Israeli politics is a contact sport.Everyone is entitled to join the fray, and if victorious claim the benefits.However, if you sit abroad ,such as in the US, it is difficult to understand why the non-participants should complain over the results.
I refer to the Reform and Conservative religious streams in the US,who are lamenting that Shas and the other Orthodox parties are joining hands in the negotiations for a new govt.Together they have 16 mandates ,more than Labor and more than Lieberman.The Reform and Conservatives have ZERO mandates, because they are foreign entities in Israel.
In truth the goal of these 2 foreign entities is to destroy the Chief Rabbinate,and allow their form of "Judiasm" to have equal billing.The problem is that the people ,even the non-orthodox will not buy into the concept of a Jewish religion with women "Rabbis",gay "Rabbis"and all the other "MODERN applications that these leaders have instituted.
Even the the non-orthodox want a bar mitzvah, wedding and burial according to the traditions of Moses(not Moses Mendleson)
Therefore these 2 movements don't compete.However every few months when the Jewish Agency is in town,their leaders issue statements attacking the status quo.In the end, no one except the Anglo-Jewish American press takes them seriously.Their point is that the concerns of American Jews have to be taken into account.In fact all politics is local,and they are not part of the local solution.
I long ago said,if half a million of their followers made aliya,they would be a part of the discussion.
