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Lees het hele artikel in de Jerusalem Post

Europe's Jews get a political lobby

HAVIV RETTIG GUR, Jerusalem Post correspondent

THE JERUSALEM POST  / October 18, 2009

BRUSSELS - Europe once had 80 to 90 percent of
the world's Jews, until the 20th century's
calamities brutally cut that figure down to the
current estimate of 10%. Two very different
societies - Israel and the United States - have
replaced Europe as home of the major centers of Jewish life.

But Europe's Jews are apparently no longer
satisfied with accepting this verdict of history.
They are increasingly organized and increasingly
vocal. And now they have a lobby.

The inauguration in Brussels of a new branch
office of the European Jewish Congress last week
marks a dramatic development in European Jewish
political activism, believes EJC president Moshe Kantor.

"In Europe we see both too much tolerance" - for
example, toward the Iranian regime's genocidal
ambitions - "and too little" when it comes to
Europe's religious and ethnic minorities, Kantor says.

The office in Brussels will be charged with
"triggering important processes in legislation,
legal issues and research to advance tolerance.
The goal is not to talk about tolerance, but to
[engage] in a wide spectrum of real action," he adds.

According to Raya Kalenova, the director of the
new office, it will also focus on "educating
against anti-Semitism and for reconciliation
between the three great monotheistic religions."

The message of the new Jewish presence in the
heartland of European government "is that
Europe's Jews are European citizens with European values," Kalenova
explains.

The opening of the Brussels office on Wednesday
seemed to suggest the organization already
possessed the ability to reach the highest
echelons of European politics. In attendance at
the celebratory cocktail reception and dinner
were Europe's most senior officials, including
European Parliament President Jerzy Buzek,
European Commission President José Manuel
Barroso, Commission Vice President for Justice,
Freedom and Security Jacques Barrot, and some 50 MEPs.

Israel also sent a high-ranking representative,
in the person of National Infrastructures Minister Uzi Landau.

According to observers, however, it is too early
to tell whether the new office will be influential or significant.

A comparison with the United States may be
instructive, some argued. Mainstream American
Jewish organizations maintain lobbies in
Washington, but rarely are they influential if
they don't represent the broad consensus of American Jews.

Among the most powerful of the Jewish advocacy
lobbies is the Washington office of the Jewish
Federations of North America, which is focused
almost exclusively on making US tax policy
favorable to charitable giving. This is because
American Jewish life does not exist outside its
non-profit institutions, which include all its
synagogues, schools, old-age homes and charities.

Also in keeping with the wide consensus of the
American Jewish community, Jewish groups in
Washington have been instrumental in developing
civil rights legislation and in advocating in
broad terms for American support for Israeli
security. But they shy away from dealing with
issues that lack an overwhelming Jewish
consensus, such as the Afghan deployment, sex
education or international trade policy.

What, one might ask, are the consensus issues of European Jewry?

Asked about the European Jewish "constituency,"
Yossi Lempkowicz, founder of the European Jewish
Press, a pan-European news agency based in
Belgium, noted that it is not easy to pin down such issues of consensus.

"Europe's Jews are citizens of Europe," he says.
"They care about many different issues as
Europeans," not in clearly defined Jewish blocs.

"For example, there is disagreement on the
question of the expansion of Europe, or on [the
rights of states to limit the wearing of] the Muslim veil," he says.

Furthermore, domestic issues affecting the daily
life of Europe's Jews - taxation, law
enforcement, regulations on religious life - are
not handled at the European level, but in each
country's national institutions.

An even greater obstacle to European Jews'
ability to conduct political advocacy is their
extreme diversity. One may fairly ask if Jewish
Latvians, Belgians and Italians can really share
an overarching agenda that can be represented in pan-European institutions.

In a sense, this question of a Jewish agenda for
Europe is a microcosm of the larger question of European identity.

What does it mean to be "European?" asked one
attendee at the reception. Is this an authentic
popular identity or, as some complain, an invention by activist
bureaucrats?

Another layer of complexity lies in the EJC's own
structure, which is also the umbrella for many
communities outside the EU, including Russia,
Macedonia and Norway. Can EJC Brussels have a
position on EU-Russian energy spats? Or can it
oppose Russia's Iran policy within EU
institutions without harming the political
situation of the Russian Jewish organizations
ostensibly represented in the Brussels office?

All these issues will have to be resolved in the
new office's first months of operation. It is not
likely to be an easy task, and there are no guarantees of success.

Yet, according to many participants, the mere
existence of the new office is a telling symbol
of a nascent European Jewish consciousness that
is emerging alongside the development of a broader European identity.