Minister of Justice Yossi Beilin believes that a more liberal approach should be taken in defining "Who is a Jew" with regard to the Law of Return. At the same time, he calls for greater stringency concerning relatives of Jews who wish to make aliyah without their families. Beilin spoke at this week's Knesset Immigration and Absorption Committee meeting at which several proposed amendments to the Law of Return placed on the Knesset agenda by MKs Chaim Lowenthal, Chaim Druckman, Michael Kleiner, and others were discussed.

Nevertheless, Beilin stressed that this is his personal opinion, stating that Prime Minister Ehud Barak had expressed his firm opposition to any amendments to the law due to the negative repercussions likely to result from such changes. "I consider "Jewishness" to be a national rather than a religious definition," said Beilin, "and I fail to understand why a non-religious Jew who wishes to define himself as a Jew by nationality needs the approval of the rabbinate."

In Beilin's view, the law regarding the right of the grandchild of a Jew to immigrate to Israel was intended to allow grandchildren to accompany their grandparents to Israel -- and not to permit anyone claiming that he had a Jewish grandfather who died 90 years earlier to obtain Israeli citizenship and immigrant rights. Jewish Agency Treasurer Chaim Chesler reported on Agency efforts to reinforce Jewish identity and enhance the link with Israel among candidates for aliyah from the former Soviet Union. He added that the Agency intends to invest millions of additional dollars in this effort. He was interrupted by MK Shmuel Halpert of Agudat Israel, who accused the Jewish Agency and Chesler personally of encouraging non-Jews to immigrate to Israel: "You will cause us to become a Jewish minority in a multi-national state," he said. "The Law of Return is not sacrosanct and can be amended."

Deputy Absorption Minister Maria Solodkin (Yisrael Ba'aliya) and MK Sofa Landver (One Israel) addressed the Committee, followed by MK Victor Brailovsky (Shinui) and MK Michael Nudelman (Yisrael Beteinu). They lauded Chaim Chesler's personal efforts during his tenure as head of the Jewish Agency mission to the FSU after the fall of the Iron Curtain, as well as the Jewish Agency's activities on behalf of aliyah .

While all the speakers expressed their opposition to amending the Law of Return -- and most felt that conversion processes should be eased as well - it became obvious during the meeting that any amendments to the law would encounter serious difficulties.

Committee Chair MK Naomi Blumenthal was adamant that any amendment to the Law of Return must be handled with extreme caution. Nevertheless, she stated, in the current situation in which more than 55% of olim are not halachically Jewish, the law should be changed to reflect the immigrant's desire to cast his fate with the Jewish people and the State of Israel. "The State of Israel has become an attractive place for people from the Third World," said Blumenthal, "and the country must protect itself from being inundated by people without any real connection to Judaism."

Immigration and Absorption Minister Yuli Tamir presented the position of the government and the prime minister which opposes any amendment to the Law of Return. She emphasized that the clause which refers to the "grandson who arrives without family" is meaningless, inasmuch as only a few olim actually fall in this category.

MK Abed Almalek Dahamshe (Raam) declared that he has no intention of limiting the rights of Jews to return to and settle in Israel. "Nevertheless, the law must be amended to provide justice for Arab citizens who seek to return to and settle in the country," he said.

Rabbi Richard Hirsch, Chairman of the Jewish Agency Committee for the FSU, stated that while the Jewish Agency opposes amending the law, it is undertaking to reinforce Jewish identity and the connection with Israel among olim.

Chernowicz, the early 1940's. Kurt Rauchberger is preparing for his bar-mitzvah. Two weeks before the ceremony, the Nazis approach the city and his parents manage to send him away to Uzbekistan. They themselves perish in the war. Kurt grows up in an orphanage and later marries the Russian girlfriend he met there. His memories of Judaism fade and only in the '90s does his grandson, Stanislaw, begin the search for his Jewish roots. He visits the synagogue and contacts the Jewish Agency emissary. Halachically, Stanislaw is not Jewish although according to the Law of Return he is entitled to become an oleh (new immigrant).

The controversy which has erupted over the Law of Return refers largely to the grandchildren of Jews. They, however, are not a major issue, since the majority of olim, their children and their spouses, are Jews; it concerns primarily the grandchildren who arrive without their Jewish grandparent, and they constitute only a small percentage of those coming to Israel.

More than any other law, it is the Law of Return which defines the unique nature of the State of Israel, which is not just the state of its citizens, but a state for the entire Jewish people. Israel was recognized as a Jewish state by the nations of the world in 1947, and was declared as such by its founders in 1948. When presenting the Law of Return to the Knesset, Ben Gurion viewed it as the most fundamental basic law. The Law of Return recognizes the natural right of all Jews to immigrate and reflects the on-going link between the Jewish people and Israel. Without the Law of Return, Israel's moral base will be affected, a divide will be created between the State of Israel and the Jewish people, and aliyah will cease.

It is true that family members who are not halachically Jewish also immigrate along with those who are Jewish. The proposal to prevent the immigration of such family members is inhuman and eventually will tear families into pieces or separate the Jewish people from Israel. In the demographic situation currently faced by the Jewish people, Jews who do not have some non-Jewish relations (as defined halachically) are few and far between. If we close the gates to them, those Jews will be left on the wrong side of the fence. We must therefore, address the challenge facing us and act to prevent the formation of a new national group whose members are neither goyim (gentiles) nor recognized as Jews.

In general, those olim who are not halachically Jewish wish to be full members of the Israeli people. They are part and parcel of Israel's Jewish society - they speak Hebrew, their day of rest is the Sabbath and national Jewish festivals are their festivals and holidays too. Their children study at our Jewish state schools and they then serve in the Israeli Army (IDF) alongside our own children.

We are duty-bound and we have the opportunity of helping them become an accepted part of the Israeli people. We must teach them the traditions and values which they were deprived of for seventy years. We must guarantee that those who come to live with us, learn to be Jewish and that those who wish to live their lives as Israeli Jews like us, can undergo a process of conversion (giyur). This recognizes the supreme interest of the Jewish people: not to close the gates, not to perpetuate a "half-Jewish" minority, not to reject family members, but to bring them close to us.

The State of Israel and the Jewish Agency did not close the gates to Stanislaw. He made aliyah with his parents and grandfather. He was absorbed at a boarding school, took an interest in Judaism and converted. His conversion ceremony took place after he joined the ranks of the IDF. Kurt Rauchberger who had not heard Jewish music played in a synagogue for almost 60 years, now prays with Stanislaw - his grandson, who has become an observant Jew, and is continuing the tune which came to a standstill with the Nazi occupation of the Ukraine.

It is this tune which connects the Jewish people with Israel and links past and future. It must go on.

The prospect of far right-wing leader Joerg Haider entering the Austrian government intensified this week with the collapse of coalition talks between the country's ruling parties. Political analysts in Vienna now believe it is only a matter of time before Haider, who once praised some of Hitler's policies, becomes a member of the next administration.

In recent days, two opinion polls showed that if new elections were held today, Haider would finish in first place. It is no coincidence that Haider is now calling for new elections as a way to resolve the nearly four-month deadlock in forming Austria's next government.

Minister of Justice Yossi Beilin called upon Israel to recall its ambassador to Vienna if Haider and his Freedom Party join the government.

Austria's 10,000 Jews are watching developments closely but insist that for now there is no reason for panic. "It's an unpleasant situation as nothing seems certain," says Pnina Schreiber, the Jewish Agency's representative in Austria. "People talk a lot about the political situation, especially the rise of Haider but no one is packing his or her bags out of fear."

Schreiber says that there has been no change in the number of Jews making aliyah since Haider's anti-immigration Freedom Party captured second place in last October's national elections. In the immediate aftermath of the vote, she received two or three calls of inquiry but that was it. Schreiber expects about 20 people to immigrate to Israel in 2000, around the same number as in recent years.

While Haider's popularity has continued to grow since the elections, it has not triggered an increase in overt anti-Semitism in Austria. "There's been no major change in anti-Jewish actions or sentiment in recent months," says veteran Vienna-based Jewish journalist Karl Pfeifer, who is the Austrian correspondent for Kol Yisrael. "But anti-Semitism has always been a part of Austria and will continue to be. It's an Israeli misconception to always be on the lookout for open anti-Semitism. What's often more dangerous is the latent kind."

Pfeifer, who strongly opposes Haider's entry into the government, dismisses the idea that Jews face any new threat. Ironically, he says, there was more anti-Semitic rhetoric before the October elections. Hate mail to Jewish leaders, he says, increased ten-fold in the weeks leading up to the vote but subsided after the election.

A new program developed by the Israeli Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare is designed to recruit Israelis living abroad and new immigrants to the high-tech field in Israel.

The program enables returning citizens and new immigrants with academic degrees in science to register for professional high-tech courses in the United States. College graduates in social sciences will be able to register for retraining courses in Israel. These courses will train participants for academic work in the field of computers. According to the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs, successful graduates of the course will have no problem finding employment in the high tech field in Israel.

Boaz Herman, the Jewish Agency aliyah emissary in Miami, reports that a pilot project was already conducted in Washington and New York. The program is currently operating in Miami, Boston, and Chicago as a joint effort by the Israeli Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare, the Jewish Agency for Israel, and the local Israeli consulate.

The 600-hour courses -- in program security, technical writing, and administration of communications networks (MCSE) -- as well as academic courses, will be conducted at locations in the center of Israel. The classes are scheduled to start in January 2001, in order to enable interested participants enough time to come to Israel and undergo the various stages of initial absorption beforehand. At the end of their studies, participants will be referred to potential employers.

During their studies, participants will receive a living stipend from Israel's National Insurance Institute. According to Herman, Israelis living abroad and potential immigrants are very interested in high tech in Israel, which is very lucrative, even in comparison with other Western countries.

The Jewish population of Florida numbers close to one million. Of these, 30,000 are former Israelis.

"Free Jonathan Pollard - he is morally innocent," says 44 year old Eli Yosef. Yosef is now in his 15^th consecutive day of a hunger strike opposite the Knesset building in Jerusalem in an effort to enlist support for the release of convicted Israeli spy Jonathan Pollard.

Yosef, a native of Egypt, who immigrated to England, made aliyah at the age of 19, where he was immediately conscripted into an IDF combat unit. About seven years ago he established B'not Zion, a residential high school for female new immigrants from France and Morocco.

Convinced that Israel was not taking adequate measures to secure Pollard's release, he began a hunger strike two weeks ago, after recovering from a serious traffic accident. Anyone who passes information to the State of Israel about enemy intentions to damage Israel using gas -- 55 years after the Holocaust -- is morally innocent, contends Eli, even if he is guilty technically.

He is highly critical of Israel and its leadership. "The State of Israel should have obtained this crucial information through more acceptable channels," he says. "However, from the moment it recruited Pollard, it was responsible for standing behind him."

Senior Israeli officials working to secure Pollard's release say in response that the efforts on his behalf continue unabated. Nonetheless, they emphasize, in light of the stiff opposition by American intelligence bodies, these efforts are being conducted through quiet diplomacy and without media fanfare.

• This past week, Alan Hoffman, formerly director of the Hebrew University's Melton Center, was appointed Director-General of the Jewish Agency's Department of Jewish Zionist Education. The department has some 350 emissaries working in formal and informal educational institutions throughout the world.

• 1,207 new immigrants from all over the world are expected to arrive in Israel this week. Of these, 1,128 are from the FSU.

• More than 12,000 people visited the Aliyah Fair that took place this past November in Argentina. An additional 10,000 are considering aliyah. The number of olim from Argentina rose by some 27% compared with 1998.

• It will cost the Jewish Agency $26,153,000 to operate absorption centers in the year 2000.

• The Jewish Agency spent $116,300 to provide summer camp activities in Israel for 784 Ethiopian immigrant children from Quara in 1999.

• The total JAFI budget for the year 2000 is $387,735,000. This includes a regular budget of $320,900,000, a special rescue budget of $9,330,000, and earmarked contributions totaling $57,505,000.

Eleven youth and young adults from Azerbaijan have been flown back to their families for a long weekend. They are accompanying a mission of top American leaders designed to familiarize participants with absorption and educational projects supported by their collective fundraising efforts. According to the Jewish Agency emissary in Baku, the youngsters -- high school and university students -- came to Israel on their own as part of the Jewish Agency's Na'aleh and Selah programs.

The youth and their parents will enjoy lunch together with mission members at a local restaurant. They will then host the American leaders in their homes, after which the group will tour the local synagogue.

The visit to the Azerbi capitol is the culmination of the "Voyage of Discovery" -­ a five-day mission of 93 federation presidents and other top American Jewish leaders. Although this is the third annual Voyage, it is the first time it is sponsored by the United Jewish Communities.

The mission, which began in Tel Aviv on Sunday, January 23, focused primarily on the absorption and social programs sponsored by the Jewish Agency for Israel and the American Joint Distribution Committee.

The itinerary was divided into four parallel tracks, all of which included meetings with new immigrants at an absorption center -- in Lod, Ashkelon, or Mevasseret Zion; tours of a Youth Aliyah village or other program for disadvantaged or abused youth; visits to special projects aimed at facilitating the integration of new Ethiopian immigrants; and visits to innovative projects developed within the framework of the Jewish Agency's Partnership 2000 framework.

Mission members met with Minister of Interior, Natan Sharansky; Chairman of the JAFI Executive, Sallai Meridor; JAFI Treasurer, Chaim Chesler; and other prominent Israeli personalities.

During the two-day visit to Baku on January 25 and 26, they learned about rescue and rehabilitation activities conducted by the Jewish Agency and the JDC. Jewish Agency programs in the city include an ulpan, a limudia, which prepares candidates for acceptance into JAFI frameworks in Israel, a winter camp for youth, and a parents club. The JDC operates a Jewish kindergarten, a community center, a welfare agency, and a Hillel student center.

Recent elections in Uzbekistan will have little impact on the country's Jewish population, says Amos Lahat, Director-General of the Jewish Agency's Department of the Former Soviet Union. In early January, Islam Abduganievich Karimov was re-elected president of the former Soviet republic. Karimov received an overwhelming 92 percent of the vote, earning a third straight five-year term. A few weeks earlier in a separate ballot, voters reelected a pro-government majority in the 250-seat National Assembly.

"During the past year, Uzbekistan witnessed an attempt to bring change through terrorist tactics," adds Lahat, citing the bombing in Tashkent last fall which killed several people. "The government succeeded in gaining control over the Islamic fundamentalist groups responsible for this atrocity and restoring relative quiet. As long as Karimov is president, the situation should remain more or less stable for Jews despite the expected growth of Islam in the region."

Karimov, 62, holds a degree in mechanical engineering and a doctorate in economics. A former finance minister, hee is credited with reforming the Communist Party after being elected First Secretary of its Central Committee.

In contrast to recent election campaigns in Russia, there was no "Jewish issue" or courting of the Jewish vote in the Uzbeki elections. Although the Jews an important part of the country's Uzbekistan's professional work force, the community numbers only 24,000 out the country's total population of 24 million.

Uzbekistan, which won its independence from Russia in 1991, borders on Kazakhstan, Kirgyyzia, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Turkementistan, and the Aral Sea.

Over the past ten years, the Uzbeki Jewish population has shrunk drastically due to the massive immigration to Israel. Whereas in 1989 the country's Jews numbered 96,000; today the community has dwindled to 24,000.

The majority of Uzbeki Jews -- some 14,800 -- live in Tashkent, home to two synagogues. The rest reside in Samarkand (4,200), Bukhara (3,000) and Fergana (850), with smaller numbers scattered in rural towns and villages.

Most are members of the indigenous Bukharan Jewish community, descended from caravan merchants from Persia plying the Silk Road. Jewish roots in the region date back to the first century CE, possibly earlier.

Most of the Jews in Samarkand and Bukhara live in the Jewish quarters of the old cities. The tightly-knit Jewish community has made valiant efforts to preserve Jewish life; they follow religious practices such as circumcision, kashrut, and daily prayer, and teach their children Hebrew. Intermarriage is low. There is a synagogue in Samarkand, headed by a local Chabad-affiliated rabbi.

Nearly all the Ashkenazim in Uzbekistan today live in Tashkent, as do about 2,000 Bukharan Jews. The Ashkenazi Jews of Tashkent are much more assimilated than the Bukharan communities, and intermarriage is fairly common.

Over 800 Jewish children attend Jewish schools in Tashkent, Samarkand, and Bukhara. Each city maintains a Jewish day school; there is a Sunday school in Samarkand, and a kindergarten in Bukhara. Tashkent and Samarkand have Jewish cultural centers and Jewish Sunday schools. A Jewish monthly, Shofar, is published in Russian.

The first Jewish Agency emissary arrived in Tashkent in 1990. Two years later, a direct flight station opened -- the first in the Central Asian republics. The JAFI office in Tashkent is responsible not only for JAFI activities in Uzbekistan, but also in the other four Central Asian republics. Some 26,000 people -- 10,000 from Uzbekistan and 16,000 from elsewhere in Central Asia ­ take part in aliyah-related activities: ulpanim, summer camps, youth clubs, and other activities for youth.

Increased aliyah is only one facet of a growing Jewish and Zionist reawakening among Argentinean Jewry.

Kito Hasson, the head of the Jewish Agency delegation to Latin America, reports that a chapter of the Zionist youth movement, "Young Israel," was recently opened in a suburb of Buenos Aires. Together with another chapter in Argentina and one in Uruguay, the movement encompasses some 500 teenagers.

Furthermore, a new youth center, named for the late Aryeh Dulzin, who served as chairman of the World Zionist Organization from 1978 to 1987, opened in the capitol early last year. The center's activities are designed to deepen Jewish and Zionist identity among young Jews age 14 to 23. In addition to ongoing activities, the center will offer a summer camp and seminars focusing on Judaism and Zionism.

Young Israel, which is affiliated with the General Zionists, is active in various locations in the Jewish communities around the world.

• "As a Jew, he always wanted to come to Israel," said the father of Raphael Zangwill, the 24 year old Israel Defense Forces soldier killed this week in south Lebanon. Raphael made aliyah alone in 1995 from Latvia. His father noted that he was very attached to his friends in the army and spoke all the time about his military service.

• The ten-day long strike by teachers affiliated with the Israel Teachers Union ended today. However, the strike at the ports is continuing.

• President Ezer Weizmann, in a speech to the nation: "I shall not resign. I am not guilty. At most, I made an innocent human error."

• Israel is preparing for a weekend snowstorm. Since the heavy rains that began earlier this month, the Kinneret (Sea of Galilee) has risen by 15 inches - almost seven inches above the lowest red line. However, the water level is still thirteen feet below the highest red line.

• The planned peace talks in Washington between Israel, Syria, and the United States did not take place this week, as Syria refused to send its representatives to the talks.

Reuben Weinstein wanders the streets of Almatti, with the excitement of a twelve year old child. He has jointed other Hebrew teachers from Kazakhstan who have gathered for a seminar on the rich Jewish history of the region, all but buried by decades of Soviet repression. Some of the participants have traveled almost two days by train through length and breadth of the republic to attend this event.

The seminar, in which various Israeli emissaries participated, included a Kabbalat Shabbat service, Hebrew study, and a Tu B'Shvat seder.

Weinstein wanders around the town like a native. When he was six-years old, in the 1930s, he arrived in the town together with his family from Irkutsk in Siberia. Although the house in which he grew up is gone, the school across the street is still standing as is the railway station that fired his imagination as a child. He tells everyone excitedly: "This is where I played, and my dog accompanied me to school over there. Here's the train station where my father left for the war."

All his colleagues at the seminar could envisage the recruits from Almatti climbing onto the train; they could see the Panfilow Division leaving for the front. They could see Reuben's 18-year old aunt marching to the train station together with the other 1,000 female volunteers . "When they reached the station, a Soviet general explained the danger, but none of them backed down," says Weinstein.

Weinstein left Almatti at age 12. He eventually came to Israel from Italy with Youth Aliyah, and attended the agricultural school in Nahalal. After that served in the Israel Defense Forces Nachal (Pioneer Corps) where he met his wife Tamar. He lived on kibbutz and, until his recent retirement, worked for the Israeli police force's Division for the Investigation of Fraud.

"Now I can do what I enjoy doing," he says. Tamar's and my interest was always the Jewish people and absorbing new immigrants."

Reuben was very excited when he was offered the opportunity of going to Almatti. He pulled out a string of photographs that his mother sewed into the back of his coat when he was 12. He sees his return to Almatti as a direct continuation of the life he left in the 1930s.

Almost 2000 people have made aliyah to Israel from Kazakhstan. Many of those who remain are studying Hebrew, participate in various Jewish social activities, and celebrate the Jewish holidays together.

Reuven explains that during the Second World War, a routine developed among both adults and children to spend time at the railway station - to find out who was wounded, who returned from the front, who was forced to flee. There, at the railway station, the link with Zionism was born. One day, staff members from the University of Odessa showed up. Among them was Prof. Yaakov Marson. He used to look for Jewish children so that he could teach them Hebrew and Judaism privately.

"I am now privileged to follow in his footsteps and help those who were left behind return to Judaism," says Weinstein.