Israel’s chief rabbis have united against the recommendations of a special committee advising on the contentious topic of conversion in Israel.
Committee chair and former government minister Moshe Nissim today presented Benjamin Netanyahu with its proposals, the key of which is the creation of a new conversion authority committed to Jewish law but not linked to the Chief Rabbinate.
Mr Nissim said mixed marriage was “a poisonous drug for the Jewish people. Unfortunately, we have been suffering in recent generations from a situation which I can only define as a spiritual holocaust. The assimilation rate in the Jewish diaspora is over 70 per cent. Instead of maintaining its existence and growing, the Jewish people are diminishing."
Under the committee’s proposals, state conversion would remain Orthodox and would be performed according to Jewish law, but not through the Chief Rabbinate. Liberal conversions performed abroad would be recognised in Israel under the Law of Return.
