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COURT SETS STAGE FOR CONVERSION SHOWDOWN
by Dan Izenberg
Jerusalem Post, May 30, 2004
The High Court of Justice on Monday took another step along the way to the final showdown over whether the state must recognize Reform and Conservative conversions of people living here as fulfilling the criteria for immigration according to the Law of Return.
In a 7-4 decision, a panel of 11 justices headed by Supreme Court President Aharon Barak rejected the state's argument that non-Jews who are living here legally, but are not listed in the Population Registry, and who convert while living here cannot become citizens according to the Law of Return regardless of whether the conversion is Orthodox, Conservative, or Reform.
The court, however, did not rule on whether the specific petitioners, almost all of whom were converted in Reform procedures, are Jewish. It gave the state 45 days to submit its opinion on this crucial matter and said it would hand down its ruling only after studying it.
The state expressed its opinion against granting citizenship to converts who were living in Israel when they converted in response to two petitions involving 15 people from various parts of the world, including Poland, Romania, Germany, Russia, Colombia, and the Gaza Strip.
The petitioners have lived here legally for several years, studied in Reform or Conservative conversion classes here, and converted in Reform, Conservative, or Orthodox ceremonies abroad. They have all demanded that the state register them as immigrants according to the Law of Return.
In rejecting the state's argument, Barak, who wrote the majority opinion, declared that "the term 'aliya' means the ingathering of the exiles and the return of the Children of Israel to their land. ('And I will turn the captivity of my people Israel' – Amos 9:14.) This is the aim of the Law of Return and it is according to this aim that its provisions must be interpreted.
"Aliya," he continued, "means coming to join the people of Israel in the State of Israel and refers to the desire of the Jew to make his home in Israel. The Law of Return also stipulates that a Jew who has come to Israel as a tourist may change his status to oleh while living in Israel.
"Aliya refers to a Jew making his home in Israel. It does not matter at all when the person who wishes to settle in Israel became a Jew, whether before or after moving to Israel."
Barak wrote that it would be unacceptable discrimination if one non-Jew became Jewish while abroad and was entitled to settle here according to the Law of Return, while another non-Jew who lived here and became Jewish was not allowed to settle here according to the Law of Return. "Both converts have joined the Jewish people and settled in the State of Israel," he wrote. "Both are Children of Israel returning to their homeland."
Barak wrote that it is true that some people might try to take advantage of the benefits granted by immigrant status (immediate citizenship and material benefits) by converting to Judaism.
But this concern applies to non-Jews who convert abroad and then come here no less than it does to non-Jews who convert to Judaism while living here. As for the 15 involved in the current petitions, "it has not been argued that they were not sincere in their conversion," Barak added.
Now that the state's "outer defense" has fallen the question is whether or not the specific petitioners are in fact Jews, was the conversion process they underwent valid.
The state did not address this question in its most recent statement to the court, hoping that the court would reject the petitions in principle. However, in an earlier response to the petition, former interior minister Natan Sharansky declared that non-Jews who convert while living here and intend to settle here must be converted by the Chief Rabbinate in an Orthodox ceremony. Before handing down its ruling, the court said it wanted to know whether Interior Minister Avraham Poraz agreed with his predecessor's position.
Thus, Poraz and the State Attorney's Office will have to address this thorny issue before the court does. Poraz has already come out in favor of having the state recognize Reform and Conservative conversions. The question is whether he will stick to his guns and whether the State Attorney's Office, which has a large degree of independence in determining its position, will go along with him.
Rabbi Uri Regev and Nicole Maor, who represented the petitioners on behalf of the Religious Action Center, welcomed the decision.
"The High Court rejected the attempt of the State Attorney's Office to constrict the application of the Law of Return and to this time justify its continuous refusal to grant the status of oleh to the petitioners by its new interpretation of the law," they said.
"The High Court repeated its previous ruling that the State of Israel is the state of the Jewish people including all of its religious streams and not the state of the 'Jewish religious community' allegedly headed by the Chief Rabbinate and that, as such, every Jew in Israel is entitled to enjoy freedom of religion and conscience."
At the new site, women will be able to worship at a section of the Wall while wearing prayer shawls and reading from the Torah, behavior that provoked anger and violence from Orthodox worshipers at the women's section of the Wall.
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