"Israel rethinks ban on female prayer at holy site" by Jodi Rudoren | New York Times, December 26, 2012
JERUSALEM — Amid outrage across the Jewish diaspora over Israel’s flurry of recent arrests of women seeking to pray at the Western Wall with ritual garments — in defiance of Israeli law — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has asked Natan Sharansky, the chairman of the Jewish Agency, to study the issue and suggest ways to make the site more accommodating to all Jews.
Related: Natan Sharansky, the ideologist of forced democratization
He was George W. Bush's inspiration.
Related: Natan Sharansky, the ideologist of forced democratization
He was George W. Bush's inspiration.
The move comes after more than two decades of civil disobedience by a group called Women of the Wall against regulations, legislation, and a 2003 Israeli Supreme Court ruling that allow for gender division at the wall, one of Judaism’s holiest sites, and prohibit women from carrying a Torah or wearing prayer shawls there.
Although the movement has struggled to gain traction in Israel, where the ultra-Orthodox retain great sway over public life, the issue has deepened a divide between the Jewish state and the Jewish diaspora at a time when Israel is battling international isolation over its settlement policy.
Poow wittle Iswael.
Poow wittle Iswael.
Critics, particularly leaders of the Reform and Conservative movements in the United States, complain that the government’s recent aggressive enforcement of restrictions at the wall has turned a national monument into an ultra-Orthodox synagogue.
‘‘The prime minister thinks the Western Wall has to be a site that expresses the unity of the Jewish people, both inside Israel and outside the state of Israel,’’ Ron Dermer, Netanyahu’s senior adviser, said in an interview Tuesday. ‘‘He wants to preserve the unity of world Jewry. This is an important component of Israel’s strength.’’
Sharansky, whose quasigovernmental nonprofit organization handles immigration for the state and is a bridge between Israel and Jews around the world, said Netanyahu had asked him Monday to take up the matter, and that he expected to have recommendations within ‘‘a few months.’’
See: Israel's Solution to Illegal Immigration
It's okay for apartheid Israel to build walls; it's wrong for the rest of you racists who hate diversity.
See: Israel's Solution to Illegal Immigration
It's okay for apartheid Israel to build walls; it's wrong for the rest of you racists who hate diversity.
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Asked whether he could imagine a day when women could wear prayer shawls and read Torah at the wall itself, Sharansky said, ‘‘I imagine very easily a situation where everybody will have their opportunity to express their solidarity with Judaism and the Jewish people and the state of Israel in a way he or she wants, without undermining the other.’’
‘‘That’s as much as I want to say at this moment,’’ he added. ‘‘Now I have to share this vision with the appropriate bodies.’’
Sharansky, a former Soviet dissident, has been called upon before to broker peace with the diaspora over questions of religious pluralism, most recently during a harsh fight over conversion. Anat Hoffman, the chairwoman of Women of the Wall, reacted with cautious optimism to Netanyahu’s initiative, but said it would not stop the Israel Religious Action Center, of which she is executive director, from filing a Supreme Court petition as soon as next week challenging the makeup of the heritage foundation’s board.
‘‘It’s a good thing that after 24 years the highest echelons in Israel are actually paying attention to this rift that is breaking diaspora Jews from Israel,’’ she said. ‘‘The table that should run the Western Wall should have everyone who has an interest in the wall sitting around it.’’
Rabbi Shmuel Rabinowitz, head of the heritage foundation, said in an e-mail that he was unaware of the Sharansky initiative and therefore ‘‘does not have an opinion about it.’’
While Hoffman said the women’s group would be satisfied if it were allowed to pray at the wall once a month with full regalia, her religious action center wants hours each day, between scheduled prayer times, when the gender partition is removed and people can freely enjoy the site as a cultural monument.
‘‘If in the end what happens is that the Robinson’s Arch area will be run by the Jewish Agency instead of the antiquities department, then we’re talking about who’s going to take care of the air conditioning in the back of the bus,’’ she said. ‘‘I don’t care about that. I don’t want to sit in the back of the bus.’’
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"Israeli police detain women at Western Wall" New York Times, February 12, 2013
JERUSALEM — Ten women, including two US rabbis, were detained by the Israeli police Monday for praying at the Western Wall wearing prayer shawls that are traditionally used by men. It was the latest escalation of a conflict over one of Judaism’s holiest sites.
Those detained were part of the group Women of the Wall, which has gathered each month for the past 24 years to protest the ultra-Orthodox insistence that only men may pray at the wall wearing traditional garb, a rule that has been backed by the Supreme Court.
Micky Rosenfeld, a spokesman for the police, said the women were not charged with criminal offenses but were barred from returning to the wall for 15 days. He said the women were detained ‘‘as a result of them wearing the garments that they’re not allowed to wear specifically at that site.’’ He noted that despite the court ruling, ‘‘they decided to go down to that specific area.’’
The dispute over prayer at the site, a remnant of the retaining wall that surrounded the ancient Temple Mount, has increased tensions in recent months between Jewish leaders in the United States and the Israeli government.
On Monday, the group of about 200 people who came to the wall for the monthly prayer included some of the paratroopers who recaptured the Western Wall from Jordanian control in 1967, and who have their own conflict with the rabbi controlling the site over whether to place a plaque there commemorating that event.
The women were allowed to conduct their service Monday wearing prayer shawls. But on their way out of the area, after many of the activists had left, 10 women were detained, including Rabbi Robyn Fryer Bodzin of the Israel Center of Conservative Judaism in New York and Rabbi Debra Cantor of Congregation B’nai Tikvoh-Sholom in Bloomfield, Conn.
Among the others detained was the sister of American comedian and New Hampshire native Sarah Silverman, as they tried to pray at a Jerusalem holy site, the head of a liberal Jewish women’s group said. Susan Silverman, a Jerusalem rabbi from the liberal Reform stream of Judaism, was detained along with her teenage daughter.
Sarah Silverman wrote on her Facebook page that she was ‘‘So proud’’ of her sister and niece for their ‘‘civil disobedience.’’
Women of the Wall has filed a lawsuit challenging the ultra-Orthodox dominance of the board that governs the holy site. In December, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked Natan Sharansky, the head of the Jewish Agency, to try to resolve the conflict.
"Plan may loosen Western Wall rules" by DANIEL ESTRIN | Associated Press, April 11, 2013
JERUSALEM — The rabbi of Judaism’s holiest prayer site endorsed a proposal on Wednesday to establish a section where men and women can worship together, a ground-breaking motion that could end a decades-old fight against an Orthodox monopoly of the place.
The fight over the Western Wall has intensified in recent months, after police arrested female worshippers who prayed at the site wearing religious garments and leading prayers — acts that Orthodox Judaism permits for men only.
The arrests caused an uproar in Israel and among liberal Jewish leaders in the United States, prompting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to instruct the semi-governmental Jewish Agency to devise a plan that would permit non-Orthodox forms of worship at the holy site.
The Western Wall’s rabbi, Shmuel Rabinovich, told Army Radio that while he dislikes non-Orthodox prayer, he would tolerate it in a separate section in order to end intra-Jewish fighting at the site.
‘‘If these things can be done at the Western Wall without hurting others, and this can bring about compromise and serenity, I don’t object,’’ Rabinovich said.
The Western Wall is Judaism’s most revered prayer site because it is a remnant of the biblical Jewish temple compound. Worship at the site is administered according to Orthodox Jewish custom. The pluralistic Reform and Conservative movements, which allow mixed prayer and female rabbis, have long campaigned for recognition in Israel.
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"5 women detained at Western Wall" April 12, 2013
JERUSALEM — Israeli police detained five women Thursday at a Jerusalem holy site for performing religious rituals that ultra-Orthodox Jews say are reserved for men.
The detentions came a day after an Israeli organization proposed a compromise to diffuse tensions over the issue of women’s worship at the Western Wall. The proposal envisions an area where men and women can pray together.
About 120 women arrived Thursday morning for their monthly prayer service and police detained five for wearing prayer shawls. They were released without charge.
An ultra-Orthodox man was held for burning a prayer book and was still in custody.
The Western Wall, the only remaining part of the biblical Temple compound, is the holiest site where Jews pray. It is divided into men’s and women’s areas. Orthodox rabbis oppose mixed-gender prayers.
In recent months, female worshipers have been detained for wearing religious garments and leading prayers.
Natan Sharansky, chairman of the semi-governmental Jewish Agency, offered a compromise Wednesday that could mark a victory for liberal streams of Judaism in their long quest for recognition.
“The events at the Western Wall today are one more reminder of the urgent need to reach a permanent solution and make the Western Wall once again a symbol of unity among the Jewish people, and not one of discord and strife,” the agency said in a statement after the arrests.
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Having read the AmeriKan ma$$ media for so long I can honestly attest to the fact that when it comes to Jewish racism, sexism, and supremacism, it is not as serious a concern as those of others.
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Declassified: Massive Israeli manipulation of US media exposed
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