37% of immigrants in last eight years not Jewish, updated data show
According to a spokeswoman, the reason for the erroneous data released earlier this week, which falsely showed that 86% of immigrants were not Jewish, was due to faulty definitions.
By JEREMY SHARONSocial media video grab of passengers queuing at the immigration counter at Dulles International Airport in Virginia(photo credit: LUKE MONTGOMERY/COURTESY/SOCIAL MEDIA/VIA REUTERS)
Following the disclosure of erroneous figures on the identity of immigrants to Israel, the Interior Ministry has released new data demonstrating that 37% of immigrants over the last eight years have not been Jewish.Of those, the overwhelming majority – some 85% of all non-Jewish immigrants – came from Russia, Ukraine and Belarus.Some 95% of immigrants from the US were Jewish, as were 96% of French immigrants.Immigrants who have a Jewish mother are granted citizenship under article 1 of the Law of Return, while those who are the spouse, child or grandchild of a Jew are granted citizenship under article 4a, known as the “grandchild clause.”Some 61% of those immigrating from Russia since 2012 were not Jewish; neither were 66% from Ukraine, nor 64% from Belarus.According to a spokeswoman for the Population and Immigration Authority of the Interior Ministry, the reason for the erroneous data released earlier this week, which falsely showed that 86% of immigrants were not Jewish, was due to faulty definitions used by the officials who did the calculations.The original data was released in response to a freedom of information request by the Hiddush religious pluralism organization.The new figures were based on the current religious status of the immigrants, and not their status when they were granted citizenship before they came to Israel.The new data also gave the total number of immigrants since 2012 as 199,876, whereas the total in the original data was 179,849.Hiddush director Rabbi Uri Regev said the discrepancies between the new figures and the original data were so massive that it was hard to know what level of trust to put in the new figures.
He also objected to the fact that the Interior Ministry had used the current status of immigrants and not their status when they immigrated, and was strongly critical of the almost total failure to explain the original error.Regev said that even the new statistics were worrying, especially in relation to the numbers of non-Jews coming from Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, and that these new citizens would therefore be denied the right to marry here.He added that the number of converts in Israel every year was a small fragment of the total population of those defined as “without religious status,” mostly immigrants from the former Soviet Union who made aliyah under the grandfather clause.“The Chief Rabbinate has totally failed in opening the gates of conversion for those interested in it,” said Regev.Rabbi Seth Farber, one of the founders of the Giyur K’Halacha network of independent, Orthodox rabbinical courts for conversion – designed to increase conversion among immigrants from the former Soviet Union – said that the numbers “reflect the new reality of Jewish peoplehood” and that the government must work harder to increase conversion rates.“There are tens of thousands of people who identify as Jews and seek to tie their destiny to the Jewish future and the Jewish state, but do not meet the halachic definition of being Jewish,” Farber said.“The State of Israel and the halachic community has a great responsibility to find ways to enable these individuals and families to join the halachic community, should they seek to," he said. "The diversity represented in these numbers is real, and we must create conversion reform in Israel. The alternative is to blind ourselves to the future of the Jewish people and to our present reality.”
