Over the past few weeks, the Reform movement has been flexing its muscles in Israeli politics, with its most glaring success being an official government recognition of their right to a share in the prayer area in front of the Western Wall. This is a watershed decision that offers nothing short of political legitimacy to a Jewish religious movement that views itself as standing outside the halakha. The answer to why the Reform have achieved this time around what they had failed to get for 27 years may be explained by the fact that both ultra-Orthodox parties in the Netanyahu coalition government are not packing up their belongings and slamming the door behind them on their way out.
Think about it, in a 61-majority coalition, where seemingly every single MK can make the difference between the success or failure of any given legislation, not to mention no-confidence votes that can topple the Netanyahu government, the ultra-Orthodox are refraining from using their power to blackmail the PM over an issue that is very dear to their heart.
And as if the Reform Wall victory were not enough, on the very week the assembly of the Council of Torah Sages of Agudath Israel is being held, Netanyahu hosted in his office a delegation of Reform rabbis from the US and Israel, who came to thank him for officially recognizing their movement as part of the Jewish milieu in Israel.
That episode drew more than a few angry rebukes from coalition partner United Torah Judaism, accusing the PM of aiding a movement that “sticks a knife in the heart of Judaism,” as MK Moshe Gafni put it, referencing an intifada imagery. “As far as we’re concerned, the Reform are the mother of all evil,” he added, sniping at Netanyahu for bowing to the Reform movement’s wealth while dishonoring the holy ground of Eretz Israel.
MK Uri Maklev, same party, accused Netanyahu, who’s been caught several times dining in traif restaurants in the US, of harboring an affinity to the Reform and the Conservative.
But even though the ultra-Orthodox have been threatening to “reconsider” their coalition partnership over this scandal, UTJ MK Israel Eichler turned their lemons into a kind of lemonade saying he wouldn’t give the Reform the satisfaction of his leaving government, because this is what they’d like to see more than anything.
“We won’t give the Reform a reward by leaving the coalition,” Eichler has been saying on several ultra-Orthodox radio stations Tuesday morning.
Avishai Ben Haim, reporter for Channel 10 News, explained this Haredi restraint with the fact that in this Knesset their combined power was clipped, from 17 seats to a mere 13. Shas, the Sephardi ultra-Orthodox party, has 7 seats, UTJ has 6. This is not a true measure of Haredi political power, but the result of a painful split inside Shas. The return of Aryeh Deri, the late Rav Ovadia Yosef’s prodigal son who was reinstated after a stint behind bars, caused the angry departure of the party chairman he replaced, Eli Yishai. Yishai launched his own Haredi Sephardi party and stopped just short of the blocking percentage, squandering away four seats.
As angry as the UTJ may be at the Reform slight, they’re not prepared to give up a pretty sweet deal in this coalition, where they’ve been making reasonable demands and getting most of them. In general, the Haredi parties make good legislators, and their contribution this time around has been on issues important to all Israelis, not just their constituents. So they’ll make the noise, pound a few committee tables, write a couple angry editorials and go back to work.