Tomorrow is election day. Whatever the result, there’s a problem the campaigns aren’t talking about, and it goes to the core of Hiddush’s work. In just the past few weeks: Rabbi Dov Lior, the senior rabbinic authority of Otzma Yehudit, ruled that stealing olives from Palestinian groves is permitted, and even a mitzvah. The same day, Washington Post photojournalist Heidi Levine was severely beaten by a group of masked settlers in tzitzit while covering an olive harvest. She needed surgery for four broken vertebrae and a nearly severed finger. A Bar-Ilan professor was indicted for drawing up plans for mass killings of Arab citizens. Churches in the Old City are being spat on and defiled. Kol HaNeshama, a Reform synagogue in Jerusalem, was broken into repeatedly during the High Holidays. At the same time, Shas and UTJ leaders are caught on tape saying the draft negotiations were only meant to “buy time,” and a Shas yeshiva that takes millions in state funding dances to a song rejecting “the rule of the heretics” - as did the official UTJ rally last night! We work closely with many religious Jews who live by justice, tolerance and love of one’s fellow. But we can not ignore how often this violence and contempt for the law is tied to religious leaders and justified in religious terms. Hiddush will not take any specific side in these elections. But what we will say is that these events are a distorted conception of Judaism, and that Diaspora Jewish leaders and philanthropists must speak up. Read more from Rabbi @uriregev in our recent newsletter: app.activetrail.com/S/aijixx…

Victory in the Supreme Court!! Last night the Supreme Court issued a conditional order in the petition we filed together with MK @NaamaLazimi against convening the Finance Committee during the Knesset's election recess. The Court ruled that the Knesset Speaker, the Finance Committee Chair, and the Ministry of Finance must explain why the coalition funds approved at that illegal session shouldn't be canceled. Until they do, the money stays frozen under an interim order. The Court also granted our request to release urgent funds — including reimbursements to local authorities for the "Summer Vacation School" program and rehabilitation budgets for communities in northern and southern Israel. That's a distinction that the Finance Minister refused to make when the Court first asked him to. The Minister tried to hold northern and southern recovery funds hostage — and block Education Ministry salaries — to force through budget transfers for religious coercion, Haredi institutions, and illegal settlements. The Court sided with us instead: releasing the funds people actually need, and blocking the illegal transfers. Religious freedom and equality cannot exist when public funds are treated as bargaining chips. It's high time the Finance Minister learned that public funds belong to all Israeli citizens, and must be allocated fairly, not according to political interests. Read more >> jpost.com/israel-news/politi…

Update on our High Court petition against the NIS 460 million coalition fund transfers: Quick recap: on August 4th, the Knesset Finance Committee convened during the election recess and approved hundreds of millions of shekels in transfers, including large sums for Haredi institutions. Together with MK @NaamaLazimi, Hiddush petitioned the High Court, arguing that the meeting was unlawful — and, on August 5th, the court froze most of the transfers pending a ruling. This week, on Tuesday, the court held the actual hearing on our petition. Our Deputy Director & Legal Advisor Dr. Yifat Solel argued that the transfers unlawfully bundled legitimate "special case" spending together with unrelated political spending — comparing it to putting matzah on the table, surrounding it with pita, and calling the whole table kosher. She also pointed out that no one has ever produced a legal opinion actually justifying the "special cases" exception the committee relied on — the chairman simply said, verbally, that Knesset Speaker Amir Ohana had signed off, with no paper trail behind it. When the Finance Minister's office pushed the court to not split the funds and to decide everything at once, Solel said that "sounds like a statement by a mafioso." The court has signaled it's leaning toward a middle path — releasing only the genuinely urgent transfers and sending the rest back to the Finance Ministry, which is close to what we asked for from the start. A final decision is still pending - but we'll keep you posted! Read more >> jpost.com/israel-news/politi…

On Friday, Israel’s Attorney General told the High Court: ultra-Orthodox schools that don't teach core curriculum won't keep getting State funding, full stop. This is a direct response to the petition that we filed challenging the State's funding of institutions that skip math, English, and science entirely. Even more telling — the AG admitted that the state's own supervision data doesn't reflect the real scope of non-compliance. In other words: the problem is bigger than the government has been willing to say. Taxpayer funds should come with obligations in how the money is used. We will keep pushing until we can guarantee that all schools in Israel teach a core curriculum — and those that don’t will no longer receive public funding. Read more >> ynetnews.com/article/zk3w65b…

The outgoing coalition “has spent its four-year-term championing an ultra-Orthodox leadership that is ever-more determined to maintain its community’s broad exemption from the responsibilities of national defense, multifront war notwithstanding, and it is massively funding an ultra-Orthodox non-education system knowing full well that this godless apparatus deliberately denies its students the opportunity to effectively participate in a first-class workforce.” As @davidhorovitz outlines in his recent op-ed — and as Professor Dan Ben-David of the @shoresh_inst has long warned about — Israel is at a crossroads. Or, perhaps more aptly, on a cliff edge. “Israel’s entire education system is in crisis. Its fastest-growing community, the ultra-Orthodox, is getting by far the worst education of all. An inadequate education spells a non-competitive workforce, a weakened army, and a country that simply won’t survive.” Without sweeping, profound, and rapid changes in government policy, the State of Israel will soon face existential danger. The upcoming election could be the last chance to turn things around… Read more >> timesofisrael.com/why-these-…