L.A. Jewish Group Fights Israeli Plan

An umbrella organization embracing most Jewish service and religious groups in Los Angeles County has mounted a petition drive through its affiliated schools and agencies asking signers to urge the Israeli government not to narrow the definition of “who is a Jew” in its immigration law.

The signature drive by the Jewish Federation Council of Greater Los Angeles is part of a broadening campaign in North America aimed at persuading Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir not to yield to demands by the politically strengthened Orthodox religious parties. They want to amend the Law of Return to require any immigrant Jew who was converted by a Reform or Conservative rabbi to undergo an Orthodox conversion.

“While only a few people would be personally affected by this political action,” the petition says, “millions would suffer a deep symbolic wound from this insult to our religious traditions and sense of peoplehood.”

The petitions were distributed in Los Angeles to as many as 85 schools as well as to Hillel chapters at college campuses, men’s and women’s groups and five regional offices of the Federation Council, according to spokesman Ron Reider.

The mass appeal follows several weeks of strong statements by leaders of much of organized U.S. Jewry and a series of lobbying trips to Israel. Wayne Feinstein and George T. Caplan, executive vice president and board chairman, respectively, of Los Angeles’ Federation Council were to arrive in Israel on Wednesday.

Collecting petitions is an “attempt to involve the grass-roots element,” said Frank Strauss, communications director for the coordinating body, the Council of Jewish Federations, with headquarters in New York.

The campaign has an unofficial goal of a million signatures, a figure mentioned when the idea was approved nearly two weeks ago at the New Orleans General Assembly of the Council of Jewish Federations. The Los Angeles body and about 200 similar local groups are members.

“I don’t think realistically we’re going to reach a million, but we want as many as we can by the end of next week so that we can take them to Israel,” Strauss said.

He said a delegation from the national council will leave for Israel Dec. 12 with hopes of presenting the petitions directly to Shamir.

No Cut in Financial Aid

No lessening of financial support was threatened in identical resolutions adopted by the General Assembly in New Orleans and by the board of the Los Angeles Federation Council, which met Nov. 22. The statements said the needs of the “people of Israel . . . have not lessened, they have increased.” But the resolution strongly warned that a move to change the Law of Return would “disunify the Jewish people.”

The only “no” vote on the resolution in the Los Angeles board meeting was cast by Stanley Treitel, according to Reider. Treitel, a spokesman for the Los Angeles branch of Agudat Israel, an Orthodox group, read a statement cautioning the board against undertaking a “holy war” against Orthodoxy and asked for a study of the matter.

Orthodox Rabbi Eli Hecht of Lomita, immediate past president of the Rabbinical Council of California, said Wednesday he opposes the action of the Federation Council.

“Why is the federation putting pressure on Jewish schools to involve innocent children in such a controversial and destructive petition?” he asked.

Orthodox rabbis in the United States generally favor changes in the definition of “who is a Jew” to ensure that Orthodoxy is Judaism’s standard in Israel. But some rabbis--including the leadership of the New York-based Rabbinical Council of America--recently indicated that the delicate unity of Jewry was more important at present than a legislative change in the Law of Return.