Uri Kerman, a member of the steering team of the “Secular Forum”, published an opinion piece in the “time” newspaper, in which he called on his members to purchase only wine that is not kosher.
Kerman sees this act as a “war on discrimination” which he claims exists in Halacha. “The wine kosher laws are actually discrimination against me as a secularist, and I am not ready to finance it. It seems necessary to me,” he wrote in the time newspaper.
“Making kosher wine involves discrimination and racism,” he claimed. “Discrimination and racism are found in the kosher of food in general. If a ‘Gentile’ lit the fire for cooking, the food is not kosher. If a ‘Gentile’ milked the cow, the dairy products are not kosher. Discrimination is part of kosher law, and originates from the desire to prevent ‘assimilation’ between the ‘Gentiles’ in exile. But the kosher laws of wine are stricter, and more racist, and some of us collaborate with them and even finance them.”
According to him, “Many wineries owners choose kosher for economic reasons. And this is precisely what must be changed. In the days of a fundamentalist nationalist government that plans to allow discrimination by law, statements are heard against businesses that discriminate on religious, ethnic or gender grounds. Every kosher seal on a bottle of wine shouts: I am a product discriminates. If the product discriminates, then the manufacturer discriminates.”
“Looking for a place to start fighting discrimination? Here’s a good starting point. Just don’t buy kosher wine, and support the wineries that don’t have a kosher certificate,” he said. “Also in restaurants. Also in hotels. Think of the effect of a lot of people entering a wine store and explaining to the salespeople why they only buy non-kosher wine. If we succeed in getting one medium-sized winery to give up its kosher certificate, maybe a change will begin here in the consciousness of the secular public in Israel and in consumer and political power His”.
Journalist Eli Beitan responded on Twitter with Jewish humor to an article published by Kerman: “I see in Haretz a call for seculars to buy non-kosher wine, so just to help the seculars every glass of wine you pour is not kosher.”
