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Back to the Kinneret Convention
By Israel Harel
Tags: Israel News, ultra-Orthodox 

About a decade ago, The Forum for National Responsibility was established. It was sponsored by the Yitzhak Rabin Center for Israel Studies, and it included people from academia, the rabbinate, the art world, the media, the defense establishment, industry and administration. Its main purpose was to create a common denominator that would put an end to the profound rift that had developed after the assassination of prime minister Yitzhak Rabin.

About two years later, after a very rocky process, the forum presented its main accomplishment to the public: the Kinneret Convention. The fact that the signers were people of stature from almost every sector of Israeli society - from the ultra-Orthodox to the Zionist extreme left - was a source of optimism. The convention, its architects hoped, would change the ugly atmosphere, create convergence around its main principles and end the tendencies toward polarization and hatred.

In fact, the convention did not become a formative document, due mainly to a lack of leadership, patience and adherence to the task by its creators. Nevertheless, despite the fact that the Israeli public has undergone additional upsets and upheavals since then, its principles, which are a continuation of the principles of Israel's Declaration of Independence, seem to be acceptable to most Israelis even now. For with the exception of marginal and separatist elements, nobody questions the broad consensus that "the State of Israel is the national home of the Jewish people, the sanctuary of its spirit, and the foundation-stone of its freedom" and must therefore be "democratic, respectful of the rights of minorities and peace loving."
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Because the rifts continue to rip us to shreds - and because there already exists a document that constitutes a worthy basis for achieving national reconciliation - it is important to renew the momentum of the convention. The government (two of whose members, Moshe Ya'alon and Daniel Hershkowitz, were among the document's signatories and members of the founding forum) should thus initiate a broad national dialogue, and form a ministerial task force that includes Benny Begin and Dan Meridor, among others.

This task force could recruit opposition members such as former education minister Yuli Tamir, who was a dominant figure, perhaps the most dominant, in formulating the Kinneret Covenant, and of course additional academics and public figures from Tamir's political camp who also signed the document. (Aharon Barak, the father of forum member Tamar Barak, was once invited to one of the forum's events. "A miracle," was how the then-president of the Supreme Court described the ability of his daughter and her friends to reach such a consensus and compose such a convention.)

Introducing the convention would be a very welcome step toward creating a shared foundation for Israeli society. The convention is also an excellent educational document that should be taught in the Israeli school system, instead of the post-Zionist content that has infiltrated the study of civics.

Today, the 17th of Tammuz, the Romans breached the walls of Jerusalem. The Jewish sources at our disposal testify that this was made possible mainly by the profound internal rift in the nation at that time, which climaxed in bloody battles among the defenders of the city even as the Roman invaders were forcing their way toward the Temple.

In spite of the harsh disputes, we are currently nowhere near civil war, God forbid. But there is a clear tendency toward distancing and alienation between the various sectors of society. To reduce these tendencies, which threaten the future of the Third Temple no less than security dangers do, we can and must do no less than we do in the realm of security.

And the Kinneret Covenant, as proposed, is certainly a worthy ideological foundation for beginning activity in this vital and sensitive sphere.
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