said, 'No Law' will pass that would 'Harm Christianity'

InJerusalem, Israel, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu responded to many concerned people from evangelical Christians in the United States and in Israel relating to a bill that was introduced by two ultra Orthodox members of Israel's Knesset that it would make it a criminal offense to try to convert anyone to another religion.

Prime Minister Netanyahu said in a tweet in English and in Hebrew, "We will not advance any law against the Christian community." The Prime Minister said this to reduce the fears that the bill put forward by two members of the coalition government would become law.

The law says, "Anyone who persuades a person, directly, digitally, by direct mail, or online, to convert his religion, his sentence is one year imprisonment, and if the person was a minor, his sentence is two years imprisonment."

The Knesset members

Moshe Gafni and Yaakov Asher from the United Torah Judaism Party (UTI) had submitted the legislation in January. They said, "The Mission bill was introduced as in every beginning of the Knesset and not promoted at this stage, so dealing with it now is not relevant."

There have been similar bills put forward for more than 20 years.

David Benjamin, the Israeli legal expert, said the extent of this effort seems very broad. "Wide as you can possibly get. In fact, Christ, I mean any, you know, just anything you say which might be in favor of a certain religion, right? Could be construed, I suppose, as being an attempt to solicit someone. Right? Where do you draw the line? While the proposed law would apply to all religions, it specifically singled out Christians, stating: "In recent times, the attempts of missionary bodies, mainly Christian ones, to persuade people to convert have increased. Sometimes these attempts do not involve the promise of money or material favors, and therefore existing law, but their many negative consequences, including mental damage, require the intervention of the legislator." David Benjamin also said, "Remember the whole issue of proselytization in Israel? There's always been a sensitive one, right? The Jewish state was set up to protect the Jewish people. Many Jewish people have been lost over the centuries, obviously to genocide. But also by assimilation, forced conversion, et cetera. So it's a very sensitive point."

David Benjamin continued to say this effort will likely violate Israel's Declaration of Independence. He said, "I think that the fundamental premise of the law is problematic in itself. I don't think it'll be unacceptable to outlaw. A person trying to persuade another person to adopt any idea, whether it be a religion or any kind of idea. You know, the free flow of ideas, freedom of thought, freedom of conscience, freedom of expression or fundamental pillars of any democracy."

The former U.S. Ambassador at large for International Religious Freedom Sam Brownback warns that this could hurt Israel. He said, "When you start to limit your religious freedom, in your nation, that's against the U.N. Charter of Human Rights that Israel and almost all of the rest of the world signed onto, too. You're entitled to practice your faith or change your faith and I think this is dangerous for Israel, really, since they've been such a beacon of an open society in that region."

But Prime Minister Netanyahu, a close friend of evangelical Christians for decades, would not support such a proposal.