Jacob Herzog, in Riyadh (Saudi Arabia), November 30, 2021. FAYEZ NURELDINE / AFP
The “Chief Rabbi of Saudi Arabia” holds office in this country of Islam’s two holiest sites. Jacob Herzog secured this title two years ago. On the streets of Riyadh, this Hasidic Jew from the Chabad movement does not go unnoticed with his long beard and traditional costume typical of Orthodox Jews. He even likes to broadcast videos of himself dancing on the street with Saudis and laughing about this inappropriate encounter.
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The 40-year-old, a New York native who set out for Israel at a young age, had already traveled through Iran and Malaysia when he heard about Neom, the futuristic city under construction in the kingdom’s northwest, in 2018. , with which Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Ben Salman wants to demonstrate his modernization ambitions and which could be given extraterritorial status for this purpose. “The concept of a city of 7 million people with separate laws from the rest of the kingdom, fascinated me. “I said to myself that we had to meet the spiritual needs of the people of other religions who would live there,” says Rabbi Herzog from Israel, where he said he was staying for the Jewish holiday of Rosh Hashanah.
Then he sets out to see this Arabia with his own eyes, in search of openness, determined to break with the strictures of Wahhabi Islam in which emigrants are flocking. “Whatever people say about Arabia, Jews and Muslims have always worked side by side there. The last Jews left the company in 1945, but Jewish emigrants have been working for Aramco for fifty years [la compagnie pétrolière nationale] without having to hide,” defends Rabbi Herzog.
Without anyone’s consent
He made his calculations – without any guarantee of scientific accuracy: “Among an emigrant population of around 750,000 people, there are 2% Jews from the United States, France, Great Britain, Latin America… who have no structure for their spiritual needs.” » Determined, the To test the willingness of the Saudi authorities to accept him as a rabbi, he set up an improvised Jewish center in Riyadh, whose doors are open to passing visitors and emigrants.
Rabbi Herzog reported on his approach to the authorities “out of politeness and to convince them of the added value.” [sa] Presence”. However, he declared himself “Chief Rabbi of Saudi Arabia” without anyone’s approval and without any other candidate for the position. “I don’t have to hide my identity, Saudi Arabia has no problem with the Jewish people. We do nothing in our rites that contradict Islam: we even replace wine with grape juice to calm him down. [le repas de la Pâque juive] “, he emphasizes. No conversion is performed. There is also no interfaith dialogue like in Abu Dhabi, where Emirati authorities inaugurated the Abrahamic Family House in 2019, a complex that houses a mosque, a church and a synagogue.
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