
more
President Peres
to Jewish Federations: Dialogue on Conversions
Must Include the Diaspora and Israel
Jewish Federations of North
America
July 13, 2010
Israeli
President Shimon Peres met with leaders of The
Jewish Federations of North America today about
proposed changes in the Law of Return, expressing
his support for greater dialogue that includes
both those in Israel and the
Diaspora.
Peres met on the
controversial conversion bill with JFNA's
President and CEO Jerry Silverman and Senior Vice
President Rebecca Caspi, as well as with 125
Jewish Federation professionals and volunteers on
the Campaign Chairs & Directors Mission, which
is visiting Israel.
"More than half
of our people are living in the State of Israel.
Almost half of it lives outside of Israel. We
should remember that those living outside of
Israel are not represented by the Knesset, they
have their own communal life," Peres told the
group.
"A discussion that bears
consequences on the entire Jewish people should
include different voices - from within Israel and
from without. The legislative process should
include an open public discussion that will lead
to an understanding. It should be conducted with
tolerance, with open hearts and open
minds."
"A split in Jewish life,"
Peres added, "will be catastrophic and totally
unnecessary."
Peres went on to say:
"We bear the responsibility for generations to
come. We should handle it with care while
preserving unity. In 1988, I could have formed a
government under my leadership. The condition was
my approval to revise the law of 'Who is a Jew'. I
immediately rejected this
offer."
Peres, commenting on
published comments by Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu that the proposed bill would not pass
the full Knesset, said: "I noticed with
appreciation the comments made by Prime Minister
Netanyahu, who said that the legislative process
will be postponed in order to conduct a serious
and inclusive discussion. We have to find a proper
solution to enable conversion in Israel, but not
at the cost of unity with the Jewish community
abroad."
Silverman and Caspi thanked
President Peres for his remarks and echoed a
letter that JFNA Chair Kathy Manning and the JFNA
Coordinating Council sent the Prime Minister
today, urging him to speak out publicly against
the proposed bill.
"We were
privileged to represent The Jewish Federations and
Diaspora Jewry in our meeting with President
Peres, and honored that President Peres took the
opportunity to meet with our CC&D Mission as
well," Silverman said.
"We thank
President Peres for his critical support of the
concerns of world Jewry and appreciate his
visionary leadership and energy in trying to reach
a resolution on this important matter."
Sharansky decries
proposed conversion bill:"We can't divide the
Jewish People"
Jewish Federations of North
America
July 12, 2010
Jewish Agency
for Israel Chairman Natan Sharansky said he is
deeply disappointed that conversion legislation
proposed by MK David Rotem, which includes several
controversial clauses, passed today (July 12) in
Knesset committee.
"We cannot divide the Jewish
People with legislation which many in the Jewish
world view as defining them as second class Jews,"
Sharansky said. "We are at the beginning of the
month of Av, the time when the Temple was
destroyed because the Jewish people were busy with
internal fighting instead of dealing with real
dangers posed by their enemies. Jews abroad are
the most loyal supporters of Israel, and stand at
the forefront of the fight for Israel's image
around the world."
"The proposed bill was
supposed to have been discussed in detail with
world Jewry," Sharansky added. "I hope the prime
minister will send a clear message that this
proposed legislation will not move forward without
proper discussion and consultation with all those
who feel they may be harmed by it."
A
partnership of world Jewry with the people and
State of Israel since 1929, the Jewish Agency for
Israel is funded by Jewish Federations of
North America, Keren Hayesod, major Jewish
communities and federations, the International
Fellowship of Christians and Jews, foundations and
donors from Israel and around the
world.
|
| Middle
East |
Inside Iran's
Revolutionary Guard: A Defector Speaks
Washington InstituteDavid
B. Crist and Reza Kahlili July 13, 2010
On July 9, 2010,
Reza Kahlili addressed a special Policy Forum
luncheon at The Washington Institute. Mr. Kahlili
is the author of A Time To Betray: The Astonishing
Double Life of a CIA Agent inside the
Revolutionary Guards of Iran, a memoir that
describes his career as a spy for the CIA. He was
introduced by David B. Crist, a visiting fellow at
The Washington Institute on leave from the Defense
Department, where he serves as a senior historian
for the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The
following is a rapporteur's summary of their
remarks. David B. Crist Although Iran was
a country of great strategic importance at the
time of the Islamic Revolution, the United States
had few sources of information about what was
occurring there, especially after the U.S. embassy
was seized and official relations ended.
Accordingly, Iran became an early priority for
former CIA director William Casey in the 1980s.
Information provided by Iranian insiders such as
Reza Kahlili became critically important in this
regard. One anecdote aptly illustrates
Kahlili's key role. Former defense secretary
Caspar Weinberger's personal papers include an
account of a National Security Council debate
concerning Iran's plan to seize Basra, Iraq. In
his book, Kahlili described how he told his CIA
handler to inform the U.S. government about the
planned offensive. Weinberger's papers make clear
that Kahlili's report was a key factor in U.S.
discussions about whether to tilt toward Saddam
Hussein in the Iran-Iraq War. Whether that was a
smart policy or not is another issue; the point
here is that thanks to Kahlili, Washington was
well informed in advance about Iran's plans.
Reza Kahlili After attending
college and graduate school in the United States,
Kahlili returned to Iran in 1979, hoping that the
Islamic Revolution would bring real democracy and
freedom to his nation. What he found, however,
fell far short of his expectations. Compared to
his successors, the shah had provided a high
standard of living to the Iranian people and
created a peaceful regional environment -- albeit
at the price of severe restraints on freedom of
speech and political participation. Kahlili had a
childhood friend in the Islamic Revolutionary
Guard Corps (IRGC) who recruited him to join the
force, where his expertise was in high demand. The
process was not complicated and did not involve
much vetting other than his friend vouching for
him. He did not receive much training; in its
early years, the IRGC was not a very systematic
organization. Read more
Iran's Hairstyle
Laws No Laughing MatterThe AtlanticMax
Fisher Jul 7 2010
The Iranian Ministry of Culture and
Islamic Guidance's new dictate on acceptable male
hairstyles might seem absurd, even silly. The
government agency has drawn international
attention by requiring Iranian men to choose from
a handful of "Islamic" haircuts. But the
restrictions, another in a long line of
Islam-touting regulations on the daily life of
Iranian citizens, are no joke. That they are
arbitrary and bizarre is precisely the
point. Whatever you think of the Iranian
leadership's judgment, it's unlikely that they
feel particularly threatened by spiked hair or
frosted tips. While the regime often cites
religion in such laws, Koranic scholars will find
little in Shia doctrine forbidding hair gel. The
regime's chief goal is control of the public
sphere, which it has aggressively pursued for
years. Westerners will be most familiar with the
clunky black chador forced on Iranian women by the
often violent Islamic police. There are also tight
controls on the media, on who may attend private
social gatherings, and even laws forbidding
unmarried, unrelated women and men from publicly
interacting. Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei sees
these restrictions as essential for maintaining ,
and the more that Iranians agitate for democracy
the more he will respond by grinding personal
freedoms into the sand. Read
more |
In
Brief
|
3,350-year-old fragment
of text found
boston.com
July 13,
2010
A tiny
clay fragment dating from the 14th century BC
discovered outside Jerusalem's Old City walls
contains the oldest written document found in the
city, researchers say.
The 3,350-year-old
clay fragment was uncovered during sifting of fill
excavated from beneath a 10th-century BC tower,
dating from the period of King Solomon in an area
near the southern wall of the Old City, the Hebrew
University of Jerusalem said yesterday in an
e-mailed statement. Details of the find appear in
the current Israel Exploration Journal.
"The find, believed to be part of a tablet
from a royal archive, further testifies to the
importance of Jerusalem as a major city in the
Late Bronze Age, long before its conquest by King
David,'' the statement said. Read more
A rebooted
Israel Museum readies for the throngs
GoJerusalem.com
This July 26, Jerusalem's landmark Israel
Museum reopens its doors to reveal the results of
its staggeringly ambitious, long-term and
expensive renovation project.
The renovations, which began in June
2007, cost a total of $100 million and include
78,000 square meters of new public facilities and
19,000 square meters of renewed gallery space,
representing what the museum is considering to be
"the largest collective philanthropic effort ever
undertaken for a single cultural institution in
the State of Israel." The construction includes
new event halls, a new dining area, a
three-building new entrance plaza, an indoor
passage, lined with walls of water, to connect the
new Gallery Entrance Pavilion to the campus
entrance, and revamped temporary exhibition
galleries.
The architects in charge of the project,
James Carpenter Design Associates (JCDA) of New
York and Efrat-Kowalsky Architects of Tel Aviv,
both brought with them impressive lists of
credentials and past accomplishments. JCDA, which
oversaw the plans for the new spaces on Israel
Museum's campus, counts the Brooklyn Bridge Park
and 7 World Trade Center amongst its past
projects, while Efrat-Kowalsky, which conceived of
the re-purposing and upgrading of existing
structures on campus, specializes in museum design
and refurbishing.
Since the museum first opened in 1965,
the revered institution has amassed nearly 500,000
objects in its collections, and eventually, the
time came to bring the campus up to date, with
better flow for people to enjoy its sprawling
spaces, and larger facilities to accommodate more
display opportunities. It's "a renewal project
that allows us to serve our public as never
before," Israel Museum Director James Snyder said
in a statement. "We look forward to welcoming our
visitors to the Museum's stunning new public
spaces and galleries, which facilitate a richer
and more enjoyable experience of our unparalleled
collections and of our powerful Jerusalem hilltop
setting."
The museum will reveal the
renovations beginning on July 26 with a series of
inaugural events. These include concerts in the
Billy Rose Art Garden by noted Israeli musicians
including Shalom Hanoch, who will perform on July
27, and Yehudit Ravitz, who will be closing out
the inaugural week on July 29. Yehuda Poliker is
scheduled to appear later this
summer.
Read more
HOME
|
|
| |
About
The JCRC
|
|
Guided
by Jewish values, the JCRC informs, collaborates,
advocates and takes action on issues in the public
arena that are of central concern to the Jewish
community. Focusing on inter-group relations,
social justice, domestic issues, international
issues and Israel, the JCRC is a community based
agency made up of 17 constituent organizations and
14 at-large members.
|
| To
Donate |
To
help make JCRC programs possible
Donate Here
|
| |
