BRUSSELS: No, Europe's cutting concern undiminished

The Jewish Daily Forward
October 9, 2015

Europe Council Reiterates Opposition to Circumcision

he Council of Europe refuted reports in Israeli media that it had canceled a resolution from 2013 that called nonmedical circumcision of boys a harmful violation of children’s rights.

The clarification Thursday on the position of the Council, a body for pan-European dialog that has no executive powers and is not part of the European Union, came following statements by Israeli politicians, Jewish activists and media suggesting the Council had reversed its position on the practice.

According to those statements, the change came in the passing on Sept. 30 by the Council’s Parliamentary Assembly of Resolution 2076 on “Freedom of religion and living together in a democratic society.”

Milah UK, a leading Jewish advocacy group supporting the practice, on Tuesday said in a statement that Resolution 2076 “cancels a previous motion that had cast into doubt the legality of religious circumcision.” Milah is the Hebrew-language name for the ritual circumcision of eight-day-old males. Muslims also circumcise their children.

The previous resolution referenced by Milah UK is Resolution 1952, which the assembly passed in 2013 and which lists milah along with female genital mutilation and calls both practices a harmful “violation of the physical integrity of children.”

But Nathalie Bargellini, a spokesperson for the Council’s Parliamentary Assembly, on Thursday told JTA that Resolution 2076 “does not cancel nor replace Resolution 1952.” She noted the more recent resolution references the older one.

Bargellini also said that Resolution 2076 “calls for strict conditions governing the exercise of this practice.” According to the new resolution, “circumcision should not be allowed ‘unless practiced by a person with the requisite training and skill, in appropriate medical and health conditions,’” Bargellini said.

Resolution 1952 carried no such recommendation for outlawing certain types of circumcision — a divisive issue in Europe for its relevance to immigration by Muslims and to children’s rights.

Though it is nonbinding, the 2013 resolution was controversial and was seen as significant because it was the first time that a prominent pan-European institution weighed in on the circumcision debate.

Earlier story

JERUSALEM: Jews, Muslims unite to undo Europe's cutting caution

The Jerusalem Post
October 1, 2015

Council of Europe cancels anti-circumcision measure after joint Jewish-Muslim effort

Jewish and Muslim MKs united over past two years to advocate for reversal of Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe resolution calling to ban ritual circumcision of children.
by Lahav Harkov

Two years of efforts by the Knesset to combat a resolution by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe recommending that countries ban [no, age-restrict] ritual circumcision bore fruit Thursday, when it was reversed via a resolution on religious freedoms. Passed with 73 in favor and six opposed, the resolution recommends that PACE member states “seek reasonable accommodations with a view to guaranteeing equality that is effective, and not merely formal, in the right to freedom of religion.”

It gives general guidelines to promote coexistence and fight hate speech, allowing religious communities to practice their faith, manage welfare institutions and express their opinions.
The resolution refers specifically to Islamophobia, but not to anti-Semitism.

The council recommended that states require circumcisions to be performed by people trained to do so, in appropriate medical and health conditions, and that parents be informed of any medical risk to their child.

The resolution also addresses ritual slaughter, stating that PACE is not convinced it should be banned, and recommends following the French or German model of protecting animals from unnecessary suffering while respecting religious freedom.

MK Esawi Frej (Meretz), who represented the Knesset at the vote, called the decision a victory for common sense.

“The argument about whether to circumcise is legitimate, but opponents of the ancient ritual should fight through education and public relations and not try to force their opinions through legislation,” Frej said. [While those who cut children force their opinions with a knife.]

In October 2013, PACE’s Social Affairs, Health and Sustainable Development Committee approved a resolution by German rapporteur Marlene Rupperecht stating that ritual circumcision, in addition to piercings, tattoos, plastic surgery, medical intervention in cases of possibly transgender children and female genital mutilation, violates children’s right to protect their physical integrity. [The words "protect their" are not in the resolution. Obviously small children can not protect their own integrity.]

It also recommended that laws be passed “to ensure that certain operations and practices will not be carried out before a child is old enough to be consulted.” Jews perform ritual circumcision on boys when they are eight days old, and Muslims do so at the age of 13.
PACE resolutions are non-binding, but are taken seriously by member states.

Since the resolution passed, the Knesset, under Speaker Yuli Edelstein’s leadership and the guidance of Knesset Diplomatic Advisor Oded Ben-Hur, has sent delegations of MKs, Jewish and Muslim, to PACE and to countries from Azerbaijan in the East to Paris in the West, to enlist their European colleagues from other countries in the battle against the decision and other initiatives to ban ritual circumcision. MKs advocated for ritual circumcision to be dealt with as a matter of religious freedom, as opposed to children’s rights, moving it to PACE’s Culture, Science Education and Media Committee, which discusses religious issues, among others.
...

STRASBOURG: Hearing about circumcision to be webcast

Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe
January 26, 2014

Hearing on the circumcision of young boys

A parliamentary hearing on the circumcision of young boys is to take place in Strasbourg at 2 p.m. on Tuesday 28 January 2014 on the margins of the plenary session of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE).

The hearing – organised by PACE’s Committee on Social Affairs, Health and Sustainable Development – will bring together medical experts, including those representing the Jewish and Muslim communities, and parliamentarians, and will be streamed live over the web.

It follows the adoption in October 2013 of the Assembly’s resolution and recommendation on “children’s right to physical integrity” and aims to encourage the open debate between different disciplines called for by the Assembly in these texts.

Participants include:

• Bernard Lobel, urologist, Professor at the Faculty of Medicine of Rennes (France), member of the French Academy of Surgeons
• Mesrur Selçuk Silay, paediatric urologist, Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Medicine, Bezmialem Vakif University (Istanbul, Turkey)
• Wolfram Hartmann, paediatrician and President of the Professional Federation of Paediatricians and Youth Doctors (Germany)
• Ronald Goldman, researcher and Director of the Circumcision Resource Center (Boston, USA)
• Marlene Rupprecht, former PACE rapporteur on this issue

Representatives of religious organisations, including the Conference of European Rabbis and the French Council of the Muslim Faith, are expected to attend, as well as NGOs active in this field. Members of the Knesset, which holds observer status with PACE, are also due to take part.

The 1995 television documentary “It's a Boy” by British director Victor Schonfeld, as well as extracts from another film – currently in production – putting forward the point of view of the Knesset observer delegation, will be screened prior to the hearing, at 1 p.m. in the same room.

---

Practical information
The hearing will take place from 2 to 3.30pm French time in Room 1 of the Palais de l’Europe in Strasbourg.

Web streaming: the hearing will be streamed live over the web, in the original language, English, French, German, Italian and Russian. A recording (original language, English and French) will be made available on the website of the Assembly.

Earlier story

JERUSALEM: Knesset to make pro-circumcision film

Jerusalem Post
January 20, 2014

Knesset producing film to fight anti-circumcision laws

by Lahav Harkov & Sam Sokol (with Herb Keinon)
The Knesset is producing a short pro-circumcision documentary, to be filmed this week and shown in a committee of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe next week.

On Monday, MK Nachman Shai (Labor) will represent Israel in the PACE Committee on Social Affairs, Health and Sustainable Development, where he plans to screen the film.

German ex-MP Marlene Rupprecht, who pushed through a motion limiting ritual circumcision last year, invited four doctors to the committee. She also invited filmmaker Victor Schonfeld to present It’s a Boy, an anti-circumcision documentary he had produced.

“It’s a Boy is very bad for the Jewish tradition. Victor Schonfeld is a known anti-Zionist,” Shai said. [And the relevance of that is...] “We demand equal time for our views.”

Shai received approval from Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein on Monday to hire a production company that will interview experts on the topic of circumcision.

The seven- to eight-minute short will also feature Israeli doctors who traveled to Africa to circumcise men in an effort to fight AIDS.

“Maybe we’ll call our film ‘It’s a Circumcised Boy,’” Shai quipped.

The Knesset plans to reuse the film to explain the importance of not outlawing ritual circumcision during lawmakers’ visits to Europe and other places around the world.

Meanwhile, Thorbjørn Jagland, secretary-general of the Council of Europe, during a meeting with Muslim and Jewish clerics on Monday slammed the 2013 resolution by his organization’s legislative arm expressing opposition to ritual circumcision.

The council is a pan-European intergovernmental organization of 47 member states that is not affiliated with the European Union, and which cannot pass binding laws.

Speaking with a delegation of rabbis and imams that the New York based Foundation For Ethnic Understanding organized, Jagland asserted that “starting to limit the rights of minorities is a very dangerous avenue to pursue.

“Whenever we have limited their rights, it has always led to catastrophe,” he told the delegation, that included Said Aalla, the former imam of Strasbourg, where COE is headquartered, as well as René Gutman, the city’s chief rabbi.

FFEU president Rabbi Marc Schneier praised Jagland, and said he believed that the battle for ritual circumcision was “not an issue which affects only Jews or only Muslims, but truly hurts the traditions of a large percentage of the peoples of faith both here in Europe and around the world.”

“What the secretary-general basically said is that this is a moot discussion because they can discuss and debate and deliberate all that they want but there is no way that the Council of Europe is ever going to accept such a resolution or proclamation.

It is just not going to happen,” Schneier told the Post. “If we were to ban circumcision then Muslims and Jews would no longer be able to continue living in Europe.”

The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe passed a resolution in October calling male ritual circumcision a “violation of the physical integrity of children” and urging the organization’s member states to “initiate a public debate, including intercultural and interreligious dialogue, aimed at reaching a large consensus on the rights of children to protection against violations of their physical integrity according to human rights standards.”

Jewish organizations reacted harshly, with the leaders of some European communities deeming the measure to be deeply anti-Semitic. Israel and Turkey, both COE member states, issued denunciations. Israel has prepared a text for a counter-resolution, which it hopes to pass through PACE.

This is not the first time that the COE secretary-general has denounced the PACE resolution. In November, Jagland told a gathering of European rabbis in Berlin that “in no way does the Council of Europe want to ban the practice of male circumcision.”

“Female genital mutilation violates human rights. Male circumcision does not. That is my position. That is the position of the Council of Europe,” he said.

While the PACE resolution has no legal standing, such resolutions exert a powerful moral influence in Europe, and the secretary-general’s statements asserting the body’s opposition to the concepts embodied in the resolution can be seen as an effort to change the prevailing discourse surrounding circumcision.

European Jewish activists believe that Jagland’s statements are part of a battle to set the moral agenda in Europe on issues of religious freedom, and that the resolution, non-binding as it is, was the opening salvo of an effort to turn local initiatives against circumcision into a continent-wide moral crusade against the practice.

Speaking with The Jerusalem Post on Monday, Conference of European Rabbis chief Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt expressed his concern that PACE “has not yet rescinded its position against circumcision,” but expressed hope that during next week’s debate “the members of PACE will reflect on their infringement of religious freedom, which is a fundamental value of the Council.”

Maren Lambrecht, a COE official, confirmed to the Post that it is procedurally impossible to cancel a previously passed resolution, but indicated that a special panel will examine the topic next week and that several medical experts and religious leaders will attend and present their views on the matter. While there will not be a formal decision taken at the end of this meeting, she said, the discussion is necessary due to the “harsh international debate” engendered by the 2013 resolution, among other reasons.

“What it could lead to is that some of the people who might be interested in preparing a new text would listen to some of the debates next week, and maybe this could influence what they are going to write in a new report,” Lambrecht said.

Despite news reports, she said, “there will not be a discussion at this meeting on the [Israeli] counterproposal” during the session.

TEL AVIV: Knesset Members to lobby Europe: "Let us go on cutting babies!"

Jerusalem Post
October 23, 2013

MKs [Members of the Knesset] to traverse Europe to combat anti-circumcision proposals

by Lahav Harkov
MKs plan to travel through Europe in the coming weeks to battle anti-circumcision legislation.
On Wednesday, Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein called in 15 MKs who head caucuses for relations with different European countries to discuss how to fight a resolution that the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe passed earlier this month.

The resolution called male ritual circumcision “a violation of the physical integrity of children,” and said states should protect children “against violations of their physical integrity according to human rights standards.”

[And their rebuttal of these almost self-evident facts is...?]
 
At the meeting, Knesset diplomatic adviser Oded Ben-Hur recommended that the MKs visit European countries and ask their counterparts to sign a new draft resolution written by Israel that would reverse the PACE decision.

In addition, the MKs will check whether there are bills on the dockets of parliaments in Europe that are meant to outlaw circumcision, and work to block them by explaining the importance the ritual has for Jews and Muslims.

“This is a battle that unites religions. [Only religions that want to cut children's genitals...] The PACE decision is scandalous and can set Europe on fire,” Edelstein warned.

The Knesset speaker said that at that moment a European MP could be trying to pass the resolution as law in his or her country, and the MKs must do all they can to stop it.

MK Ahmed Tibi (United Arab List-Ta’al) said that although he did not usually travel with Knesset delegations, he would join this battle.

“I can’t imagine that circumcision will become illegal,” Tibi stated. “We [Jews and Muslims] have a joint interest of the first order, an interest that is supreme and moral. [!] We must fight together.”

ISRAEL: Knesset Speaker calls off circumcision-persuation trip to Berlin

Yes, it could look like that....

Israel National News
August 29, 2012

Knesset Delegation to Germany Cancelled

Knesset Speaker Reuven Rivlin has cancelled a planned delegation to Germany to discuss the issue of a recent court ban on circumcision. The decision to cancel the trip was made unanimously along with trip leaders MK Yaakov Edri (Kadima) and MK Yisrael Eichler (United Torah Judaism).

The MKs were concerned that the trip could make Israel look over-involved in internal German affairs. Rivlin noted that German Chancellor Angela Merkel has already committed to ensure [adult] Jews’ religious freedom despite the ruling, and said Israel should wait to see what happens before commenting further on the issue.

Earlier story