A proposal in Israel to stamp the identification cards of converts to Judaism to indicate they were not of Jewish birth was condemned here Monday by Ernest Michel, executive vice president of the UJA Federation in New York.
The proposal, by the Interior Ministry in Jerusalem earlier this year, raised a storm of protest in Israel and abroad. It was not implemented.
Michel, addressing the annual luncheon of American Women for Bar Ilan University to honor veteran New York UJA leader Myrtle Hirsch, said: “This is no policy for Israel to adopt. I deplore it as I’m sure every one of you does.”
Michel recalled growing up in Nazi Germany and being forced to carry an identity card “in which the Nazis identified me as a Jew and gave me — and every other Jewish male — the middle name of Israel. Every Jewish woman and girl was given the middle name of Sarah for her identity card, which was also stamped with the epithet, ‘Jude’.”
But, Michel added, “I think it would be wrong of us to exaggerate the failings of Israeli society. Israel was created out of hundreds of different civilizations. It would be folly to expect that, after a brief 38 years, Israel should turn out to be an ideal society. Yet it is a nation that every one of us can take pride in and rejoice in as we share in its achievements.”
Hirsch, chairman of Project Renewal for the UJA-Federation women’s campaign since 1980, was honored as “a dedicated Zionist, outstanding humanitarian and devoted communal leader in the United States and Israel.”
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