Reciprocity must be precondition in secular-religious relations in Israel - opinion

The Yom Kippur events in Dizengoff Square provided the match that ignited the flames of religious/secular tensions that have intensified over the past few years. Much has been written in recent days about the explosive unfolding situation.

Beyond expressions of support or condemnation, it is important that we ask ourselves – how should the secular and traditional public respond:

1. To the “spreading out” initiatives of Rosh Yehudi, as part of its mission to change the secular Jewish population?
2. To the Torah nucleus that receives tens of millions in allocations from the national budget to engage in outreach to the secular community in many towns throughout the country?
3. To other wheeler-dealers intent on “religionization?” 

What should the follow-up steps be to these issues in their broader context?

The answer is, in our view, that it’s high time to set a precondition of reciprocity as a central element in the relationship between the religious and secular public. This, of course, is in addition to putting an end to any rhetoric that leads to incitement or violence, even if these are masquerading as “opinion” and open discourse.

Under the guise of offering a honey-coated apple, these organizations offer the secular and traditional public a cynical and manipulative saccharine syrup. They are abusing the concept of liberalism, and under the slogan “we are brothers,” they attempt to expand their sphere of influence and control.

Yes, control: It is enough to see the one-billion shekel budget allocated recently to launching Orthodox and ultra-Orthodox religious outreach initiatives via five different government ministries; or what transpired in the Education Ministry during the tenure of education minister Naftali Bennett and under the current minister, Yoav Kisch. 

We are talking about organizations that reject liberalism as a value, but they and their propagandists constantly wave it around. It is part of the same saccharine syrup, along with a demand to respect their religious feelings and principles. 

It is sufficient to hear the words of Israel Zeira, the leader of Rosh Yehudi, who explained in a recent interview that Rabbi Levinstein (the racist homophobe and misogynist, a born-again Jew himself, who heads a pre-military academy ) is a welcome guest in his programs, since he “does not rule out people because of their opinions.”

Is that indeed the case? Would he not reject, for example, an antisemitic speaker? Would he invite him to explain his views? He has not yet clarified where he sets the limit. But not surprisingly, he alluded to the limit of his open-mindedness when a radio interviewer asked him about the “Women of the Wall” who are fighting for the rights of women to hold women’s group prayers at the Western Wall.

He explained that while his organization wanted to hold the Ne’ila prayer “in a public space” in Tel Aviv, the Western Wall plaza is a “synagogue” and therefore the Women of the Wall should not be allowed to pray there according to their practice which follows a religious commitment to gender equality. 

Similarly, he would surely maintain that non-Orthodox prayer groups should not be allowed to hold egalitarian services in the public plaza further from the Wall, because that area too was declared to be subject to the rules which apply in Orthodox synagogues.

This is nonsense, since the Western Wall plaza was never a synagogue until it was designated as such by Shas ministers as part of their attempts to exclude the Women of the Wall and the egalitarian family-friendly prayer groups of the Reform, Conservative, and Reconstructionist movements. 

Clearly, he uses the Shas minister’s regulation as an excuse to exclude other Jewish groups but refused to obey the regulations of the Tel Aviv Municipality.

AS WE know, the Supreme Court upheld the Municipality’s regulations that forbade the placing of a partition in a public space to segregate men from women. But as we saw, he does not feel obligated to obey the law and the courts, and liberalism is not a value that guides him. What motivates him is a long-held mission to promote Orthodox religious indoctrination throughout the country and especially in the heart of the secular Jewish public – Tel Aviv.

An existential struggle for the Israeli identity

We are facing an existential struggle for the identity of the State of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state. Therefore, after removing organizations and speakers that engage in incitement and violent speech, the marketplace of Jewish ideas and practices must be based on reciprocity.

Organizations and speakers should not be allowed to enter state educational institutions and impart the Orthodox brand of the “sweet light of Judaism” to the students, unless it is also possible for Jewish renewal, secular, and pluralist organizations and speakers to enter state religious schools [including Chabad] and ultra-Orthodox educational institutions and be allowed to engage their students in areas concerning scientific research, gender equality, and Jewish pluralism. 

The same principle of reciprocity should apply to holding Orthodox religious ceremonies in public spaces in secular or mixed neighborhoods and cities, unless it is similarly possible for organizations that present alternative interpretations of Judaism. They too should be able to enter Orthodox neighborhoods and cities and expose the residents there to the beauty of visual and vocal artistic creativity (for example in the form of mixed choirs singing Israeli folk songs as well as modern liturgical compositions). Let “a thousand flowers bloom,” and people of all religious persuasions will be able to exercise their autonomy and free choice, in an atmosphere of tolerance and with open minds and hearts.

Without reciprocity, the use of the concept of “liberalism” is mere demagoguery. The events of the past year demonstrate that the time has come to fight for and resolve the challenge facing Israel as a Jewish and democratic state, in the spirit of the Declaration of Independence, which guarantees “freedom of religion and conscience” as well as “equality, regardless of religion, race or gender”.

The writer, a rabbi and attorney, heads Hiddush – for Religious Freedom and Equality.