Israel Agrees to Work for Accord on Who Is a Jew

JERUSALEM — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, hoping to avert a split among Jews worldwide, reached agreement Wednesday with leaders of the liberal branches of Judaism to resolve a dispute over conversions by the end of the year.

Both sides hailed the agreement as a step by the Jewish state toward greater recognition of the Reform and Conservative movements, which are small in Israel but represent the majority of American Jews.

“We cannot underestimate the importance of this development,” said Rabbi Uri Regev, a leader of the Reform movement in Israel. “It is unprecedented that the prime minister would invite Reform and Conservative leaders to negotiate a solution. We are convinced he has entered this agreement in good faith . . . and on the assumption that a solution can be found.”

But Orthodox political parties have already expressed opposition to the agreement.

The issue to be decided is whether Orthodox rabbis will continue to have the monopoly over conversions to Judaism in Israel that they have maintained since the founding of the Jewish state in 1948--a situation that allows them to define who is a Jew and to determine which converts in Israel may be granted citizenship.

Reform and Conservative leaders say the Orthodox should not be the sole voice of Judaism or its lone interpreters.

The Orthodox rabbinate, Israel’s highest religious authority, sees itself as the caretaker of Jewish tradition and views Reform and Conservative Jews as agents of assimilation, preachers of a religion that ultimately is not Judaism.

In response to Supreme Court challenges, Netanyahu’s government introduced legislation earlier this year that would write the status quo on conversions into law and stymie the liberal movements’ push for greater authority.

The “conversion bill” would not affect conversions conducted abroad, which are currently recognized by the state if not by the rabbinate. Nonetheless, the proposed law enraged American Jews who believe that a Jewish state should not take steps against their own Judaism or relegate them to the status of “second-class Jews.”

A majority of Israel’s 4.7 million Jews are secular or nonobservant. Among the estimated 20% to 30% of the population who are religious, there are only about 5,000 Reform Jews and 20,000 Conservative Jews, while the two branches constitute about 85% of the 5.8 million American Jews.

In the accord hammered out before dawn Wednesday, the two sides decided to postpone passage of the conversion law and to freeze the Supreme Court cases while a seven-member committee of Reform, Conservative and Orthodox Jews and government representatives comes up with an alternative.

The committee must submit its recommendations to the government by Aug. 15, and the parliament must pass legislation two months after the opening of its winter session in late October or all bets are off.

“This is a breakthrough,” said Bobby Brown, the prime minister’s advisor on Diaspora affairs. “There has never been a government committee that included Reform and Conservative Jews to talk about issues of religion and the state.”

Leaders of the Orthodox parties in the government coalition did not participate in drafting the agreement, and Brown acknowledged that a solution is far from guaranteed. But he denied that the agreement is a delay tactic.

A compromise is likely to separate state issues--such as the right to citizenship for Jews--and personal issues such as marriage, divorce and burial. In the first case, the government may recognize Reform and Conservative conversions in some fashion, while the latter rites are expected to remain in Orthodox hands.

Currently, the state recognizes Reform and Conservative conversions abroad for the purposes of immigration. But Orthodox rabbis will not marry these converts in Israel, where there are no civil ceremonies, and do not consider the children of such female converts to be Jews. Under strict Jewish law, only the children of Jewish mothers are considered to be Jews.

Regev said that Reform and Conservative leaders want two conditions met: A new law must apply equally to Jews by birth and Jews “by choice,” and it must not discriminate against non-Orthodox conversions in civil matters.