The Knesset yesterday called on the next government to appoint a special minister in charge of relations with the diaspora and on the next Knesset to appoint a special committee to deal with the subject. In a resolution approved by the vast majority of the House’s factions, including Labor and Likud, the Knesset declared that Israel’s links with the diaspora needed to be tightened–but ought to be based above all on the Zionist premise of aliya.
Another paragraph in the resolution challenged the World Zionist Organization to become “a body that realizes its ideals” by obliging its members and especially its leaders to fulfill personally the commandment of aliya. The government, the resolution said, ought to revise its partnership with the WZO, taking much more of the responsibility to itself–and out of the WZO’s hands.
Israeli ambassadors abroad should see themselves in part as Israel’s envoys to local Jewish communities, and Israel as a State should focus much more attention, and more resources on the imperative need to boost Jewish education abroad. The resolution, summing up an earlier debate on the issue, was presented by Likud’s firebrand, Ms. Geula Cohen, and passed by an overwhelming majority.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
