The Gazette (Montreal)
January 19, 2005 Wednesday
Final Edition

Other ethnic groups funded: Greeks and Armenians benefit from similar
arrangements, prominent Jews say

JEFF HEINRICH, The Gazette

Smarting from charges that their community bought special status for
its school system with payoffs to the Quebec Liberal Party, prominent
Jews yesterday chastised critics and also each other over the way the
affair has been “spun” in the news media.

Jews are not the only ethnic group to get 100-per-cent funding for
secular studies at their privately run schools; Greeks and Armenians
in Quebec also enjoy similar arrangements, and have for many years,
some noted.

It’s also no secret that Jews have long wanted full funding for their
schools – and almost got it a decade ago under another Liberal
government, others said.

“This is not the first time that this has been attempted,” said Barry
Rishikof, a former president of the Quebec Association of Jewish Day
Schools.

It’s also well established that the Jewish community has always been
a strong financial supporter of the Liberals, and raised campaign
cash for Jean Charest at numerous fundraisers before his party’s
election in 2003, others said.

But to imply that the Liberals agreed to better school funding only
after getting cash in their coffers is cynical and naive and feeds
old stereotypes of rich Jews buying their way to political privilege,
they said.

“The criticism is painful, and some of the sentiments implicit to the
criticism are troubling,” said Reuben Poupko, rabbi at Montreal’s
Beth Israel Beth Aaron synagogue.

“Jews exercise their right like all citizens to participate in the
political process through voting and supporting their candidates.
It’s a healthy expression of their involvement.”

Added Jack Jedwab, a past executive director of the Canadian Jewish
Congress in Quebec: “It’s perfectly natural for individuals to raise
issues (with politicians) that they believe to be important to their
constituencies.”

In a terse statement, the philanthropic organization Federation CJA
said it “neither contributes to, nor raises money on behalf of, any
political party.”

Its president, Sylvain Abitbol, did not respond to a request for an
interview.

Some Quebec Jewish leaders yesterday privately expressed exasperation
over how poor salesmanship of the idea of taxpayer-funded Jewish
schools led to the public-relations fiasco it appears to have turned
into.

The Liberals and their Jewish supporters blundered, they said, when
they sold the change from partial to full funding as a way to help
Jewish schools reach out and get involved with non-Jewish schools – a
“rapprochement fig leaf” that didn’t fool anyone, as one put it
yesterday.

Instead, they said, the change should have been touted for what it
really is: simply a way to reward schools that churn out some of the
most productive members of Quebec society.

Little wonder the approach was rejected, however, for that flattering
self-appraisal grates other Quebec ethnic groups who feel left out in
the bargain, including Muslims who don’t benefit from the same
privileged subsidies for some of their schools.

“I support the 100-per-cent funding of the Jewish schools, but the
government should be funding our schools in the same way,” said
Muslim community member Abdul Muttalib, who like many others gives
private donations to the non-subsidized Ecole musulmane de Montreal
private high school.

Allison Lampert of The Gazette contributed to this report