Religion Magazine

Proposed Law: Nothing to Even Indicate Possible Kashrut in Businesses Serving Food, Without the Rabbanut

By Gldmeier @gldmeier
Shas, via ML Yoav Ben Tzur, is trying to get a new law passed, with coordinating with their coalition partners.
I am not sure if the bigger story of this is the lack of coordination and the attempt to push it through regardless of anyone else's opinion, or if the bigger story is the law itself.
Shas has announced that it wants a law passed by which a restaurant, any establishment serving food would have to get a hechsher from the Rabbanut confirming that the food is kosher. No private hechshers allowed.
This does not just refer to the hechsher itself - that they must have a Rabbanut hechsher in order to display a different hechsher. It also includes anything in the establishment that might indicate kashrut - e.g. pictures of rabbonim, prayers on the wall (prayer for successful business or the like), maybe hamsa, the word kosher, or anything else that might make someone think the food inside is kosher. If a restaurant is going to hang in the shop anything like that, he must first have a Rabbanut hechsher.
MKs from Kulanu have a problem with this law. It seems that the biggest problem they have is that Shas is trying to ram it down everyone's throat and did not coordinate at all, and is trying to push it through very quickly with no debate. I did hear MK Rachel Azaria on the radio, and she also does not like the wording of the law, as it is too oppressive - according to Azaria the law would criminalize people who serve coffee in their business meeting and have a "birkat haesek" hanging in the shop, for example.
Interestingly, this would not just affect restaurants looking to avoid the hechsher route (like those getting involved with the "hashgacha pratit" people), but would also require all restaurants with mehadrin hechshers to display Rabbanut hechshers. The radio show hosts on Kol Hai, when discussing the issue, refused to go there (when I was listening) and talk about that, but only wanted to talk about Kulanu's opposition to the law.
No, the government won't be brought down over this. Maximum, Shas will have to put it on hold for a bit while they work out the details with the coalition partners.
According to NRG, Shas says they are unwilling to compromise on this and change the wording.
I am not sure what the rush is. Why can't this wait a few days and get it done properly instead of being pushed through quickly? This makes me most suspicious.
------------------------------------------------------ Reach thousands of readers with your ad by advertising on Life in Israel ------------------------------------------------------

Back to Featured Articles on Logo Paperblog