Are there Israelis so estranged from Judaism as to quell their hunger with a bite of bacon or hunk of ham? The country's founders, except for the most rabidly secular, could hardly imagine it. The Jewish National Fund banned the raising of pigs on its land (but winked at those Hashomer Hatza'ir kibbutzim that did so anyway). To avoid offending Jewish, Muslim, and national sensibilities, the authorities forbade the sale of pork outside Christian localities.

Nevertheless, for years, when Israeli Jews had a craving for what the Sages could bring themselves to call only basar aher -- "other meat" -- they did not have to drive to Nazareth. Almost every sizable Jewish locality had a butcher shop or two that quietly dispensed "white steak" and sausage. Today, however, with hundreds of thousands of gastarbeiter and recent FSU immigrants who have brought their own dietary habits with them, the forbidden aroma wafts almost everywhere except where the Orthodox rule. Each year, that aroma mingles in one or two localities with a more acrid stench, when haredi zealots decide to make the offending stores the venue for a reenactment of the "Dissertation on Roast Pig."

With less fanfare than has accompanied Sabbath law enforcement, local authorities have begun to crack down on the pork proliferation by serving offenders with court summonses and closure orders. Religious coercion? No, said Ashdod Magistrate's Court in March 1998. Loathing pork remains a national value. The judge's remarks and ruling -- compounded by the presence of a skullcap on his head, which he did not deem reason to recuse himself -- touched off acrimonious exchanges in the Knesset and the media.