Jerusalem – Correcting previous reports that Israel’s Religious Services Ministry had transferred funds earmarked to pay four Reform Movement communal rabbis, reps for the Culture and Sports Ministry have confirmed that it is, in fact, they who are providing the funds.
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THE TIMES OF ISRAEL (http://bit.ly/1lzX3OK) reports that after the news broke on Wednesday naming Religious Services as the source of payment, Daniel Bar, spokesman for Religious Services, jumped quickly to deny that the agency was involved, saying “his ministry does not pay Reform rabbis.”
In a statement, Religious Services said, “As opposed to what has been published in the press, the Religious Services Ministry has not budgeted for Reform rabbis in 2013. The budget for Reform rabbis comes solely through the Culture Ministry.”
Amid strong opposition from the Orthodox and ultra-Orthodox, the Israel Religious Action Center, in 2012, won a lengthy court battle against the State of Israel demanding equal pay for the four Reform Movement communal rabbis.
A Religious Services Ministry insider said Wednesday that, barring unforeseen circumstances, only Orthodox and ultra-Orthodox communal rabbis would continue to receive salaries through that agency.
Fitting that it would come from the Culture and Sports Ministry, which funds all sorts of other nonsense.
It’s interesting they hadn’t funded them before , after all what does the Israeli government have in common with Halacha or Judaism …
What of Reform conversion standards and their refusal to require gittin for divorced people who remarry? The Jewish state will now be paying “rabbis” who may not even be halakhically Jewish to officiate at weddings that intermarry Jews with non-Jews and will create many more mamzerim. This is “progress” from “progressive” Judaism??? More like chillul hashem than progress. Let’s hope “progressive” movements of Judaism disappear even faster in Israel than in the US.
Seculer Zionists deciding what’s Jewish …Now you understand why the Rabbis opposed them .
it’s about time!
Objectively, it is up to each community to choose who their Rabbi or “rabbi” is and if the government funds one, they are pretty much stuck funding all. How they got away with it so long is a surprise. The communities should be funding their own Rabbi’s, not the government.