S creaming headlines pronouncing a complete rupture in Diaspora-Israel relations.
Threats to sever relations with the Israeli government by Jewish Agency chairman Natan Sharansky.
The controversy over Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s decision to “freeze” implementation of a 2016 Kosel compromise sure has the class of professional Jews hopping mad.
But what is the controversy actually about? Let us first clarify what it is not about. It is not about the fervent desire of Reform and Conservative American Jews to pray at the Western Wall as they wish. They can already do that. Since 2000 a site has been set aside at Robinson’s Arch for egalitarian prayer and the Conservative movement has used the area for the occasional family bar mitzvah celebration and summer youth group. And in 2013 former minister of religious services Naftali Bennett announced plans to dramatically expand and spiff up the area. All this passed without protest.
