No Twirl With Khomeinism for Israelis : Handwringing Ignores Role Religious Parties Have Played in the Past

When Ari Rath, the feisty editor of the Jerusalem Post, told the world his opinion of the Israeli election last week, many civilized spines chilled. Israel had shifted “a bit to the Dark Ages,” he said.

Indeed, the images in the news of rabbis wearing long beards, uniform heavy black coats and imposing black hats celebrating a political victory would seem to indicate that Israelis have opted for a twirl with a Khomeinism of sorts. Suddenly religious parties, some described not merely as “Orthodox” but as “ultra-Orthodox,” find themselves the power brokers of Israeli politics. Shevah Weiss of the leftist Mapam Party, Labor’s traditional coalition partner, complained that Israel’s political capital has moved from Jerusalem to Bnei Brak, the home of many Orthodox congregations.

These observations reek of stuff and nonsense, hyperbole and sour grapes. Israeli voters have not dramatically deviated from previous balloting patterns, and these rabbis are not any less reasonable than other players in Israel’s political theater.

The National Religious Party won five seats in the new Knesset, an achievement comparable to its representation in the outgoing parliament. This party, often characterized as the “modern Orthodox” group, has been a partner in every coalition government in Israel’s history. Its representatives have been ministers of health and welfare, interior and education. This last post was held as recently as four years ago by Zevulun Hammer. At the time, Israeli leftists warned that an Orthodox minister of education would turn the nation’s schools into one vast parochial network. Hammer disappointed them. He served with distinction.

The Shas, an ethnically focused Orthodox party, held four seats previously and now has two more. This party, too, has played an active role in the past. Rabbi Yitzhak Peretz, who held ministerial rank, even gained a hero’s reputation when he served as the cool-headed go-between for Shimon Peres and Ariel Sharon during a political crisis three years ago. Peres, then prime minister, and Sharon, the former defense minister, had publicly insulted each other, and each threatened to bring down the national unity government unless the other would publicly apologize. Peretz was the only Knesset member with the sophistication and savvy to get these two feuding “schoolchildren” to shake hands and make up.

Western governments and observers will do well to recall the Orthodox parties’ flexibility on issues of war and peace. Yosef Burg, former leader of the National Religious Party, played an important role in talks with Egyptian leaders, and the leading rabbinical persona behind the three parties of Shas, Agudat Israel and Degel Torah have opinions that range from moderate to dovish. In published halakhic (Jewish legal) responsa, all major Torah scholars have expressed Judaism’s religious focus on the primacy of human life, even at the cost of territorial accommodation. Certainly they believe in the Torah’s account that God gave the land to the Jewish people, but they understand that the ultimate biblical boundaries are a matter for the Messiah, not the Israeli army, to finalize. Like their secularist counterparts, including Labor, these parties support Jewish settlements in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) as a legitimate manifestation of the Jewish right to dwell in the ancestral homeland. At the same time, though, they supported Camp David and would accommodate serious Arab peace overtures--if they ever appear; jihad is not a Hebrew word.

These religious parties are not merely in tune with their times; ultimately they offer Israelis greater civility. The Knesset is notorious for its circus atmosphere where “parliamentarians” scream invectives at one another and get ousted from the chamber daily. (Parents often admonish their rude children to remember that they are in their home, not in the Knesset.) These rabbis, trained in the yeshiva classrooms rather than in Israel’s political jungle, may just bring the Knesset a touch of class.

It is understandable that Israeli leftists like Rath and Weiss are disappointed that for the fourth straight time their ideology has been rejected by the national consensus. But we Americans owe it to ourselves to understand their hyperbole in that light. In a few days our own sore losers will be heaping similar calumny on their successful opponents.