The Jerusalem Post reports:
Some of the rabbis who spoke to The Jerusalem Post have a heartfelt concern that procedures at AgriProcessors may be faulty.
But they are also concerned that PETA's highly successful media campaign might be a springboard for a general attack on shehita.
In an attempt to protect shehita from a groundswell of public criticism, rabbis are sidestepping the issue of whether its methods should be revised and, instead, are coordinating public announcements in its defense.…
Dr. Temple Grandin, assistant professor of animal science at Colorado State University, who provided expert advice to PETA [and to the kosher meat industry], told The Jerusalem Post that incompetent kosher slaughterers and shoddy quality control at AgriProcessors is giving shehita a bad name.
"What really makes me mad is when Orthodox Jews try to hide behind religious rhetoric to try to justify sloppy slaughtering procedures," she said.
"You know what that's called? Bulls**t. I've seen kosher done right and all it takes is responsible management."
In other words, the rabbis are hiding the truth and banding together to 'protect' shechita. Funny how this 'attack against shechita' started with rabbis failing at their jobs and has now devolved into other rabbis parsing language and spinning in order to protect them. Sad.
Read it all after the jump.
Rabbis unite against wider anti-'shehita' campaign
Dec. 12, 2004 5:41 | Updated Dec. 12, 2004 6:06
Rabbis in the US and in Israel are patching up differences of opinion to present a united front against PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals), which uncovered sloppy shehita (kosher slaughtering) procedures at AgriProcessors, one of the largest kosher slaughterhouses in the US.
Some of the rabbis who spoke to The Jerusalem Post have a heartfelt concern that procedures at AgriProcessors may be faulty.
But they are also concerned that PETA's highly successful media campaign might be a springboard for a general attack on shehita.
In an attempt to protect shehita from a groundswell of public criticism, rabbis are sidestepping the issue of whether its methods should be revised and, instead, are coordinating public announcements in its defense.
Rabbi Ezra Harari Raful, director of overseas shehita and meat imports for Israel's Chief Rabbinate, is the latest addition to a coalition of rabbis issuing statements supporting kosher shehita and downplaying possible mismanagement and unnecessary cruelty to animals.
Last week, a diverse group of 12 rabbis, including halachic authorities from the Rabbinical Authority of America, the Sephardi Beit Din of America, Star-K kashrut authority and the Nitra Beth Din of Monsey, issued a statement saying they were concerned that the recent publicity "may lead to misconceptions about the practices depicted on the videotape [released by PETA] and, more generally, about the shehita process itself."
Neither Raful nor the 12 rabbis said anything about the need for changes at AgriProcessors.
In recent weeks shehita has come under the scrutiny of the media after PETA, based in Norfolk, Virginia, released on its Internet site a grisly video. The tape shows cows in the Agriprocessors slaughterhouse in Postville, Iowa, slamming their heads on the floor, staggering and even standing shakily minutes after their throats were cut and their trachea and esophagus were ripped out.
In an interview with The Jerusalem Post last week, Raful said the shehita shown in the video, although technically kosher, does not meet the standards of the Israel Rabbinate.
He said there were two problems: the esophagus and trachea were torn out after shehita and the steers were able to stand after shehita because the carotid arteries were not cut.
Immediately after the video was released, the Orthodox Union, which supervises AgriProcessors' shehita, admitted that the pictures on the video were not pretty, but said they did not show a breach of Halacha (Jewish law).
However, harsh criticism of the OU's reaction, including from OU congregants, and Raful's statement, put immense pressure on the OU to issue a retraction.
A few days after the release of the video, Rabbi Tzvi Hersh Weinreb, executive vice president of the OU, said the ripping of the esophagus and trachea was an "especially inhumane" practice and "generally unacceptable," but the organization wanted to find out how regularly it happened.
He said that if the ripping procedure had been used it would be stopped.
Nevertheless, in recent days US and Israeli rabbis are staging an about face. On Friday Raful was quoted by a Public Relations firm contracted by US rabbis as saying that AgriProcessors' meat is kosher.
As if he were refuting an inaccurate news report, Raful said that "I never said that the shehita seen in the [PETA] video is not kosher."
"What I did say is that the Chief Rabbinate does not approve of an animal that gets up after shehita because of 'marit ayin' [perception] but that the animal is kosher! I also never said that that the Rabbinate will not accept shehita where the arteries have not been severed."
PETA, which advocates vegetarianism, is known for its extreme tactics and rhetoric. Last year, the group's "Holocaust on your plate" campaign drew protests by Jewish groups for comparing the slaughtering of farm animals to the murder of six million Jews by the Nazis.
But so far PETA's criticism of AgriProcessors has not turned into an overall attack on shehita. Its Web site makes a point of noting that "Kosher slaughter is more than twice as well regulated as conventional slaughter and is supposed to be more humane."
Dr. Temple Grandin, assistant professor of animal science at Colorado State University, who provided expert advice to PETA, told The Jerusalem Post that incompetent kosher slaughterers and shoddy quality control at AgriProcessors is giving shehita a bad name.
"What really makes me mad is when Orthodox Jews try to hide behind religious rhetoric to try to justify sloppy slaughtering procedures," she said.
"You know what that's called? Bulls**t. I've seen kosher done right and all it takes is responsible management."
Grandin has 30 years of experience engineering slaughterhouses, both kosher and non kosher, throughout the world. Her job is to make them as efficient and safe as possible by minimizing stress to animals before and after slaughter, and to maximize employee safety.
She has four basic criteria for kosher slaughterhouse managers who want to run a tight ship:
No more than five out of 100 cows should be bellowing during handling.
The collapse rate (the time it takes for the steers to lose consciousness after shehita) should be no more than 10 seconds.
Electric prods should be used on no more than 25 percent of the cattle.
Only about 1% should fall down when being corralled into the slaughter pen.
She recently worked with two kosher Toronto slaughterhouses, Dominion and St. Helens.
"There's a guy over there named Moishe who can put 'em down boom, boom, boom. Even after he cuts they don't move, 'cause they didn't feel anything. And within eight, 10 seconds they're down," she says.
"But over at AgriProcessors they are running a sloppy operation. They need to clean up their act. It's places like Agriprocessors that give kosher shehita a bad name.
"The shehita method of slaughtering is more intricate, so it is more complicated to maintain efficiency. At nonkosher places that kill with stunners all you have to do is maintain your gun. But to do shehita properly you need a shohet [slaughterer] who knows what he is doing."
Grandin said that the shohet who appeared on PETA's video was not a professional.
She guesses that the ripping of the neck was done in order to open the carotid veins and release blood as quickly as possible to prevent blood spots on the meat, which would affect its quality.
When an incompetent shohet cuts slowly it may stretch the blood vessels, which prevents blood from flowing out quickly, resulting in spotting.
But instead of ripping the neck after an unprofessional shehita, it is a lot easier, and less stressful to the cow, to cut quickly, says Grandin.
She said that the main problem at AgriProcessors was not the equipment but rather shoddy quality control.