While large scale reform of religious life in Israel, promised by Yesh Atid during the last government, failed to materialize, attempts to liberalize the provision of the current religious services provided to the public were only partially successful.
ITIM, a religious services advisory and lobbying group, has said that despite the difficulties experienced in the last Knesset, and the likely obstacles to reform that will be presented by the next government, it will continue to advocate for liberalization, focusing on four issues in particular.
The first concern for the organization is the knotty issue of proving Jewish status. While there are some 330,000 Israelis from the former Soviet Union, or there descendants, who are not considered to be Jewish according to Jewish law, there are tens of thousands of other immigrants from that region who claim to be Jewish but have difficulties proving so.
According to ITIM, some 4,500 people go through the process of proving they are Jewish every year, the majority of them doing so before getting married in order to enable them to marry through the chief rabbinate.
The process for proving Jewish status is conducted through the rabbinical courts system, but their authority for presiding over this process is not anchored in any law. This means that there is also no oversight over the rabbinical courts on this matter.
Furthermore, rabbinical courts rely exclusively on the use of Soviet documentation to establish Jewish status in Israel, a method that has never been subject to legal or halachic scrutiny, says ITIM director Rabbi Seth Farber.
Such documentation is frequently unavailable however, and there is also no recourse for anyone who claims to be Jewish but whose claim of Jewish status is denied by the rabbinical courts.
“The rabbinical judges are not doing their job, they are just rubber stamping what investigators say, not asking if it is possible to prove someone’s Jewishness without documentation,” says Farber. “Jewish status has become purely technocratic issue and not substantive halachic one.”
ITIM is proposing that instead of the chief rabbinate, it should be municipal chief rabbis in their capacity as marriage registrars who decide whether or not someone needs to clarify their Jewish status.
If Jewish status does require clarification through a rabbinical court then, ITIM has suggested establishing a special committee, under the auspices of the chief rabbinate, comprised of experts on Jewish law and the Jewish community in the former Soviet Union to evaluate the claims.
“No one who understands the dynamics of the various Jewish diasporas has been involved in the determination of these halachic standards. The fact that so many Jews are subjected to humiliating investigations only adds insult to injury,” said Farber.
Another matter of concern which frequently appears on ITIM’s radar is that of the use of public mikvaot, or ritual baths, by women who wish to use them without the presence of a mikva attendant, something which is not currently possible.
Religiously observant married Orthodox women go to the mikva once a month after a 12-day period during which they and their husband are not permitted to engage in sexual relations or any form of physical contact. After immersing in the mikva physical relations are once again permitted.
It is however not possible to insist that a mikva attendant not be present, but since immersion must be done while completely naked, increasing numbers of women have expressed discomfort and unease at being exposed in front of a stranger.
According to ITIM, dozens of women have turned to the organization regarding this issue, which it says constitutes a severe injury to freedom of religious practice and the right to privacy.
It wants regulations issued by the MInistry of Religious Services to state explicitly that a woman can immerse without the presence of an attendant, and says it will work towards this goal during the next government.
Another issue which ITIM is seeking to resolve is a problem that faces participants on Birthright tours, the groups of Jewish youth from the Diaspora who are brought to Israel by the Birthright organization for a free ten-day tour.
A significant number of Birthright participants, a large proportion of whom are not affiliated with a Jewish community and mostly have never visited Israel before, try and lengthen their stay in Israel after the ten-day tour is finished, but face bureaucratic difficulties from the Ministry of the Interior.
When signing up to join a Birthright trip, participants are in most cases not required to provide documentary evidence of their Jewish identity.
But if Birthright participants who have been especially enthusiastic about their trip to Israel and wish to extend their visa for a significantly longer period, the Ministry of the Interior asks tour participants to provide documentary proof that they are indeed Jewish, such as a letter from a community rabbi, the marriage certificate of their parents or something similar.
This often causes undue hassle and difficulty for such Birthright participants and exposes them to inconvenient bureaucracy at Ministry of the Interior branches, in a process which can also make such people feel that the State of Israel is rejecting their Jewish identity after a tour that is designed to strengthen their affiliation.
“The situation is mystifying,” says Farber. “On one hand, the state is dedicated to bringing young and in many case unaffiliated Jews to Israel. The country even invests millions of dollars in these programs. And yet, when these young people want to stay on in Israel the interior ministry treats them worse than if they were undesirables.
“We should be embracing these your Jews and not insisting that their first independent encounter with the Israeli establishment is one of suspicion.”
And the last but not least issue Farber says requires regulation and oversight is that of the lessons on Jewish laws of family purity that all women are required to take when registering for marriage by the local religious council where they register and the local municipal rabbi of the city or region.
Family purity laws include the restrictions on physical contact and sex during a woman’s period and the seven following days, the process of going to the mikva afterwards, and other issues.
When a couple register for marriage, the woman is required by the rabbinate to take classes on these laws before the couple’s marriage registration can be completed and authorised.
Some local rabbinates allow women to take these classes privately with an approved instructor but some do not permit this and women have to go to a rabbinate employee, paid for by the local religious council, for the lessons.
There are currently no regulations on qualifications for the instructors, how many lessons need to be given, where they should take place, and if they are to be conducted privately or in a group.
Some local religious councils insist on as many as eight lessons, some conduct the lessons in a one-on-one format and some in groups, some have the lessons at the offices of the local religious and some at the homes of the instructors.
And the classes can often include discussions matters of an intimate and private nature, such as when a woman’s last period was, how often sexual relations should be conducted, how to treat their husbands during sex, how women should physically prepare themselves for the mikvah and similar matters.
Although ITIM says it favors women learning about Jewish law pertaining to marriage, sex, and family purity, the organization wants to have legislation passed that would give women the right to refuse to go to such classes if she does not want to.
“If someone says they want to have a private teacher, read about these issues by themselves, or not have them at all then they should have the right,” said Farber
Farber says that despite the opposition experienced during the last Knesset to religious service reform and the likely inclusion of haredi parties in the next government who will likely also oppose any serious changes, he is still hopeful that change will be possible
“Though it may be difficult to advance some of these issues in the coming Knesset, I remain optimistic that the government and the country are ready for meaningful changes in this realm. ITIM will continue to advocate in the Knesset for legislation that makes Israel more Jewish and more democratic.”