By Julia Loeb, WLCJ International President
Last week, I visited a Jewish school in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, with the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations and listened to children sing.
Their voices were clear and confident singing Oseh Shalom, Hebrew words that have traveled across continents and centuries. These were not whispered songs or guarded expressions of identity. They were joyful and strong, as if Jewish life there were the most natural thing in the world.
In Azerbaijan, a Muslim-majority country bordering both Russia and Iran, Jewish life is visible, supported, and secure. Jews live openly, without the antisemitism that has scarred so much of our history elsewhere. Synagogues stand proudly. Jewish schools, supported by the government, educate the next generation. Government officials speak openly about religious tolerance. Being Jewish is not something to conceal. It is part of the fabric of society.
The children sang with joy, not cautiously, not defensively, but freely.
Just days later, I stood at the Kotel in Jerusalem with Women of the Wall.
We came to pray, women wearing tefillin and wrapped in tallitot, lifting our voices in song at Judaism’s holiest accessible site. We came to connect to God and to one another. We came as Jewish women who believe that our voices belong in sacred space.
And we were met not with harmony, but with hostility.
Young girls, not much older than the students I had just heard singing in Baku, stood around us and screamed. They shouted over our prayers, attempting to drown out our voices. At one point, in a painful moment, a girl lunged forward and tore down the Israeli flag we were holding as we sang Hatikvah.
The contrast was jarring.
In Azerbaijan, Jews sing openly in a Muslim-majority society without fear. In Jerusalem, Jewish women praying at the Western Wall were shouted down by fellow Jews, and a symbol of our shared peoplehood was ripped from our hands.
Adding to this painful reality, the Knesset has proposed a bill to place all areas of the Kotel under the authority of the ultra-Orthodox Chief Rabbinate. If enacted, this legislation would effectively eliminate the legal standing of the egalitarian section.
Worship that does not conform to the Rabbinate’s standards could be punishable by up to seven years in prison, transforming sincere prayer into a potential crime.
How deeply tragic that possibility would be. A place that should unite the Jewish people risks becoming narrower, more restrictive, less reflective of the diversity of Jewish life around the world.
What struck me most last week was the sound.
The sound of children singing with pride in Baku.
The sound of children screaming in Jerusalem.
Children absorb what they see modeled. They learn whether difference is something to fear or something to respect. They learn whether strength comes from confidence or from silencing others.
Judaism has always made room for argument. Debate for the sake of Heaven is sacred.
But mocking another Jew’s prayer, tearing down her flag, or criminalizing her form of worship is not holy disagreement. It is a failure of responsibility.
As Jewish women, as leaders, as mothers and grandmothers, we must ask ourselves what we are teaching the next generation.
Are we raising children who can sing their own songs without needing to drown out someone else’s? Are we modeling dignity rather than intimidation?
We have heard what Jewish life can sound like when it is grounded in security and respect.
Now we must decide which sound will define our future.
This dangerous legislation is not yet law, but it is a severe escalation that threatens the religious freedom of millions of Jews worldwide. As a community that consistently stands by Israel, we must now insist that Israel protects the right of all Jews to worship at our holiest site without fear of intimidation or imprisonment. We cannot allow the Egalitarian Kotel to be dismantled, nor can we stay silent while sincere prayer is criminalized. Please take immediate action by signing this urgent Conservative/Masorti Movement petition to demand that Israeli leaders halt this disastrous bill and preserve the Kotel for all of us.
Julia Loeb
WLCJ International President
jloeb@wlcj.org
