My wife is fantastic. Dedicated to Chicago Federation discipline, she rarely reads this Blog. She is an avid reader of more reliable sources like the JTA, Jerusalem Post, Jewish Week and Forward, among others. While we were driving today, she asked: "What is going on with the Conversion Bill." I explained that tomorrow is a day of reckoning -- if the Bill is not voted on, there will be a two-month period in which Diaspora Jewry can organize itself and mount an international campaign with JAFI and our religious streams to offset the destructive efforts of Yisrael Beiteinu and Shas to pass this odious legislation and. perhaps, bring down the Netanyahu Government.
I added, "this will give Jerry Silverman the chance to continue to run around the halls of the Knesset for the next two months." My wife then asked: "Is Jerry a terrible at delegating?" To which I replied -- "Sorry you don't read my Blog, for then you would know that Jerry has no one at JFNA to delegate to. No one."
Meanwhile, Silverman continues to seek meetings with the nefarious MK David Rotem, the Bill's Knesset sponsor as if he can change Rotem's mind. In today's JTA, Rotem is quoted: The Bill "...has nothing to do with the Jews in the Diaspora. It is only an Israeli matter." One might ask, "then why did you travel to the United States to "listen" to North American Jewry's 'concerns' six weeks ago?" A rhetorical question -- Rotem didn't come to "listen," he came to "sell." He just doesn't care a whit about the unity of the Jewish People.
My wife told me she would start reading the Blog.
Rwexler
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As much as we would like to think that the crisis is in Israel/diaspora relations only, the crisis runs much deeper. It is a profound global Jewish crisis between zionism as originally conceived in the 20th century and enshrined in Israel's declaration of Independence and 1948 Knesset's basic laws and a fundamentalist orthodoxy that has ideologically trampled their moderate orthodox brethren (worldwide including in the US) and deny any and all adaptation with modernity. Somewhere in a great zionist heaven the leftist Ben Gurion, the rightist Zeev Jabotinsky, and Mizrachi's Yosef Burg are having tea and saying, "Nu, I guess our differences weren't that great after all!"
Well, the "Soloveitchik Orthodox" represented by the Rabbinical Council of America have weighed in with a statement of SUPPORT for the Conversion Bill. Among this RCA's observations is that JFNA has failed to reach out their movement. (Maybe Jerry Silverman took them for granted as, I would presume, he attends an RCA shul.) The statement goes on at some length -- decrying any opposition in the Diaspora to any opposition to any action of the Government of Israel on any issue -- apparently unaware that the Government of Israel, embodied in the leadership of the Prime Minister, opposes this Bill.
Oh well.
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