IT’S A HUGE DISCRACE

No Matter How Cruel, Your Meat Is Still Glatt Kosher, Israel’s Chief Rabbis Say
Shmarya Rosenberg • FailedMessiah.com

The chief rabbis eat with a forked tongue.

If a restaurant hires belly dancers or dresses its waitstaff in skimpy costumes, it can lose its kosher supervision. The same is true if it puts a Christmas tree in its lobby for tourists or hosts a New Year’s Eve Party on December 31st.

But if a slaughterhouse is caught on tape repeatedly torturing animals in violation of Jewish and secular law, Israel’s chief rabbis say their hands are suddenly tied. There’s nothing they can do, and the slaughterhouse’s kosher supervision has to remain – and this true even when everyone involved, including the company’s CEO, admits the animal cruelty took place.

When Israel Education Television’s Vacuum newsmagazine broadcast an undercover report almost two weeks ago documenting extreme cruelty at Israel’s premier glatt kosher slaughterhouse, Adom Adom slaughterhouse in Beit Shean, the country was shocked. Spontaneous boycotts of products made by Tnuva, Adom Adom’s parent corporation, sprung up overnight. Public figures and private citizens alike expressed revulsion at the video of cattle, imported from Australia, being electrically prodded on their eyes and genitals, over and over and over again, by Adom Adom workers.

This wasn’t the first exposé done of cruelty at Adom Adom slaughterhouse. Several months ago an animal welfare group documented much of the abuse, but it was not broadcast nationally and it got little traction in the media. Adom Adom did nothing to fix the problems and Israel’s chief rabbis remained aloof.

But when the Vacuum exposé aired almost two weeks ago, Adom Adom’s world exploded.

An international investigation was launched because the cruelty violated international treaties Israel signed, and because Israel’s track record in enforcing such agreements is spotty.

Australian animal welfare groups called for a ban on cattle sales to Israel.

In Israel, spontaneous boycotts of Tnuva products were launched. Orthodox animal welfare activists tried to find sources of red meat that were not cruel and used the Adom Adom affair as a teaching moment. And then a group of activists petitioned the chief rabbis, asking them to pull Adom Adom’s kosher supervision, thinking that this would send a message to all kosher slaughterhouses that animal welfare mattered.

And the state’s haredi chief rabbis, who seemingly never miss an opportunity to stick their noses in everyone else’s business, suddenly balked at sticking their noses in at Adom Adom, where it most certainly was their business.

“Our Holy Torah commands us to be compassionate towards animals and prohibits causing undue sorrow,” the chief rabbis said in statement. However, they continued, while outraged by the abuses at Adom Adom, the Chief Rabbinate does not have the authority to revoke its supervision of Adom Adom kosher slaughter because of those abuses.

The rabbis reportedly called on Adom Adom to draft guidelines to ensure that the unacceptable behavior by its employees is not continued, and recommended – but did not order – that any animal that is abused should be immediately classified as non-kosher.

Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi Yonah Metzger added that “tza’ar ba’alei hayyim [gratuitous or preventable pain caused an animal] is prohibited by the Torah and if the Chief Rabbinate had the authority, it would revoke the kosher supervision from the company.”

Many people question the chief rabbi’s claim that they cannot revoke Adom Adom’s kosher supervision for intentionally torturing animals, while the chief rabbis continue to claim that they have the right to revoke the kosher supervision of restaurants that host New Year’s Eve parties or have belly dancers, even though the High Court of Justice ruled more than a decade ago that they did not have that power.

Among those people are activists and leaders of several animal welfare organizations who are taking the chief rabbis to Israel’s High Court of Justice, hoping for a ruling that would compel the chief rabbis to revoke Adom Adom’s kosher supervision.

The chief rabbis set a precedent in the Agriprocessors animal cruelty case in 2004, when the Postville, Iowa glatt kosher slaughterhouse – the largest in the world – was caught on video committing some of the worst acts of animal cruelty recorded in modern times.

While at first seeming to rule that the meat from Agriprocessors might not be kosher, the rabbis quickly made clear that Agriprocessors meat was the finest glatt kosher meat available and completely kosher.