When 'Reform' Is No Longer Enough

Brussel's European Quarter is a fascinating place, where one can meet people from the four corners of the Continent. Lobbying groups sprout up every week. A few years ago, a new group materialized on the Rond-Point Schuman, the main square of the quarter: young Lubavitchers. In short time, a kosher restaurant and a new synagogue opened, to which were soon added a state-of-the-art yeshiva, where every single book has been digitalized, a European Jewish Student Center and an Orthodox day school. The man behind all these new institutions is Rabbi Moshe Garelik, the founding director of an organization called the Rabbinical Center of Europe.

This past December, I spent an entire day visiting Garelik's projects. What I discovered was an army of young, smart and dedicated people working for the good of Jews and the tikkun of Europe.

At the end of the day, Rabbi Garelik invited me to a Hanukkah celebration on the other side of the square, at Berlaymont, the building that is the executive heart of the European Commission. There I witnessed a surreal scene. Entering the main hall, in front of a gigantic menorah and under the banner of the European Jewish Community Center, one could see young religious men and women chatting with top European technocrats and MEPs. The event was hosted by the European Commission's vice president, Franco Frattini, who held the shammes candle as the menorah was lit.

How, I wondered, did a bunch of 30-year-old Lubavitchers manage to set up an event unlike any organized by any of the supposedly well-established Jewish organizations, such as the European Jewish Congress, in recent memory?

A short time before this, the president of the World Jewish Congress, Ronald Lauder, and his European counterpart, the Geneva-based Russian businessman Moshe Kantor, were on another, self-styled mission: a meeting with Chancellor Angela Merkel, in Berlin. The topic: Iran's nuclear program. Before beginning the conversation, Kantor presented Merkel with a small gift, a bar of soap, the type, Kantor explained to his host, the Nazis would hand to their Jewish victims as they were being ushered into the gas chambers. "It's a symbol of the need for continued vigilance against anti-Semitism," he was reported as having told her. Merkel went white, and did not respond, but the meeting was much shorter than predicted.

Together, these two surprising scenes exemplify the problem of Europe's Jewish leadership today: On the one hand, a group of young, professional and committed religious Jews, who aim to speak in the name of all Jews, but operate on the basis of no representative authority; on the other, an elected representative who is a loose cannon, with no clear agenda or no political strategy. Indeed, "Europe's Jews Deserve Better," as Antony Lerman wrote on this page on April 4.

The time has come to change the old pattern. For, behind a facade of prosperity and activism, European Jewry is in crisis. Rising rates of intermarriage and creeping assimilation; crumbling schools, retirement homes and community centers; a growing sense of alienation among youngsters who may feel individually Jewish but don't identify with the community - all of these are partly reflected in, and exacerbated by, the difficulty of raising funds for local needs. Politically, the ongoing internal feuds and the lack of common agenda have left a huge vacuum in the European political arena, which is rapidly being filled with new Jewish interest groups, such as Garelik's.

This may be a blessing, as Europe has never seen such an array of senior politicians so well disposed to Israel and to Jewish concerns. However, Jewish politics is flourishing at the expense of a global Jewish policy. In short, it turns the WJC and its European affiliate into obsolete, irrelevant bodies. One cannot point to a single political achievement since the election of their incumbent leadership. Instead of having an impact on policy, they toil on personal media relations and they give speeches.

Far more important than the fate of the WJC and its European affiliate, though, is the fate of the communities they presume to represent. I myself have been witness to too many maneuvers of petty Jewish politics not to feel hungry for another kind of leadership, capable of reflecting Jewish dynamism, creativity and inspiration, fostering the conditions for their development, and yes, strengthening the ties between the Diaspora and Israel.

How do we create that leadership? The major global Jewish institutions are not "reformable." We will need to create new bodies, authentically representative of European Jewry, and a new, inspired and professional leadership, capable of undertaking a deep reform of our communities' social and educational institutions, and revitalizing the Diaspora- Israel relationship.

I know of only one way to do this: democratically. Elections alone don't make democracy. Participation does, and the process needs to be opened up to the Jewish masses. It's past time we began our renewal. With our creativity, our energy and especially with involvement of the next generations, we can certainly expect a multiplicity of ideas and efforts. Perhaps to start, each important constituency - education, social services and Israel fundraising - from communities across Europe, should meet. Sharing their experiences, considering their needs, setting an agenda and a loose structure of its own to promote it will not only engage vastly more activist Jews, but will distribute responsibilities, so that the communities are not left with a few who have positioned themselves at the top of a ladder with so many broken rungs.

Claude Kandiyoti, a founding member of the Kol Dor organization, and a former member of the WJC board of governors, is currently the editor of Contact J, a monthly of the Belgian Jewish Community.