Holy City, Secular Mayor

Judith Amselem, despite being Orthodox, said she was wary of Meir Porush, who lost last week’s mayoral election against Nir Barkat, the victor. Amselem feared that Porush’s allegiance would stop at his haredi constituency. Michele Chabin

Judith Amselem, despite being Orthodox, said she was wary of Meir Porush, who lost last week’s mayoral election against Nir Barkat, the victor. Amselem feared that Porush’s allegiance would stop at his haredi constituency. Michele Chabin

by Michele Chabin
Israel Correspondent

Jerusalem — No one expects Nir Barkat, Jerusalem’s newly elected secular mayor, to suddenly introduce Shabbat bus service to the city or to hand over large chunks of land to the Reform or Conservative movements to build synagogues or youth centers. Nor does anyone expect the 49-year-old businessman to allocate significantly more money to non-haredi schools or to fund Friday-night entertainment.
What the majority of Jerusalemites who voted for Barkat in the Nov. 11 mayoral election do expect is an all-out effort to preserve the religious status quo, which many believe is threatened by the high birthrate in the haredi sector and the annual exodus of thousands of mostly non-haredi residents.

“I didn’t vote for Barkat just because Porush is frum [religious]. I’m religious myself,” said Adam Nahoum, who is Modern Orthodox, as he watched his son play soccer in a Jerusalem park. “I voted for Barkat largely because he promised to maintain the status quo. I want Jerusalem to retain its religious character, but I also feel that no one should be coerced into being more religious.”

Interestingly, Menachem, a fervently religious man in his 50s who declined to give his last name, said he favored Porush “because we haredim knew that he would at least maintain the religious status quo. Of course we want all of Jerusalem to be haredi, but we know that’s not possible. Our fear is that Barkat will erode the status quo, reducing the city’s holy character.”

Throughout the election — and during his entire career — Porush proudly proclaimed that his goal was to make Jerusalem and the rest of the country more religious.

Two days before the election, Porush told Israel television that the haredi sector is “growing and multiplying at a fast pace, and within 10 years there will not be a secular candidate at all in any city, except maybe in an abandoned village.”

And while Porush vowed to be “a mayor for all Jerusalemites,” he promised in a Jerusalem Post ad to make educational funding a priority — but only for haredi and national religious schools. Secular schools were conspicuously absent.

That advertisement and other Porush statements alarmed Judith Amselem, an Orthodox Zionist.
“We’re not haredim, though we are religious, and I thought, ‘What about the rest of the population?’”
Secular, traditional and even many Modern Orthodox voters were similarly turned off by the message, and in contrast to previous mayoral elections many made it a priority to vote.

“For the first time in many years the non-ultra-Orthodox population in Jerusalem was galvanized,” said Rabbi David Rosen, director of the American Jewish Committee’s department for inter-religious affairs and a longtime resident of the city. “Barkat managed to coalesce them into a united bloc.”

Rabbi Rosen also attributed Barkat’s victory to fissures within the fervently Orthodox community, which weakened Porush’s support base. Some preeminent haredi rabbis instructed their faithful not to vote for Porush, the sole Orthodox candidate.

“One of the most important blocs of the Gerer Hasidim aligned with Barkat,” he noted. “It was revenge payback for Porush’s support of a certain candidate in Beitar Illit,” a haredi town in the West Bank.
Pioneering feminist and Israel Prize winner Alice Shalvi, who has lived in Jerusalem for three decades, believes Barkat won because “a large number of Jerusalemites have suffered — and I mean suffered — from the ultra-Orthodox rule over the city during the past five years and wanted to stop the neglect of public services and cultural activities. They wanted a change, a return to some normality and even the glory days of [longtime Mayor] Teddy Kollek.”

Instead of allocating more money to yeshivas and mikvehs in haredi neighborhoods, Shalvi wants the new mayor to build more parks and support such institutions as the legendary Khan Theater, which is struggling financially.

“I want to see more funding for the things that will improve the quality of life of the majority of Jerusalemites: popular culture, events, open spaces where children can play.”

Yet even if Barkat delivers on these promises, Shalvi, a dedicated pluralist and self-described “halachic Jew,” strongly doubts whether the mayor will turn Jerusalem — whose population is roughly a third haredi, a third non-haredi and a third Arab — into a bastion of pluralism. That’s because he owes a significant part of his victory to the Orthodox sector.

“For me it’s disillusioning to see Barkat in coalition negotiations with the haredi bloc of city council members,” Shalvi said, referring to the many seats haredi Jews won during last week’s municipal elections. “I would have liked him to create a coalition between his own party and the other more liberal parties.”
Assuming Barkat’s coalition depends on the Orthodox city council bloc, “he will need to give them fairly important portfolios and one, unfortunately, is the city planning portfolio,” Shalvi said, her tone ominous. “I doubt we can count on an equitable approach when it comes to the needs of the secular and non-Orthodox.”

Rabbi Rosen agrees that Barkat is beholden to the haredi and national religious rabbis who either supported him or nixed Porush, thereby easing his way. However, he says, “I do think [his win] will make things easier for the non-Orthodox movements. While I understand and acknowledge Alice’s skepticism, I still think the non-Orthodox will have an address with the mayor that was not there before,” he said.

Westchester Jewish Conference

Westchester’s Jewish Community Relations Organization