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Reform and Conservative representa-
tives, Rabbis Uri Regev and Ehud
Bandel, insisted on their right to con-
duct their own conversions in excep-
tional cases where a candidate might
not be acceptable to the Orthodox.
They would only consider dropping
this demand if the chief rabbis met
them, thus acknowledging their legiti-
macy. The chief rabbis declined, in a
communique that pointedly did not
identify the "heretics" as Reform or
Conservative.
Rabbi Lau spelled it out: "If they
imagine that they can meet together in

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the teachers' room of some institute
and that will bring Jewish unity while
they continue to defraud the public,
they are mistaken."
Reform's Uri Regev responded:
"The challenge that is now facing the
government and the Knesset is where
they are going to take their lead from
-- the hate-filled attitude of the
Orthodox chief rabbinate, or the val-
ues of equality and religious freedom.
Is Israel, at 50, to be the only country
in the world that still denies Jews reli-
gious freedom?" ❑

Israelis Speak Out

Detroit's partner communities in the Central
Galilee line up behind pluralism.

T

he Central Galilee
Volunteer Forum, corn-
prised of Israeli partici-
pants in the Jewish
Federation's Partnership 2000 pro-
ject, has issued a letter decrying
attempts to pass the proposed Law
of Conversion as "creating a perilous
(and perhaps irreparable) rift
between Israel and the overwhelm-
ing majority of American Jews and
their communities."
The conversion pro-
posal calls for writing
into law Orthodox con-
trol over religious con-
versions in Israel and
barring non-Orthodox
representatives on local
religious councils.
The 55 Volunteer
Forum members, some
of them from the
Orthodox enclave of
Hoshaya, composed the Feb. 12 let-
ter at one of its twice-yearly retreats
and faxed it to Jewish Federation of
Metropolitan Detroit's Executive
Vice President Robert Aronson.
The letter also states that:
"The bridge we have sought to
build ... is intended to ensure our
collective passage as part of the
Jewish people — in Israel and in the
Diaspora — towards the future.
"The proposed Law of
Conversion represents nothing less
than the antithesis of our efforts.
We maintain that every Jew should
be allowed to exercise his/her inter-
pretation of Judaism while respect-

ing the legitimacy and dignity of
other streams within our tradition."
Volunteer Forum members,
drawn from the Detroit Federation's
"sister" communities of Migdal
Ha'Emek, Nazareth Illit and the
Jezreel Valley, have participated in
Partnership 2000 exchanges over the
past few years.
Partnership 2000 is a Jewish
Agency for Israel program linking
27 regions of Israel with Jewish
communities in the Diaspora. The
program encourages
people-to-people rela-
tionships and focuses on
educational exchanges,
leadership development,
and fostering of business
partnerships.
The Jewish Agency
for Israel is a beneficiary
agency of the Jewish
Federation's Allied
Jewish Campaign.
Over the next few months, the
Federation is hosting three
Partnership 2000 programs that
will bring Israeli counterparts of
American participants to the
Detroit area. A group of Israeli
women will be here in early March
to visit Federation agencies; partic-
ipants in the Joint Learning and
Leadership Program will come in
mid-March to visit their counter-
parts; and in April, 45 teens from
the Central Galilee region will stay
in the homes of local teens to learn
about the Detroit Jewish commu-
nity. ❑

"Creating
a perilous
rift."

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1998

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