AN ARTICLE IN Israel HaYom for April 28 reported that Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi David Lau, in consultation with other Israeli rabbis, has proposed a changes to kashrut supervision in Israel.
The article examines some of the technical changes, but eventually gets to the “bottom line” which is:
The (kashrut) inspectors (משגיחים) no longer will be paid by the food venue owners. Business owners will pay their local rabbinate, which will hire the inspectors as contract service providers rather than as employees of the local council. The reform is expected to eliminate the ties that exist today between business owners and inspectors, as well as the conflict of interest that currently is in place due to the inspectors being paid by the people whose businesses they approve.
This “pay an agency not the mashgiach (kashrut inspector)” is pretty much SOP (Standard Operating Procedure) for most establishments operating under an organization’s supervision in the U.S. For example, in Florida’s Broward and Palm Beach counties, inspectors are employed by the Orthodox Rabbinical Board (ORB), the primary kashrut agency in the two-county area.
While it may not seem like a potential problem in Israel, there is the potential for a problem arising between Ashkenazi kashrut and Sefardi/Mizachi kashrut.
Sefardi/Mizrachi kashrut — a/k/a Bet Yosef or halak — demands that a Jew participate in food preparation. It is sufficient for a Jew to light the fire to satisfy Ashkenazi kashrut.
To be fair, since most restaurants in the U.S. — and I suspect Israel, too — are owned and operated by Ashkenazim, Sefardi and Mizrachi Jews “accept” the Ashkenazi kashrut where there is no Bet Yosef/halak option.
A visitor to Israel might mistakenly believe that a. All restaurants in Israel are kosher (they are not) and
b. All Israeli restaurant employees are Jews (they are not).
Where there is a large Sefardi/Mizrachi population, such as in South Florida, some restaurant owners will accommodate requests to have a Jew participate in the food preparation (beyond lighting a fire or turning on the electricity).
The Israel HaYom article did NOT specify if the Mizrachi “Sefardic” Chief Rabbi agrees with Rabbi Lau, nor did the article indicate that a food vendor could request Bet Yosef/halak supervision.
According to the article, Lau's plan will allow tens of thousands of food businesses in Israel -- including restaurants, cafes, pizzerias, falafel stands, and other venues that serve food -- to choose between one of two new models of kashrut supervision: electronic monitoring, which costs less, or the "kashrut trustee" model.
The details are provided in the article.
The impetus for the change likely was a growing movement to offer kashrut supervision not controlled by the Chief Rabbinute.
A personal aside. When I worked in Holon there was a small restaurant near my worksite. I asked the Yemenite owner if he had a kashrut certificate. The man hit the roof and invited me to come into his kitchen and storage areas to see for myself that the operation was strictly kosher. “I’m not going to pay some (expletive deleted) “inspector” to come in and tell me I have a kosher restaurant.”
Caveat: I am not a משגיח and I don’t play one on tv.
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