The Israeli rabbinate has been quiet on conversion lately and in its stead, the Interior Ministry has decided to make news. A recent article (“Fresh Rift Seen Over New Israeli Conversion Rules,” February 25, The Jewish Week-New York) says that stricter guidelines will be imposed for diaspora converts wishing to immigrate to Israel. Conversion must be harder, much harder the Ministry insists. The suspicious, the insincere must be ferreted out through harsher standards. Those sneaky foreign workers must be prevented from converting at all costs. But in reality, it is always the sincere converts who pay.

Next year, I will be following my husband to wherever he is appointed as a rabbi. But when a friend in Israel suggested we look for jobs there, I recoiled. Israel, with all the current bureaucracy surrounding conversion, doesn’t look particularly inviting. But even living outside of Israel, I can’t escape the Israeli rabbinate who has managed to stretch its long arm around the world to ensure conversions are more difficult in the diaspora for Orthodox Jews.

Only a handful of Orthodox rabbis can now perform conversions in America through a handful of batei din approved by the Israeli Rabbinate. A convert can’t even begin to study towards their conversion without being approved by one of these courts. And all those who converted before the new, stricter guidelines still aren’t sure if they are really “kosher” according to Israel.

And now, the Interior Ministry seeks to impose new, stricter guidelines on all diaspora converts, even the Orthodox, wishing to immigrate to Israel. The guidelines are simple enough: (a) a minimum of 350 hours study in a Jewish community, (b) 18 months must be spent in the community that does the conversion and (c) of those 18 months, 9 months must be spent in the community to prove a true commitment to Judaism. But each guideline has a deeper, more insidious meaning.

Where the Israeli rabbinate has gotten the Orthodox rabbinate in America to submit to its will, the Interior Ministry has gone one better. The new guidelines will be imposed not just on all diaspora converts but on all diaspora rabbis. Whereas the Israeli rabbinate will continue to watchdog over all Orthodox conversions and the rabbis who perform them, the Interior Ministry will bend diaspora rabbis from all streams to their will. The real message: rabbis cannot be trusted. So even for converts who only nominally flirt with the idea of ever wanting to immigrate to Israel, conversion standards will have to change.

I picture converts from all streams walking around with timesheets taped to their chests. How else will we track those minimum 350 hours of study? How else will we prove that every hour has been counted properly? Perhaps, there will be machines in synagogues where every convert can punch in. And how long before, the Israeli rabbinate or the Interior Ministry decides what is considered acceptable “study.” They will already be deciding which communities are recognized and which aren’t.

I spent only 6 months in the community that performed my conversion. It was too expensive to live there so after those 6 months, I loved to a more affordable one. And once those six months were over, I moved yet again to live in a community that was still more affordable. I don’t have timesheets to prove my 350 hours. I’m not sure if any of these communities were “recognized.” It doesn’t matter. I haven’t clocked in 18 months in any community and I didn’t put in 9 months after my conversion. Does this mean that while the Israeli rabbinate approves of my conversion the Interior Ministry will not allow me to immigrate? Good question. It is just one of many questions converts will be asking themselves soon.

I have a friend works for an organization doing Passover outreach to needy Jewish families. When she was going through applications, she discovered that piles of applications marked “Convert=Not Jewish” had been thrown into the trash. Her superiors assured her this was proper protocol because converts are not really Jewish. “They’re only pretending to be Jewish. “ While perhaps, the Interior Ministry and the Israeli Rabbinate do not hold so harsh a view, they are making one thing clear to converts. Converts will not be afforded the same respect as real Jews. Their status will always be in question. They will always be under suspicion. And though Jewish law demands we never oppress the convert, the Israeli rabbinate and the Interior Ministry will continue to do just that.

Closer to home, by the way, the RCA has invalidated conversion performed by Rabbi Avi Weiss with a beis din that included a rabbi who was himself a convert. For more on that, read “RCA Backtracks On Conversion Policy”.