I am aware of Chabad.org and have visited that site, along with many other kosher sites, and they all have good information. But--there is one point that no kosher site is making, and that is that the current situation, with Judaism as a mere religious denomination among many others, is not normative. Normative Torah Judaism is a fully Torah/Halakhic state in 'Eretz Yisra'el, and none of the "religious freedom" arguments Jews have been using for two hundred years to justify being allowed to observe Torah apply to this normative Torah Theocratic Judaism. Furthermore, this Judaism teaches that all non-Jews are required to observe the Noachide Laws--and all the other religions are forbidden.
No Orthodox Jewish web site or spokesman, no matter how "black hat" or reactionary, is going to come out and say this because they're afraid that it will lead to a backlash. What they fail to understand is that the association of Judaism with "enlightenment" liberalism has created a backlash of its own and that many non-Jews resent the "special treatment" Judaism allegedly receives as a symbol of religious pluralism and multiculturalism (and religious subjectivism).
Down here in the Bible Belt, everyone thinks he's right and the other fellow is wrong. Yet everyone gets along just fine. Yes, there would be some grumbling if Orthodox Jews invoked Koh 'amar HaShem instead of the First Amendment as justification for Torah observance, but more people would understand the position than most think. You must remember that most people down here get their "Jewish stereotype" from the Bible, and no one in the Bible invokes the "First Amendment" or "freedom of speech."
Perhaps I stress these things because I am a non-Jew attracted to Objective Biblical Truth and who sees it in Torah. I simply don't understand the reduction of Torah Judaism to a First Amendment test case.
Furthermore, the radical libertarianism (and hypocritically inconsistent morality) of most American conservatives simply infuriates me. For years I have had to hear of liberal "Jewish leaders" defending aboriton, homosexuality, obscenity, and moral nihilism in the name of (lehavdil!) "Judaism." Now chrstian conservatives attack moslems for being "homophobic?" That's just crazy! These conservatives aren't Monotheists; they're civilizationists! G-d to them is merely a symbol of "western civilization," and if homosexuality eats away and destroys someone else's "civilization," well, that's just peachy! This sounds an awful lot like liberal Jews trying to protect homosexuals from chrstianity to me.
And finally, American conservatives are creatures of the eighteenth century European "enlightenment." They simply don't know how to think any other way. Yet the world was here for millennia before the "enlightenment," and so was G-d. In fact, the "enlightenment" has totally distorted people's notions of G-d, religion, and freedom. Judaism is an ancient, pre-enlightenment religion. And in the diatribes against "theocracy" and claims that no one has the right to enforce any moral laws whatsoever--that there is nowhere any duly authorized religious authority--I hear radical subjectivism and also a hint that these same people would oppose Theocratic Torah Judaism as well as islam.
Bottom line--the fact that islam "isn't a religion" is actually a mark in its favor. Torah Judaism is also an all-embracing way of life that governs and regulates every aspect of daily life--not just the "religious" part. And if these "conservatives" object to islam because it is an all-embracing system, they obviously only tolerate Judaism because they don't understand it. And that is not good.
Jewish theocracy applies only in the Land Of Israel. Non-Jews are expected to set up their own systems (which may differ from each other) to enforce the Seven Laws of the Children of Noah.
Jews used to negotiate as a community with the rulers of the land for permission to practice Judaism. “Freedom of religion” has only been an argument since it was popularized in the Enlightenment. No reason Jews couldn’t go back to negotiating as a community.
You’re right about the term “conservative.” It’s used in a pretty elastic way these days.