Rabbi Rick Jacobs Shuns Israel Minister Who Denigrated Reform Jews
Image by Union for Reform Judaism
Israeli and American Reform Jews will boycott Israeli Tourism Minister Yariv Levin, after Levin made disparaging comments about the Reform Movement.
During a cabinet meeting last month on a proposed expansion to the non-Orthodox section of the Western Wall, Levin called Reform Judaism a “dying world” that has succumbed to assimilation. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned the statement.
In response, Israeli Reform Movement CEO Rabbi Gilad Kariv called on his American counterparts to shun Levin. Rabbi Rick Jacobs, president of the American Union for Reform Judaism, accepted the call.
A meeting between Levin and Reform leaders in the United States next week has been canceled.
“As long as he (Levin) doesn’t think that Diaspora Jews have no right to voice opinions on matters such as the [Western Wall], there’s no reason to give him a platform in Jewish communities and organizations in the United States,” Jacobs told Israeli Army Radio Thursday, according to Israeli reports. “Minister Levin will not teach us what support for Israel is.”
A message from our Publisher & CEO Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism so that we can be prepared for whatever news 2025 brings.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
