KOSHER FOOD & SHECHITA CONTROVERSY IN NORWAY:

Shechita controversy

In April 2011, Alan M. Dershowitz sharply criticized Norway for its treatment of Jews, writing that "All Jews are apparently the same in this country that has done everything in its power to make life in Norway nearly impossible for Jews. Norway was apparently the first modern nation to prohibit the production of Kosher meat, while at the same time permitting Halal meat and encouraging the slaughter of seals, whales and other animals that are protected by international treaties. No wonder less than 1000 Jews live in Norway."

Prejudice against Jews became a focal point in the controversy about the legality of shechita, the Jewish practice of ritual slaughter. The issue had originally been raised in the 1890s, but a municipal ban on the practice in Oslo brought the matter to national attention.

Efforts to ban shechita put well-intended humane society activists in league with antisemitic individuals. In particular, Jonas Søhr, a senior police official, took a particular interest and eventually rose to the leadership of The Norwegian Federation for Animal Protection. The animal rights cause was used as a means to attack not just the method of slaughter, but also the community itself. Those opposing the ban included Fridtjof Nansen, but the division on the issue crossed party lines in all mainstream parties, except the Agrarian Party (today, the Centre Party), which was principled in its opposition to schechita. Protests were raised in the Norwegian press, during the 1890s, against the practice of shechita, on the grounds that it was cruel to animals. The Jewish community responded to these objections by stating that the method was humane.

A committee commissioned on February 11, 1927 consulted numerous experts and visited a slaughterhouse in Copenhagen. Its majority favored a ban and found support in the Department of Agriculture and the parliamentary agriculture committee. Those who opposed a ban spoke of religious tolerance, and also found that schechita was no more inhumane than other slaughter methods. Ingvar Svanberg writes that many of the arguments against shechita were based "on the distrust of 'foreign' habits" and "often contained anti-Semitic elements". C. J. Hambro was one of those most appalled by the antisemitic invective, noting that "where animal rights are protected to an exaggerated extent, it usually is done with the help of human sacrifice"

The controversy continued until 1929, when the Norwegian parliament banned the practice of slaughtering animals which have not been first stunned or paralyzed. The ban remains in force today.

The former chief rabbi of Norway, Michael Melchior, argued that antisemitism is one motive for the bans: "I won't say this is the only motivation, but it's certainly no coincidence that one of the first things Nazi Germany forbade was kosher slaughter. I also know that during the original debate on this issue in Norway, where shechitah has been banned since 1930, one of the parliamentarians said straight out, 'If they don't like it, let them go live somewhere else.'"

No forms of religious slaughter are named as being banned in the Norwegian legislation. Norwegian law requires that animals be stunned before being slaughtered, without exception for religious practices, which is incompatible with shechita. (The Norwegian Islamic Council, on the other hand, has found that sedation is compatible with halal rules, provided that the animal's heart is still beating at the time of slaughter.) Representatives of both Muslim and Jewish communities, citing scientific studies, dispute the assertion that traditional halal and kosher slaughtering methods lead to unnecessary animal suffering. Norway's acceptance of hunting, whaling and sealing were also raised as proof of the alleged hypocrisy of the Norwegian position. Minister of Agriculture, Lars Peder Brekk of the Centre Party (which has always rejected shechita, see above), rejected the comparison.

Proponents of the continued ban, including officials from the Norwegian Food Safety Authority claimed that animals slaughtered according to shechita were conscious for "several minutes" after they were slaughtered, and writer and farmer Tore Stubberud claimed that animals in Judaism had "no moral status... pure objects for ... archaic, religious needs", and wondered whether the EU, in allowing for such slaughter had become "purely a bank, without values".

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NORWAY: JEWS, KASHRUTH & ANTISEMITISM:

1. CHABAD LUBAVICH OSLO
2. KOSHER FOOD & SHECHITA CONTROVERSY
3. MAP OF NORWAY  
4. MIKVAH IN OSLO
5. SYNAGOGUES

Also see:

1. ANTISEMITISM IN NORWAY
2. HISTORY OF THE JEWS IN NORWAY
3. JEWISH CHILDREN'S HOME IN OSLO
4. NORWEGIAN CENTER FOR STUDIES OF HOLOCAUST AND RELIGIOUS MINORITIES
5. NORWEGIAN RIGHTEOUS AMONG THE NATIONS
6. OCCUPATION OF NORWAY BY NAZI GERMANY
7. THE HOLOCAUST IN NORWAY
8. TIMELINE TO THE HOLOCAUST IN NORWAY