Israeli Rabbis Agree to Exempt Ethiopians From Ritual Bath
JERUSALEM — Ethiopian Jews, angered because they have not been fully recognized as Jews in Israel, will no longer be asked to take a symbolic conversion bath, the country’s chief rabbis said today.
The statement, after a meeting between Prime Minister Shimon Peres and chief rabbis Avraham Shapira and Mordechai Eliahu, follows weeks of protests by the 15,000 Ethiopian Jews.
Like other Jews, the new immigrants--brought from the famine-plagued Horn of Africa in a secret airlift--will still be required to prove they are full-fledged Jews before marrying, and rabbis might demand they take the ritual bath then.
It was not immediately clear whether the concession would satisfy the Ethiopians.
Rahamim Elazar, secretary of the Assn. of Ethiopian Jews, said the compromise will be referred to the community’s religious leaders.
Peres intervened in the dispute after hundreds of Ethiopian Jews trekked on foot to Ben Gurion Airport last week, saying they had been humiliated by the rabbis and wanted to emigrate.
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