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T he
A Bitter Dispute
Divides Consistoire
Paris (JTA) — A bitter
dispute is dividing the Paris
Consistoire, the body that
oversees the religious needs
of the Jewish community in
France, and if a resolution is
not reached soon, a non-
Jewish administrator may
soon be appointed to oversee
the organization.
At issue is the future
course of the 186-year-old
Consistoire, which has been
caught in a widening rift
between two conceptions of
what it means to be a Jew in
France today.
According to those oppos-
ing the group's president,
Benny Cohen, the Con-
sistoire has become overly
committed to Orthodoxy at
the expense of the needs of
the community's less re-
ligious members.
"The Consistoire is not
only the representative of
the most Orthodox Jews, but
of all Jews, even the non-
religious ones," said Moise
Cohen, the leader of the op-
position.
Four years ago, Benny
Cohen was elected to the
presidency of the Paris Con-
sistoire, which among other
duties oversees kosher
slaughtering for all of
France, administers the
local Bet Din, or religious
court, and issues kosher
licenses to restaurants.
At the beginning of his
presidency, Benny Cohen
was perceived as a very ac-
tive leader who built syn-
agogues and mikvehs, or
ritual baths.
But last year some of his
programs — including the
building of a yeshiva in
Israel's administered ter-
ritories and another in the
United States — were sub-
ject to intense criticism, and
the Jewish community here
began to question how its
money was being spent.
In hotly contested elec-
tions for the board of the
Consistoire last November,
half of the winning can-
didates supported Benny
Cohen, while the other half
backed the opposition's
Moise Cohen.
As a result of the evenly
split board — which has
Ashkenazic and Sephardic
Jews represented on each
side in equal proportion —
the Consistoire has had no
president since January.
In an unprecedented move
since the inception of the
Consistoire in 1808, one of
Moise Cohen's supporters,
Lazare Kaplan, has called on
the French courts to resolve
the impasse.
If the board cannot reach
agreement within several
weeks, the Consistoire will
soon be run for three months
by a non-Jewish ad-
ministrator appointed by the
Paris Tribunal.
Benny Cohen and his sup-
porters, incensed by the ac-
tion of their opponents, hotly
opposed intervention by the
courts. The notion of the
Consistoire being run by a
non-Jew, they point out, has
been unheard-of since the
days of the Vichy regime.
Moise Cohen is currently
calling for new elections for
the board — a suggestion
opposed by Benny Cohen.
Any Jew contributing fi-
nancially to the Consistoire,
which is often done in local
synagogues, can cast a ballot
in the elections to the board.
Out of an estimated
population of 350,000 Jews
in the broader Paris area
administered by the Con-
sistoire, some 30,000 are eli-
gible voters.
Four years ago, only 1,500
members of the community
voted. Following last
November's hotly fought
campaign, 3,000 ballots
were cast. ❑
_156 1
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State Names
Pelletreau
Washington (JTA) -- Robert
Pelletreau Jr. was sworn in
this month to head the State
Department's Near East bu-
reau, which plays a key role
in U.S. policies toward
Israel.
The career diplomat took
his oath of office as assistant
secretary of state for Near
Eastern affairs after being
confirmed by a Senate voice
vote on Feb. 10.
Pelletreau succeeds Ed-
ward Djerejian, who is now
serving as U.S. ambassador
to Israel.
State Department
spokesman Mike McCurry
said last Friday that
Pelletreau "is beginning to
engage very fully in the
work of the (Middle East)
peace team."
McCurry added that
Pelletreau's responsibilities
go "well beyond the peace
process itself."
❑
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