The National Council of Young Israel (NCYI) on Friday sharply criticized a European Union (EU) court after it upheld Belgium’s ban on ritual slaughter.
The Court of Justice of the European Union ruled on Thursday that a decision by two of Belgium’s three states which prohibits slaughtering animals without stunning them first did not constitute a violation of the EU’s standards regarding freedom of worship.
The EU court’s ruling comes despite a September 2020 opinion by the Advocate General of the Court of Justice of the European Union which condemned Belgium’s ban on ritual slaughter and stated that it improperly impairs the ability of Belgians to freely practice their religion.
“The European Union court’s discriminatory decision is a blatant attack on religious freedom that unjustly targets religious communities whose faith-based doctrines require ritual slaughter in order to produce meat that is permissible for consumption,” said NCYI President Farley Weiss.
“By upholding a bigoted ban that adversely impacts both the Jewish and Muslim communities, the court has regrettably paved the way for other European nations to institute similar prohibitions that shamelessly trample on the ability of religious individuals to abide by the tenets of their faith. The anti-Semitic Belgian ban and subsequent EU court decision are barefaced violations of religious freedom and signify an excessive overreach of governmental power that sadly comes at the expense of Europe’s Jewish community,” added Weiss.
The Israeli Foreign Ministry on Thursday said it would work to reverse the ruling of the European Union’s highest court.
"The European Court of Justice today upheld the de facto ban on kosher slaughter in Belgium, sending a harsh message to all of European Jewry. Beyond the fact that the decision violates freedom of worship and religion in Europe, a value which is at the heart of the EU, it signals to the Jewish communities that they are undesirable in Europe," the Foreign Ministry said.
"It is important that a way be found to change the decision and allow the Jewish citizens of the European Union to continue to observe the commandments of the Jewish religion. Any other decision is contrary to the values of religious freedom that EU citizens rightly support," it added.
(Arutz Sheva’s North American desk is keeping you updated until the start of Shabbat in New York. The time posted automatically on all Arutz Sheva articles, however, is Israeli time.)