Last year, Jewish religious authorities issued a ruling that cast doubt on her conversion to Judaism. But after the election of her father Donald Trump as president, a new interpretation of religious laws emerged that has raised suspicions among sectors that pushed for greater tolerance of converts.
Trump's daughter converted to Judaism under the tutelage of a prominent Orthodox rabbi in Manhattan before marrying Jared Kushner, a practicing Jew, in 2009.
In its ruling last July, the government's religious affairs court rejected the legitimacy of another conversion by the same rabbi. While that ruling did not directly affect Ivanka Trump, some questions arose about whether that powerful Israeli religious institution would accept Trump's daughter as a Jew.
Until December, just weeks after Trump's election victory, Israel's chief rabbis said they would change the rules for recognizing conversions made abroad, specifically mentioning the case of Ivanka Trump.
"Under the proposal, her conversion will be confirmed without the need for further investigation," they said in a statement.
Israeli activists believe the sudden policy shift appears to be an attempt to curry favor with the new US president. Ivanka Trump's husband has been appointed as an adviser to Trump and is expected to focus on efforts to seal peace between Israel and the Palestinians.
A commission of Israeli rabbis has met several times to discuss ways to speed up conversions, according to activists.
"The timing of all this certainly raises suspicions," said Rabbi Seth Farber, head of ITIM, an organization that represents Jewish converts who want to be recognized by the Jewish hierarchy. “My main concern is that the rabbis will find a way to certify Mrs. Trump as kosher, to recognize her conversion, pushing aside thousands of converts, saying simply that they are not Jewish enough for us.”
The New York Jewish community newspaper Jewish Week quoted unnamed sources in Trump’s transition team as saying that senior U.S. government figures had expressed concern to Israel about the legitimacy of Ivanka Trump’s conversion and that Israel’s efforts to recognize her conversion could encourage a closer relationship between the Trump family and Israel.
A Trump spokeswoman did not respond to calls seeking confirmation, and Washington Rabbi Levi Shemtov, a close associate of Ivanka Trump, declined to comment.
A spokesman for one of Israel’s top rabbis said the changes had been in the works for some time and were not a direct result of Trump’s election.
“There was talk of this even before Ivanka Trump,” Pinchas Tennenbaum said.
Since Ivanka Trump does not live in Israel, the issue is relatively secondary. But for converts in Israel, the rulings of rabbis affect their daily lives. If they are not recognized as Jews, they cannot marry in Israel and theoretically cannot have a religious burial when they die.
Israel’s Orthodox establishment does not recognize conversions carried out by Reform and Conservative Judaism, to which most American Jews adhere. But immigration authorities are more liberal, generally granting citizenship to Reform and Conservative converts as Jews.
Many Jews completely ignore the rabbinate, as religious authorities are called. Some even consider it corrupt. A religious court rabbi was recently sentenced to three and a half years in prison for corruption and bribery.
“The rabbinate is a fossilized institution that does not meet the needs of modern times,” said Nahum Barnea, a leading Israeli columnist. “Most Israelis regard Ivanka Trump’s recognition of Judaism, or non-recognition of it, as frivolous.”
Some say the religious courts reject dozens of conversions every year, saying they were not rigorous enough. And they struggled when they refused to recognize the conversion of American Nicole Zeitler, 31.
Zeitler said her conversion was a very rigorous process that included twice-weekly meetings with Rabbi Haskel Lookstein, the same person who worked on Ivanka Trump's conversion.
The American settled in Israel and became engaged to an Israeli, but the rabbinical courts did not grant her a license because they did not consider her Jewish.
This created a scandal and Zeitler was finally allowed to convert through a declaration of faith, although without formally recognizing the conversion process overseen by Rabbi Lookstein.
"The rabbinical establishment is ultra-conservative. Rabbi Lookstein is a little more open," Farber said.
Lookstein declined to comment and referred all questions to Farber.
Elad Kaplan, an ITIM lawyer who represented Zeitler before the religious courts, believes the woman's confirmation is directly related to Trump's election.
“It would have been a very awkward situation if Ivanka Trump’s family visited Israel and the Jewish authorities did not recognize her as Jewish,” Kaplan said.
Zeitler said she found the recognition of her conversion “a bit suspicious” after the obstacles that had been put in her way.
“But I am glad that Trump is president and that this can change things,” she added in her apartment in Petah Tikva, the city in central Israel where she lives with her husband. “After all, that is how the world works. Someone super famous and important has to come for there to be change.”
