A Jewish group deplored that a conference on labelling of meat from ritually slaughtered animals in the European Parliament doesn’t include a representative of the Jewish community.
The conference on Tuesday in Brussels is hosted by Danish MEP Morten Messerchmidt from the Europe of Freedom and Democracy Group (EFD), who is leading a campaign to label all products arising from ritual slaughter ‘’to comply with animal welfare standard and consumer protection,’’ targeting especially the kosher and halal meat.
Muslim and Jewish groups object such a labelling. Kosher laws require an animal to be fully conscious when it’s slaughtered. The method of slaughter is a quick, deep stroke across the throat with a perfectly sharp blade with no nicks or unevenness. Jewish groups stress that this method is painless, causes unconsciousness within two seconds, and is widely recognized as the most humane method of slaughter possible.
The European Jewish Association (EJA), a Brussels-based umbrella group for various Jewish organizations active on European level, asked on Monday MEP Messerchmidt to add a Jewish representative to the conference panel ‘’in order to ensure a balanced discussion on this issue which is of profound importance for Jews and Muslims across Europe.’’
But the conference organizer said it was ’’too late’’ to change the programme and added that any representative was welcomed to attend the conference and ask questions.
‘It is not fair to organize such a conference without anyone representing the Jewish point of view regarding kosher meat,’’ Rabbi Menachem Margolin, Director General of the European Jewish Association told Messerchmidt in an email.
‘’It is very easy to agree with the importance of animal rights but human rights are not less important,’’ he said.
‘’The proposed labelling on ritual slaughtered meat is wrong because it gives the impression that the animals are not killed in a humane way,’’ he said.
‘’For us Jews it’s a big problem first because the Jewish way of killing animals is very humane.’’
‘’The kosher meat is already labeled as kosher so there is no need to make another label,’’ he added, warning that the kosher market could become very expansive if such a measure is introduced because part of the Jewish ritual slaughtered meat, which is not kosher, goes to the general market. ‘’Because people will not buy this meat prices of kosher meat will go up dramatically,’’ Margolin said.
The situation is different for the halal meat which gos only to the halal market.