Tensions betweens secular and ultra-orthodox Jews far outstrip left-right divisions as a source of concern to Jewish Israelis, according to a new survey.
The poll published this week by Hiddush, an organisation promoting religious freedom and diversity in Israel, said 70 percent are opposed to the introduction of new religious legislation in Israel, where the Orthodox Rabbinate governs many aspects of people’s personal lives.
Rabbi Uri Regev, Director of Hiddush, said “the poll’s results demonstrate the vast gap between the wish of the public for freedom of religion and the government.”
Although the great majority of Jewish Israelis are not Orthodox they may only marry in Orthodox Jewish services. There are no civil courts for marriage or divorce, so many couples are obliged to go abroad in order to legalise their union or dissolve it. Mixed marriages are forbidden.
More than 300,000 immigrants not considered Jewish by the Orthodox Rabbinate cannot be married or divorced in Israel, nor can they be buried in public religious cemeteries when they die. There is only one public civil/secular burial plot in Israel.
In 2009 the budget for religious services for the Jewish population was 96 percent of total funding, although religious minorities (including Moslems, Christians, Druze, Baha’i and others) comprise slightly more than 20 percent of the population.
A “Protection of Holy Places” law prohibits women praying at the Western Wall in Jerusalem. Police detained a 25-year-old medical student praying there last November and banned her from visiting the wall for 15 days.
The Hiddush poll, based on a survey of 800 Jewish Israelis, shows opposition to growing religious influence on the state among supporters of centre and left-leaning parties Labour and Meretz, and also from centre and right wing parties Kadima, Likud and Israel Beiteinu.
Fifty-five percent of those surveyed support complete separation of religion and state. However, 30 percent want religious legislation to be ‘as broad as possible.’
Forty-two percent of those surveyed see tensions between ultra-orthodox Jews and secular Jews in Israel as the most severe tension in Jewish Israeli society today – almost double the percentage (23%) who regard the divisions between right and left as the most serious rift in Israeli society.
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