Telegraph
Israel risks alienating Jewish diaspora over definition of a Jew
Israel has been warned it risks alienating the Jewish diaspora with controversial proposals to redefine who has the right to be called a Jew.
Israel has been warned it risks alienating the Jewish diaspora with controversial proposals to redefine who has the right to be called a Jew Photo: ALAMY
The row has left Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, as an unwilling arbitrator in a stand-off of potentially historic proportions between American Jewish leaders and senior figures in his own coalition.
There are growing fears that the dispute could lead to a major schism in world Jewry and the prime minister is facing a choice between further isolating his country or the possible collapse of his government. Mr Netanyahu said this week that the proposed law could “tear apart the Jewish people”. He has received tens of thousands of emails of protest from American Jews, who have been urged to contact him by their rabbis.
Matters came to a head earlier this month when a committee in the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, narrowly approved legislation that could result in many foreign Jews being denied the right to settle in Israel.
The so-called “conversion bill”, which still has to be passed by a full session of the Knesset before it becomes law, has caused fury in the United States.
Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, a million Russian-speaking immigrants have moved to Israel. But, because they either had only a Jewish father or married into the faith, almost 350,000 of them are not recognised as Jews in their adopted homeland. That includes 90,000 who were born in Israel.
According to Orthodox doctrine, only those whose mothers are Jewish can be officially classed as Jews.
Rectifying this anomaly is vital to the future of Israel, according to Danny Ayalon, the deputy foreign minister and a senior figure in the Yisrael Beiteinu party, whose core constituency is Russian-speaking. “The 350,000 immigrants who are not considered Jews are a national strategic problem that must be solved now, because in another generation or two it could tear our society apart,” he said.
Yisrael Beiteinu’s original proposals were designed to make it easier for Russian-speakers to become Jewish by allowing a sympathetic local rabbi to convert them. But to have any hope of forcing the bill through the Knesset, it had to make a major concession to religious parties by proposing that the ultra-Orthodox rabbinate would have ultimate authority on conversions.
The bill prompted a storm of protest in the US, where more than 80 per cent of Jews are non-Orthodox. American Jewish leaders fear that the bill could mean conversions performed by American rabbis are not recognised in Israel – meaning that new converts might not be allowed to live in the country.
Rabbi Shlomo Amar, the chief Sephardic rabbi of Israel, told the New York Times that Mr Netanyahu had told him that the controversy over the conversion bill was threatening to alienate American Jews, whose support he needed in his negotiations with President Barack Obama over peace with the Palestinians.
Natan Sharansky, the former Soviet dissident who is now the powerful chairman of Israel’s Jewish Agency, warned that many foreign Jews could end up feeling like second-class members of the faith.
Unable to forge a compromise, Mr Netanyahu this week succeeded in having a Knesset debate on the conversion legislation delayed for six months.
Telegraph
Palestinian jailed for rape after claiming to be Jewish
A Palestinian man has been convicted of rape after having consensual sex with an Israeli woman who believed he was Jewish because he introduced himself as "Daniel".
Photo: AP
A court in Jerusalem has made international legal history by jailing Sabbar Kashur, a 30-year-old delivery man from East Jerusalem, for 18 months.
He was convicted of "rape by deception" following a criminal trial that has drawn criticism from across Israel.
After striking up a conversation, the two went into a top-floor room of a nearby office-block and engaged in a sexual encounter, after which Mr Kashur left before the woman had a chance to get dressed. It was only later that she discovered Mr Kashur's true racial background, lawyers said.
Although conceding that the sex was consensual, district court judge Tzvi Segal concluded that the law had a duty to protect women from "smooth-tongued criminals who can deceive innocent victims at an unbearable price"
"If she hadn't thought the accused was a Jewish bachelor interested in a serious romantic relationship, she would not have co-operated," Mrs Segal said as she delivered her verdict.
A conviction for rape by deception on the grounds of racial misrepresentation is believed to be internationally unprecedented, according to British legal experts.
The charge is rarely used in the West. In 2007, a Syrian pilot walked free from a court in Swansea after being accused of tricking a woman into intercourse by saying it could cure her of a sexually transmitted disease.
A court in Massachusetts also acquitted a man who allegedly masqueraded as his twin-brother in order to have sex with the man's wife.
While forced sex by deception is an offence under Israeli law, legal experts say it is a charge used sparingly in cases involving protracted deceit and a promise of marriage.
Kashur was originally accused of violent rape and indecent assault, but later accepted the lesser charge under a plea-bargain after prosecutors received evidence suggesting the encounter was consensual.
Kashur’s lawyer, Adnan Aladdin, said he had filed an appeal to ensure that the verdict was not considered precedent-setting, adding that otherwise “many men would find themselves in jail.”
Israeli legal experts said they found the verdict disquieting.
"In the context of Israeli society, you can see that some women would feel very strongly that they had been violated by someone who says he is Jewish but is not," said a former senior justice ministry official.
"The question is whether the state should punish somebody in that situation. It puts the law in the position of what could loosely be described as discrimination. I would feel intuitively uncomfortable about prosecuting someone for something like that."
Asked whether his client was the victim of racial discrimination, Mr Aladdin said he "would rather not comment". Others, however, were scathing.
Gideon Levy, a leading liberal commentator, said: "I would like to raise only one question with the judge. What if this guy had been a Jew who pretended to be a Muslim and had sex with a Muslim woman. Would he have been convicted of rape? The answer is: of course not."
Israeli human rights activists said that Kashur's actions reflected the deceits many Palestinians practise when in Israel in an attempt to avoid official and private prejudice because of their background.
"It is very well known that Israeli-Palestinians living in Israel disguise themselves," said Leah Tsemel, a human-rights lawyer. "You change your accent and you change your dress because if you look like an Arab you face harassment.
"If you want to enter a pub, you'd better not look like an Arab and if you want to have sex with an Israeli girl, you had better not look like an Arab."
The prosecutor in the case was unavailable for comment and officials in the Jerusalem district attorney's office declined to discuss it.
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