Belgium’s Jewish community protests plans by the country’s regional government to ban in 2019 ritual slaughter of animals without prior stunning, a measure that would mean that kosher meat would in future have to be imported. A similar measure is envisaged by the French-speaking Walloon region.

Ben Weyts, who is Minister of Animal Welfare in the government of the Flemish region — one of three regions that make up federal Belgium – announced the plans- scheduled for 2019- in the Flemish in the parliament. The plans were agreed by the coalition partners in the Flemish government.

"Unstunned slaughter is outdated," said the minister. "In a civilized society, it is our damn duty to avoid animal suffering where possible."

Daily Flemish newspaper Gazet Van Antwerpen said the precise nature of the measure has not yet been made public nor finalized pending talks with representatives of the Jewish and Muslim communities.

Commenting on criticism by some Jews and Muslims in Belgium over the announcement, the minister, who is a member of the center-right New Flemish Alliance (NVA) ruling party. told the newspaper that “the decision in principle has been taken and everyone should respect it.”

But the representatives of the Belgian Jewish community – both in Brussels and Antwerp- have not been consulted.

Shechitah, the Jewish ritual method of slaughtering animals, requires they be conscious when their throats are slit — a practice that critics say is cruel but which advocates insist is more humane than mechanized methods used in non-kosher abattoirs. Muslims slaughter animals in a similar method, albeit with fewer restrictions, to produce halal meat.

In a statement issued on Friday, the president of CCOJB, the umbrella group of Belgian Jewish organizations, Yohan Benizri, said his group opposes the minister’s plan to ban ritual slaughter. ‘’This measure is problematic for the Jewish community but it creates a stir beyond this group among all those who favor a reasonable protection of freedom of religions,’’ he said.

‘’Respect of minorities, including religious minoritiers and their freedoms, is an essential combat when it is led in a reasonable manner,’’ the CCOJB said.

CCOJB noted that ‘’the Jewish ritual slaughter’s humanitarian high level moral are totally unknown by those who criticize them.’’

Philippe Markiewicz, the president of Belgium's Central Jewish Consistory, called plans to totally ban ritual slaughter by 2019 "a crisis without precedent, if not the biggest crisis since World War II."

Markiewicz also called it an affront that Geert Bourgeois, head of the Flemish regional government, had suggested during a recent debate on the issue that the question of ritual slaughter was related to integration of immigrants into Belgian society.

Walloon and Flemish politicians who dealt with the issue reportedly turned down requests from the Jewish community to consider the "traditional-culture aspect of kosher slaughter" or to discuss a compromise.

In 2016, Belgium's Council of State, the country’s highest administrative body, issued a ruling that a complete ban on ritual slaughter would violate the country’s constitution and recommended a compromise to be sought, in consultation with Jewish and Muslim religious communities.

The European Jewish Association, a Brussels-based group active on European level, also condemned the Flemish Minister’s announcement, which the group said amounted to a ban on the practice.

“This decision has nothing to do with animals and everything to do with targeting Jews and Jewish practices, which have been part of the fabric of European society for millennia,’’ said EJA leader Rabbi Menachem Margolin. ‘’It is dubious, unsettling and running contrary to evidence,” he said. His Association respresents many thousands of Jews across Europe,

For Rabbi Margolin, ‘’this decision has nothing to do with animals and everything to do with targeting Jews and Jewish practices, which have been part of the fabric of European society for millennia.’’

“Kosher meat is responsible for a minute fraction of the cattle slaughtered in Belgium. Minute. Not only that, when compared to the meat most Europeans buy in the supermarket - which equates to mass animal slaughter - Kosher, with minimizing the suffering of the animal as its very core, represents truly humane slaughter. This does not even mention the abhorrent ways most animals are shipped around Europe in containers for non-Kosher meat,’’ he said.

Margolin noted that the European Food Safety authority found that the failure rate for the much-trumpeted penetrating captive bolt stunning in conventional mechanical slaughter may be as high as 6.6%, and up to 31% for non-penetrating captive bolt and electric stunning. ‘’This equates to millions of animals each year that experience cruel and unnecessary suffering. But there are no campaigns on this. Even though these figures massively outnumber the amount of animals killed per year in Belgium for Kosher meat,’’ he stressed.

“There will always be a discussion about what can be learned from scientific evidence, and the Jewish communities across Europe are always ready to discuss this, but it is simply a falsehood, and a dangerous one at that, to suggest that banning ritual slaughter is a key part of animal welfare.’’

The EJA leader said his organization will take his message across Belgium and the entire EU ‘’to ensure that such proposals are not put in place and are deemed as unnecessary and deeply discriminatory.”