The dreaded proposal recommended establishing a new state-run Orthodox authority independent of the Chief Rabbinate to take on the formidable task of converting the hundreds of thousands of Israelis - mostly immigrants from the former Soviet Union and their families - who remain officially “without religion.” This population, most of whom consider themselves Jewish and are fully contributing members of Israeli society have refused to subject themselves to the difficult and often humiliating process of converting to Judaism under the auspices of the Rabbinate. [...]
With the switch of a few words, the message was sent that the state of Israel was only committed to the unity of the Jewish people outside its borders. Within the state, the ultra-Orthodox rabbinic monopoly wanted to make it clear that there was only one officially approved form of practicing Judaism in Israel - their kind. [...]
It was yet another sign that the leader of what is now officially the "Jewish Nation State” cares little for the concerns of the non-Orthodox and modern Orthodox Jews who live outside it - as well as the embattled minority of Jews in the country who, under increasingly difficult circumstance, continue to believe that there is more than one way to observe their religion.
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