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Jenna Jameson is So Jewish Right Now

The former porn star is cooking up a kosher storm for her Israeli fiancé

by
Jonathan Zalman
June 11, 2015
Evan Agostini/Getty Images
Jenna Jameson at the release party for her book 'How To Make Love Like A Porn Star' in New York City, August 2004.Evan Agostini/Getty Images
Evan Agostini/Getty Images
Jenna Jameson at the release party for her book 'How To Make Love Like A Porn Star' in New York City, August 2004.Evan Agostini/Getty Images

On Tuesday, Jenna Jameson, one of the most popular porn stars in history, shared an exchange on Twitter with Nina Hartley, another porn legend. Hartley asked Jameson to clarify an earlier tweet, in which Jameson wrote she thought it’d be a good idea to blog about her “conversion journey.”

@ninaland Catholicism to Judaism
— Jenna Jameson (@jennajameson) June 9, 2015

So that’s cool: Jenna Jameson says she’s converting to Judaism. To which denomination, however, one can only wonder as she did not specify. On one hand, this comes as a surprise since Jameson has publicly stated how much she values her Christian faith. The Daily Beast reported:

“I’m very religious,” Jameson told Larry King in 2013. “I think that we’ve come a long way religiously. I don’t think that you have to take the Bible literally… And I love being able to teach my children what it means to just believe and have the strength of faith… I’ve always been extremely Catholic. My father was Catholic, and he brought me up that way.”

What does seem certain, however, is part of Jameson’s impetus for her apparent conversion: Jameson fiancé, reported The Jerusalem Post is Lior Bitton, “a Herzliya native who works in the diamond business in Los Angeles, where they both live.” The Daily Beast dug up some dirt on Bitton:

In 2010, he was arrested and charged with insurance fraud for having falsely reported the theft of a 4.21-carat diamond from his Pacific Diamonds and Gems store. Earlier that year, after one of his couriers was robbed of 20 diamonds, Bitton filed a claim for stolen goods, including for the 4.21-carat diamond. After he collected a cool $99,000 from the insurance company, he flew to Israel and attempted to sell to a wholesaler the same diamond he had claimed was stolen. The following year, Bitton pleaded guilty and was sentenced to three years of formal probation, five days in jail, and 90 days of home confinement. The diamond was turned over to the insurance company, Berkley Asset Protection, and Bitton was ordered to cough up the $99,000 in restitution.

Jameson, who is bisexual, has been married twice before, both times to pornographic actors. She was also allegedly the victim of domestic abuse in her last relationship with UFC fighter Tito Ortiz, with whom she has two children. It appears that Bitton’s Jewish and Israeli heritage has had quite the influence on Jameson, who, according to her Instagram page, prides herself on her cooking skills. Here’s Jameson’s post about cooking her first Shabbat dinner:

And just last weekend, Jameson flashed her Shabbat table spread, including some beautiful-looking challahs, potato pancakes, and Israeli salad:

Jonathan Zalman is a writer and teacher based in Brooklyn.