Masorti - Israel

Israel

Conservative Judaism had begun to make its presence known in Israel before the 1960s. Today, there are almost 60 congregations with over 15,000 affiliates (about 0.25% of the jewish population). In 1962 The Jewish Theological Seminary of America (JTS) began creating Neve Schechter, the university's Jerusalem campus. This center houses the Schocken Center for Jewish Research, and the Saul Lieberman Institute for Talmudic Research. In 1975 JTS instituted a year of study in Israel as a requirement for every rabbinical student in JTS and the University of Judaism's (now the American Jewish University) rabbinical seminary.

In 1979 JTS Chancellor Gerson Cohen announced the creation of the Masorti ("Traditional") movement as Israel's own indigenous Conservative movement, with its own executive director, board and executive committee.

The Masorti movement created MERCAZ, a Zionist party within the structure of the World Zionist Organization. The Conservative movement is thus officially represented in the centers of decision making within the Zionist movement. The Masorti movement sponsors youth groups, an overnight camp, a system of day camps (Camp Ramah), Kibbutz Hannaton and the Hannaton Education Center, Moshav Shorashim, and special programs teaching new olim (immigrants) basic Judaism. It is involved in many issues promoting the legitimate rights of non-Orthodox Jews.

MERCAZ is the Zionist organization of the Conservative Movement, and represents Conservative/Masorti Jews the world over. Its goals include pressing for religious pluralism, working for an equitable distribution of funding from the World Zionist Organization and the Jewish Agency for Conservative Zionist programs in Israel and America, promoting civil rights in Israel for all people, encouraging electoral reform in Israel, and opposing any change in "Who Is a Jew?" and "Law of Return".

MERCAZ is a member of the World Zionist Organization and the Jewish Agency for Israel, both of which have been designated by the Knesset as channels of communication and influence between Diaspora Jewry and the government of Israel. Through these institutions MERCAZ works with on issues such as aliyah and absorption, education, young leadership, and community affairs.

The Masorti movement in Israel adopts positions on subjects of Jewish Law independent of the Conservative movement in the United States, and the two movements sometimes take different positions. The Masorti movement is sometimes somewhat more traditional than the U.S. Conservative movement and has not accepted a number of the U.S. movement's leniencies. For example, the Masorti movement in Israel rejected a decision by the Conservative movement in the United States permitting Jews living far from synagogues to drive to synagogue on Shabbat.

For eight years up to late 2005 the president of the movement was Rabbi Ehud Bandel.

There is a "Conservative Yeshivah" in Jerusalem, but this belongs to the American Conservative movement and not to the Israeli Masorti movement.