Sharansky tells PM ’Meaningful dialogue’ with organized Jewry has been eliminated.

The Jewish Agency can no longer consider itself a part of the government’s multi-billion shekel effort to bolster Jewish identity in the Diaspora, chairman Natan Sharansky told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday.

The program, as currently implemented, violates various agreements between the Jewish Agency and the government, Sharansky wrote in a Thursday letter to the premier that was obtained by The Jerusalem Post.

“Any and all meaningful dialogue with the organized Jewish community, as represented by the Jewish Federations of North America, Keren Hayesod, the World Zionist Organization and the Jewish Agency for Israel, has been eliminated. Rather, this undertaking has transformed simply into a funding framework for programs to be conducted by a single government ministry,” Sharansky alleged, referring to increasing control of the government undertaking by the Diaspora Affairs Ministry headed by Bayit Yehudi leader Naftali Bennett.