Haredi Lawmaker Draws Threats, Ire With Call For Haredim To Go To Work

With his dark suit, black skullcap and graying beard, Rabbi Haim Amsalem hardly looks the part of a revolutionary. But the soft-spoken lawmaker is causing an uproar in the influential and tight-knit ultra-Orthodox world in Israel with a simple message: It's time for people to go to work.

Ultra-Orthodox Israeli draws ire with call to work
By ARON HELLER • The Associated Press

JERUSALEM -- With his dark suit, black skullcap and graying beard, Rabbi Haim Amsalem hardly looks the part of a revolutionary. But the soft-spoken lawmaker is causing an uproar in the influential and tight-knit ultra-Orthodox world in Israel with a simple message: It's time for people to go to work.

It is a stunning call to upend a tradition ingrained for generations: Most devoutly religious men in Israel study the Bible instead of entering the work force or doing military service that is compulsory for others, relying on payments from the state.

Amsalem's view - that work and integrating into mainstream society are necessary for the insular ultra-Orthodox community to progress and emerge from considerable poverty - has become the talk of the country in recent days. It has turned the previously unknown backbencher into a darling of the secular media and won him thousands of immediate supporters from across the political spectrum.

It also got him kicked out of the ultra-Orthodox Shas party.

"Shas has deteriorated to unreasonable levels, they've lost all proportions. They are losing their minds," Amsalem told The Associated Press on Friday. "The problem is that Shas instills terror and that's how they fool the public."

Besides ousting him, Shas called on him to resign from parliament and even branded him "amalek" - a reviled biblical enemy. Parliament has assigned him a bodyguard for fear that zealots may try to harm him.

Such criticism from within the highly disciplined and homogeneous party is unheard of. For nearly three decades, Shas held the balance of power in successive coalition governments. Its elected officials never stray from the strict rulings of the party's spiritual leader, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef.

The future of Mideast peace talks is currently in limbo while Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu awaits word from the outspoken 90-year-old Yosef on a U.S. proposal on a renewed West Bank settlement slowdown.

Amsalem insists he is still loyal to Yosef, but that the elderly rabbi is being led astray by advisers who have neglected the party's traditional constituency of working-class Jews of Middle Eastern descent. Instead, he says it has become an uncompromising and extremist body that has exacerbated the rift between the observant and Israel's secular majority.

Many secular Israelis see the ultra-Orthodox, with their large families, as a financial drain, while the ultra-Orthodox view their secular brethren as having neglected their Jewish faith.

It is perhaps the central domestic schism in Israel and Amsalem's defection could potentially reshuffle the deck of cards that is Israeli politics.

"The secular public is hearing just one side, just one voice," he said. "At the end of the day, Middle Eastern Jews don't belong in the extreme corner."

Shas - which currently has 11 seats in the 120-member parliament - has used its considerable influence to maintain the uneasy status quo that keeps the ultra-Orthodox segregated in schools, exempt from military service and out of the workplace.

Amsalem, 51, says the arrangement has kept his community from progressing, and that only a select few rabbinical prodigies should be exempt from working and immersing into mainstream society.

"There is poverty. Whomever needs to learn the Torah, should learn; those who are not learning, should get to work," he said. "No one has ever placed a mirror before Shas. No one has said, 'Look how you look!' And they look bad."

Shas spokesman Roi Lachmanovitch said Amsalem's words were not worthy of his comment. He said he had nothing to add to the statement issued by the party's Council of Torah Sages, which called on Amsalem to return his mandate to the party or else be branded a 'swindler' - one who ignores the rabbis and violates Jewish law.

Erez Tzfadia, a public policy expert from southern Israel's Sapir Academic College who has researched Shas extensively, said the rare rebellion marks a watershed moment for Shas. He said the party has morphed from its initial mission of providing welfare for the lower class to becoming a right-wing party with an extreme religious doctrine.

"Shas failed in immersing its constituency because it couldn't improve their status ... the project failed and the gaps continued to grow," he said. "Instead, they now focus on Judaism and on hating the 'other' as a way of belonging. The name of the game is belonging."

Amsalem was born in Algeria to a Moroccan Jewish family that immigrated to Israel in 1970. A father of eight, he was ordained as a rabbi and first elected to parliament in 2006.

He says he wants to create a new moderate party based on welfare that appeals to Shas' traditional voters.

He advocates for a more compromising attitude toward conversion, military induction and the inclusion of nonreligious education - such as English, math and history - in ultra-Orthodox schools.

He says that, unlike Shas, he doesn't want a new generation of poverty to arise.

"I want them to make a respectable living," he said.

Comments

[Adam Neira]

Prayers and blessings for Rabbi Haim Amsalem. I have great fears for the mental instability of some Israelis. However I do have faith in the majority of the Jewish people.

In the Messianic Kingdom work will be fulfilling, rewarding and commensurate with the skills and interests of the worker. When people's lifestyle is threatened they can react in vicious ways. The great problem with the State of Israel and the Middle East proper now is that many groups have been painted themselves into corners. They have done this because of incorrect interpretations of G-d's words. A little bit of spiritual fuzziness is o.k. but when the ignorance leads to full blown insanity then violence and chaos can result. Cause and effect must be appreciated here. The politicians are also scrambling to appease their constituents in any way possible. Short-termism is dangerous. What is urgent is vastly different to what is important.

I hope the leaders of Shas and the other senior Rabbis of the various sects realise the importance of their decisions and public statements at this time. As they know G-d makes sure that certain people hold the very fabric of the universe together. The puzzle for them right now is if they suddenly discover they are not one of these people. It is shock to the hubristic to find they no longer hold the high moral ground. Some even try and pull the whole edifice down in their grief.

Be careful everyone...

G-d is watching your hearts and minds.

[ah-pee-chorus]

+++G-d is watching your hearts and minds.+++

what a shame to go through life believing your every action and even thought is being recorded. those who believe this will never know what freedom feels like.

[Shlomo]

Kol hakavod le Rav Amsalem! Truly a man of courage. I hope that as doors close behind him, new doors will open up.

[ah-pee-chorus]

lets hope this does lead to a bit more introspection by those that claim the status quo is what real judaism is all about, as well as those that vote for them.

[Dave]

I wish Rabbi Amsellem the very best.
He is a brave man.
Adam, Shlomo, I agree with you both 100%.

[A. Nuran]

I offer sincere prayers for his success

[Common sense]

They are so enraged that he went against their beliefs that they are ready to shoot him- guns were found in a parking lot near his home. My goodness- how far can a Jew fall to try to take the life of another cuz he demands you go to work like the rest of society and like all Jews used to before this so called new age couture of extremism came about. The ego...the extremism...the rigidity in the thinking and behavior. I am blessed to not be a part of this insanity. I am very content with my mainstream practices. If I were a part of this culture of extremsim and fanatasim found in this group, as well as among haredis, I would leave. This isn't religion-this is fantasism.

[Menachem Mendel lll]

------------PARASHAT VEYELECH--------------

Moshe tell us to us to be Hazak Ve-'Ematz.

“Be strong and be brave.”

[invhand]

There is a 'dog that didn't bark' quality to this story.
However extreme and isolated a tendency in Judaism may seem, the weight of Jewish tradition is still on the side of seeing and thinking. Many may read the Talmud just to obey, but someone opens it and begins to think. They join the conversation and write themselves into Jewish tradition. Rabbi Amsalem has done just that.
Israel does not have to secularize or collapse. Jews can adapt. Work by day. Torah in the evening.
This might not be my choice, but it doesn't have to be.
There are a lot of Haredi jerks. But compared to the extremists of other faiths, they open a book and read. It is impossible to keep them all from thinking.
That is the dog that didn't bark.

[Joshua Shalet]

He should advocate for a professional army instead of the currently ineficient draft model. This will cause more haredim to get degrees and join the work force.

The draft army is the only thing standing in the way of economic prosperity for the WHOLE country!