Tensions spill over at Board of Deputies over how to position itself on Israel
V A VICE-PRESIDENT of the Board of Deputies has hit out at “leaks” over a proposed, controversial survey of its members on Israel.
At Sunday’s plenary meeting, Sheila Gewolb told deputies she had stopped allowing observers to attend meetings of the Board’s International Division “because there was a leak” of draft questions that were part of “a piece of work that was nowhere near complete”.
The survey was suspended in January as Board President Marie van der Zyl warned: “Despite the good intentions of this initiative, it has become clear that the survey itself is proving as divisive as the issue itself.”
Ms Gewolb has rejected Mrs van der Zyl’s proposal of a deputies’ conference on Israel, chaired by former Labour MP Dame Louise Ellman, to explore deputies’ views.
Speaking at Sunday’s meeting while sitting next to Mrs van der Zyl, Ms Gewolb said of the leak: “That’s why I refuse to have observers because basically you can’t trust people.
“Every member of the division was really, unfortunately, concerned at the lack of respect shown to me and other members by causing voices to be silenced by leaking a piece of work that was not completed.”
She was speaking after Mary Regnier-Leigh, a deputy from Western Marble Arch Synagogue, complained the International Division was “so secret and so silent”. She claimed that in order to attend as an observer, she had been asked to sign a non-disclosure agreement that would have “prevented me from discussing it at all”.
Her offer of attending if she undertook to not repeat anything was rejected, she said.
“I found that a bit insulting,” Ms Regnier-Leigh told deputies. “What’s our job here? Is it to look after Anglo-Jewry? Or is it to make statements about the internal affairs of Israel?
“A survey will divide us... If we have a survey or indeed a meeting, I will promise you that will leak, just as it leaked that there was such a survey...
“Does anyone in this hall actually believe we can reach a consensus?
“If we can’t, and I believe we cannot, then we should not be involved in something that is going to divide the Board of Deputies irrevocably and get out to the public so they can point the finger and say ‘that Jew doesn’t support Israel and that Jew does’ and we are going to have to defend ourselves.”
Ms Gewolb replied: “The very reason why I stopped allowing observers was because there was a leak...
“I’m in my fifth year as a vice-president. I have never, ever turned away an observer before.
“But the very thing that people accuse the division of trying to promote — divisiveness within the community — was actually effected by survey questions on a work on progress that was not even near completion being leaked to the press and other deputies — to cause the very divisiveness and reputational damage that we were trying to avoid.” She added: “I’m sorry if I’ve used strong language. That is not me as a person. People who have worked with me know who I am and what I try to achieve.
“I am guided by what my divisional members want. It’s a democratic process. It’s not secret but the only reason I refuse to have observers was because somebody had leaked details of a piece of work that was nowhere near complete.
“And had no right to cause controversy and reputational damage to the Board in so doing.”
Mrs van der Zyl said the survey was causing “divisiveness before it’s even set off”.
She reiterated her preference for a conference on the subject, which she said Dame Louise, a former Labour Friends of Israel president, was “ideally placed” to chair.
But after a meeting of the Board’s International Division — which includes a number of individuals in favour of the survey — a near unanimous vote rejected the alternative idea of staging a conference.
When asked why there had been such strong opposition to the conference idea in the Division, one longserving Deputy told the JC that the decision had been influenced by “the survey.”
Mrs van der Zyl has previously said she opposed the survey because “British Jews are overwhelmingly a proudly Zionist community.
“There is a high degree of consensus around the centrality of Israel to Jewish identity and concern for the welfare of its citizens.”
She is also convinced that the Board should continue concentrating on holding Labour to account over antisemitism and other domestic issues.
Yachad, the left-wing orgainsation who have some support from deputies on the International Division, said: “A representative body, such as the BoD, should embrace an opportunity to find out what our community actually thinks, not fear it.”
Does anyone in this hall actually believe we can reach a consensus?