Mizrahi Orthodox Jews

Mizrahi Jews are primarily from North Africa or the Middle East, their culture is often referred to as vibrant and colorful. “For hundreds of years, most Jews in the Holy Land were Mizrahi/Sephardi.” (Rosenthal 225) The immigration of Ashkenazi Jews began under the British rule and Mirzrahims began to decrease. Rosenthal gives a description of a Ashkenazi and Mizrahi wedding in which the culture differences are apparent from the beginning. Adi was a daughter of Orthodox American Israelis and Moti’s parents were Orthodox Algerian Israelis. Moti’s family hosted a dinner three nights before the wedding in which a traditional henna practice was done as a Mizrahi and Arab custom. Adi and Moti both got matching henna symbolism of their prosperous and long lived marriage. Moti’s family sang to the couple in Arabic while his six sisters danced around them. Adi’s guests did not dance because Orthodox Ashkenazi girls primarily do not dance. After the wedding ceremony the couple move into an apartment together in which they both observe a Mizrahi style of the dietary laws. According to the Pew Study “Sephardim/Mizrahim are generally more religiously observant than Ashkenazim. ”When they except their first child they follow the Mizrahi tradition of naming their child after a living relative. Mizrahis are primality Orthodox Jews and attend a synagogue belonging to the same ethnicity they belong to or are comfortable with. Adi and Moti both being Orthodox Jews value the importance of the connection between state and religion. Israel is meant to be in connection with the religious tradition of Judaism because they claim that persecution their ancestors went through would be a waste. (Rosenthal 223-230) 

The 2016 Haaretz article “In Blow to Rabbinate's Monopoly, Israel's Top Court Approves Private Conversions” discusses rabbinic views on the approval of the new act which gives non-Jews the privilege of being eligible to partake in the Law of Return. Rabbis are calling the new act outrageous making it easy for any non-Jew to obtain citizenship in Israel. Orthodox Jews do not recognize Russian and Ethiopian immigrants as legitimate Jews even through conversion. Reform and conservative conversions are not taken with much seriousness due to their liberal views. Kariv the leader of the Israel Movement for Reform and Progressive Judaism states "This is a day of celebration for all who believe that the unity of the Jewish people will come only through mutual respect and religious tolerance and by Israel's recognition of all streams of thought of the Jewish people.” Other’s argue that this issue is another argument in which Jews are battling between one another as a ranking to determine which Jew is a legitimate Jew. Some followers of the case argue that it is a “war on assimilation.”