Israel must now introduce real civil marriage - The Jewish Chronicle

The spin has been dizzying. "Today, the Knesset took a historic step forward," claimed coalition chairman Ze'ev Elkin of Likud. MK David Rotem of Yisrael Beiteinu, insisted that the Knesset had "succeeded in cracking the wall that existed for 62 years."

Rotem it was who introduced the measure provoking such excitement - a law, now approved by the Knesset, allowing civil marriage for some Israelis.

But this was not history in the making; no walls were being cracked. This was cynical Israeli politics at its worst.

There are 350,000 Israelis caught in a marriage trap. They are immigrants, or the children of immigrants, from the former Soviet Union who are Jewish according to civil law but not according to religious law. This means they are unable get married through the Israeli chief rabbinate, which shares the monopoly on marriage with churches and mosques.

The coalition party Yisrael Beiteinu promised before the election to solve the problem within a year of taking office. And at first sight, it seems to have done that - until you read the small print.

The state of Israel has become matchmaker for these 350,000 people. They are allowed to get married, but only so long as they marry one another. Yisrael Beiteinu may have ticked a box on its election checklist, but it has created an absurd situation.

Israel has an obligation to these citizens.They were brought to Israel by Israel, in accordance with the state's noble vision of "ingathering the exiles"- and also in no small part with the hope of increasing the Jewish demographic (in civil if not religious terms) in Israel.

When the Israeli government made the decision to bring them in, it was well aware of the likely marriage ramifications. As early as 1959, the Orthodox Israeli intellectual Yeshayahu Leibowitz wrote of "the problems that will arise the moment - perhaps not so far away - when masses of Jews from the USSR or the United States will stream to Israel".

The fact that civil marriage was not instituted in the early days of the state is quite understandable, and the many who present it as a travesty are mistaken. When Israel's laws and civil structures were being set up, there seemed little need for civil marriage. Maintaining Jewish marriage and divorce as the norm in the Jewish state seemed desirable from a cultural point of view. Every society has its own concept of marriage, and there seemed no reason why the default option in the Jewish state should not be the traditional Jewish way.

Additionally, there was concern that civil marriage - and perhaps more importantly civil divorce - could cause divisions in Israeli society. The main worry was that, as married couples separate, they would not obtain a religious divorce, rendering their children in future relationships mamzerim who, according to religious law, cannot marry non-mamzerim. This would result in a situation where many halachic Jews in Israel would be unable to marry.

Now, however, Israeli society is bolstered by the state-instigated influx of immigrants from the Former Soviet Union. To tell these immigrants and their children that they can marry only among themselves is unjust and untenable. Israel must now introduce full-blown civil marriage.