Opinion | Who Is a Reform Jew?

How many Reform Jews live in Israel? The proper answer to this question ought to be: Who cares? And yet some people do care, me included. Orthodox rabbis care because they fear Reform infiltration; pro-Reform activists care because they want the denomination’s fortunes to rise in Israel; I care because of professional interest. Some care because Reform Judaism plays a significant role in Jewish life in America, and its adherents would like it to play a similar role in Israel. Can it succeed? This depends, among other things, on numbers. Hence, the repeated attempts to figure out the number of Reform Israelis. My latest attempt to do such a thing was part of an ongoing study of Israeli Judaism under the auspices of The Jewish People Policy Institute, of which I am a director. Despite this...

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