Eric Yoffie is president of the Union for Reform Judaism.
Was. He was just replaced by Richard Jacobs who is active in J Street (the Yevsektzia of today). Yoffie was truly a tinok shenishba with a Jewish heart who unfortunately ended up where he did because of the times in which he lived. Even reform does not want J-street Jacobs.
And what Yoffie said could not be more true. Many an Israeli emigrant or his offspring has intermarried. After all, they were taught to become nothing more than members of a new nation called Israeli that is as artificial as another new nation that was called Soviet.
Those who keep even their “Israeli” identity, even Hebrew for another generation, are the many Israeli baalei tshuva abroad or those who are at least traditional. What’s more, the baalei tshuva often go back to EY to live there bekedusha instead of the way they lived there before their yerida letzorech aliya.