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The Conversion exchange, part 2: How strict is the Israeli public when it comes to Jewish identity?

[additional-authors]
September 2, 2015

Dr. Netanel Fisher is a visiting lecturer at Israel’s Open University and head of a research group at the Van Leer Institute in Jerusalem. Dr. Fisher holds a PhD from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. He has served as a an adjunct lecturer at the Hebrew University and as an Associate Researcher at the Israel Democracy Institute.

This exchange focuses on Dr. Fisher’s new policy paper, The Challenge of Conversion to Judaism in Israel, published (in Hebrew) by the Israel Democracy Institute. Part one can be found here.

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Dear Netanel,

In your first response, in which you tried to explain why Israel has a ‘conversion challenge,’ you made a few assumptions which I would like to ask you about. 

From the fact that “most Israelis don't want their children to marry non-Jews,” for instance, you concluded that most Israelis would probably be behind an initiative to encourage technically ‘non-Jewish’ immigrants to undergo orthodox conversion. But it’s fairly clear that many of the Israelis who want their children to marry Jewish would be perfectly content with them marrying a second generation Russian immigrant with one Jewish parent who sees himself/herself as Jewish. 

Moreover, you say that “hardly any politicians argue against the idea that it is in the best interest of both immigrants (Olim) and the State as a whole that Israelis who are not recognized as Jews by Jewish law undergo Orthodox conversion.” Is this really the case? After all, many Jewish Israelis, and their representatives, are not orthodox.

Isn’t it possible that you are overestimating the level of orthodoxy of the Israeli public? Doesn’t the whole conversion cause assume Israelis are more religiously strict than they actually are?  

Yours,

Shmuel.

***

Dear Shmuel,

Thank you for your response and your follow-up questions. I will base my response on some recent surveys:

In the most recent Guttman-Avi Chai Survey (2009), Israeli Jews were asked whether they consider someone to be Jewish if “he was born to a Jewish father and a non-Jewish mother” or if he was “converted by a non-Orthodox rabbi.” The agreement with these statements was 40% and 48% respectively.

Specifically regarding your question, in 2014 Haaretz conducted a poll revealing that “almost two-thirds of secular respondents said they would refuse to marry a non-Jew.” However, the same poll also found that “44% of Jewish respondents said they would try to prevent a relative from marrying a new immigrant who was non-Jewish according to Jewish law.” As one might expect, among traditional, Orthodox, and ultra-Orthodox respondents, the opposition to marrying a new immigrant who is not Jewish according to Jewish law grew to 53%, 71%, and 95% respectively. (I found these numbers to be a bit suspicious, since I doubt that 29% of Orthodox respondents, the middle group, would accept such marriages, but I will leave the judgment to your readers).

Similarly, ITIM – The Jewish Life Information Center asked respondents what they would recommend to a non-Jewish relative who lives in Israel and is considering conversion. Only 6% (!) chose the option “I would  recommend that he does not convert,” 28% answered that they would recommend alternatives, such as a Beit Din (rabbinical court) outside of the rabbinical establishment or a Reform conversion, while a full 50% said they would recommend undergoing the official process of conversion under the auspices of the Chief Rabbinate.

As I understand these figures, it seems that most Jews in Israel (including secular Jews) think conversion is the best way to join the Jewish people, although a significant percentage considers Jews who are not recognized by Jewish law as Jews to be Jews and would agree to marry them anway.

Based on these findings, as well on the fact that it is hard to find any politician who is against the involvement of the state in promoting Orthodox conversion, my policy paper recommends that we as a society take steps to assist non halachic Olim to convert. This recommendation represents my opinion (and not necessarily that of the Israel Democracy Institute),  yet – as I wrote to you previously – I truly believe that promoting conversion is a great challenge and addressing it properly will be a great service to the continuation of the Jewish people.

What is the best way to do it? Are the Olim themselves interested in converting to Judaism and how many of them succeed in converting? If you would like, I would be happy to answer that in our next exchange.

Sincerely,

Netanel.

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