To stop my son from presenting as Jewish at school

[Wonderberry]

I really wish this wasn't the case.

My son wants to wear his kippah (skullcap) at school. This is entirely his choice, and something that he has chosen to start wearing recently. He just wants to express his religious and cultural background.

Unfortunately, I don't feel like he would be safe to do so. I hate that this is where we are at currently in the UK, but I know it is the reality. He goes to a community school in London, and doesn't understand why he cannot wear his kippah at school. On cultural days, he also cannot share his culture either.

Right of return to Israel is actually a religion, not an ethnicity. So you wouldn't have the right of return if your father was Jewish. It's not related to how ethnically Jewish you are. Just a note.

One of my son's friends is a Palestinian refugee. He's not allowed at our house or at my son's party, but they play together all day. One day at school he did a presentation on Ramadan followed the next day by my son's presentation on Passover. Then they played football. So there is some level of hope - fingers crossed for the next generation!

Doing a commute to school, you can meet all sorts of people. Some people are vile and will attack anybody, for being Jewish, Muslim, wearing a pride flag brooch etc. Unfortunately, we cannot control the actions of a bigoted public.

However, inside a school, I truly believe that any child should be able to wear a star of David necklace, a hijab or anything proscribed by their religion, unless it affects health, safety or teaching. It blows my mind that children are not safe to wear a kippah inside of their school. They should be allowed to do so, and should be allowed to talk about their heritage. I do think the onus is on the school to manage this robustly within the school day, and allow kids to wear a symbol of their religion if they wish.

It is a shame that he isn't allowed at your house but lovely that these two little kids have built what sounds like a lovely friendship. We need hope for the future.

Actually just googled it and it's more complicated than that - you can have a right of return for a variety of reasons, you don't necessarily have to 'qualify' as being Jewish. But as ever, it's super complicated. But not related to ethnicity exactly!

It is related to ethnicity though converts also have right of reform if they converted through a recognised denomination.

The Law of Return (Hebrew: חוק השבות, ḥok ha-shvūt) is an Israeli law, passed on 5 July 1950, which gives Jews, people with one or more Jewish grandparent, and their spouses the right to relocate to Israel and acquire Israeli citizenship.

People who aren't halachically jewish under orthodox definition can't be married or buried in jewish cemetery in Israel. They would have to marry in Cyprus.. lots of Russian Jews face problems with this..

Yeah my parents were in Israel when I was born and they couldn't get married there as they couldn't provide all the paperwork. Lots of their friends flew to Cyprus but they just went back to the states to get married and then went back. Meant my grandmother had full control of the wedding so it was 100% less hippie themed than my mum would have liked lol.

That would depend on if they married locally

I am a liberal convert and technically can make aliyah on my own accord. But in reality would be much easier to rely on my husband who is jewish based on the orthodox definition as his mother converted under the London beit din (orthodox). His sisters both successfully made aliyah..

The law of return is based on the nuremberg laws. If you would have been sent to auschwitz, you need refuge in a Jewish state.

As Orthodox Jews, they would have only married other Orthodox Jews. For my orthodox Jewish wedding I had to show evidence that I was halachically (according to Jewish law) Jewish, e.g show my parents’ kesuba (Jewish marriage certificate), as did my husband, and for our parents’ and previous generations’ weddings they had to do the same

Ah you're speaking specifically your family. I'm speaking more generally.

It's very interesting. I was wondering about my brother's wife who converted. They didn't have children but I think it starts to get complicated as the generations go further down. And I think there's some added complication about if you want to get married 'in' Israel.

But not relevant to me as I was born in Israel and my parents made aliyah (and then repatriated) before I was born so I was born a citizen. I just can't quite remember why my parents couldn't marry there...

No I’m speaking of Orthodox Jews in general. And modern/ non traditional Jewish branches like the Reform movement are a more recent development (in last couple centuries) and intermarriage before these developed would not have been accepted. If you married out of the Jewish community, you’d have been cast out.

anyway this is a massive derailment from the original point

My SiL who is jewish under the orthodox definition and so is her dh didn't marry in Israel even though they lived there. Her dh was ideologically opposed to the rabbinate. They had a civil ceremony in the usa and a religious ceremony conducted by a masorti rabbi in Israel a few months later followed by a big party.

What percentage of Jewish people are Orthodox?

I don't think it is a derailment. I'm not trying to debate or establish whether anyone has the right to Israeli citizenship. I'm trying to establish what connection he has to Israel as this is about him sharing his Israeli (not Jewish) heritage.

Much more than I thought. 2 million Chareidi Jews (not sure how they define that) plus more Orthdox Jews of various types.

Can't find a source for all Orthodox Jews.

https://www.jpr.org.uk/insights/one-seven-all-jews-are-strictly-orthodox-2040-it-will-be-one-five

Anyway, as regards presenting in school on culture day, me/my kids would not consider themselves Israeli in the modern sense.

In response to the previous Jewish poster who would not consider herself Austrian, it is true I don't consider myself Polish or German because that is where my family settled for many centuries. But there is a strong Polish Jewish culture and a strong German Jewish culture. Still, its been a generation or two since we have lived there so probably just Jewish culture would work. British Jewry (as in many other Jewish communities) is a bit of a melting pot where sefardic, ashkenazic and mizrachi cultures merge and kids go to school together and food businesses reflect the diverse nature of the community.

Fried gefilta fish balls (a uniquely British Jewish staple) is a perfect example of the merging of ashkenazi and sefardic cuisines.

Its difficult for a displaced Jewish community to keep their culture strong in another location, I think Syrian Jews in New York manage this to some extent and Chassidic Jews also attempt to, with much backlash over still speaking Yiddish for example.

The Op said her son has strong Israeli connections, presumably a grandparent.

Although intermarriage has always happened to some extent, (plus forced marriage and rape), I think the high rate at which intermarriage happens is a recent phenomenon. I can’t find stats, sorry, but it only became accepted by branches of reform/conservative etc, which are fairly recent themselves, and before then, although it happened, it was socially unacceptable (to Jews and non-Jews). Before reform there wasn’t even a concept of ‘orthodox’ Jews. It was only in response to reform that this even became a thing.

ethnically Jews are genetically a very distinct grouo, presumably because of the long history of in-group marriage. And Jews are from Judea.

Yes but that answer isn't good enough for this poster as they're quite determined to imply over and over again that the boy shouldn't consider his heritage as Israeli because his family possibly haven't lived there for at least 4 generations yet, which is the amount of generations this poster has randomly decided is the amount after which your ethnicity changes based on their own singular experience 😂

that reminds me of the shabbat gues we had once who kept the Dutch custom of waiting only one hour from meat to milk. (IYKYK) This was based on their german grandparents living in Holland for a few years before WW2. :)

Has anyone let Jews live peacefully anywhere for four generations???

I mean, I have recorded that my family were living in Germany in 1600 or so, (and probably more) but we were clearly not considered german enough. :(

So interesting! Thank you for sharing and educating people like me who don't know alot about Jewish culture/Judaism.

Jewish tradition and practice is also completely intrinsically interlinked to the land. We haven’t stopped saying the same prayers about our hope of returning to our homeland for 2000 years, since we were forcibly expelled from the land, and Jews have never in that entire time stopped trying to go back. A lot of our commandments only apply in Israel.
As a Jew, regardless of the modern state of Israel, the land of Israel is a central part of his tradition, culture, and history.

@Jewishbookworm Has anyone let Jews live peacefully anywhere for four generations???
good question

Would you say the majority of British Jews are religious or secular? I only ask because I have seen it mentioned quite a few times now how British Jews have assimilated so well into British culture. To the extent that unless they told even close friends that they were Jewish, they wouldn't know.

However, from my very limited understanding of Judaism (so I might have got this wrong) there's quite a few commandments that practicing Jews carry out and I don't know how this can all be kept hidden.

I don't think I have met many Jewish people in real life (not because I don't want to I should add!) I'm now pondering that i must have but just didn't know they were Jewish as indicated by some of the messages on this thread. How some people deliberately hide their Jewish identity, which is very sad that they even feel the need to do this to protect themselves.

Forgive my derailment OP, wishing you and your family all the best.

My lifelong friends know I am. I am very cautious when I meet new people...my dc know never to mention their heritage at school.