Israel’s Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that the Rabbinical Court of Appeals is barred from hearing a petition filed by an unrelated individual against a ruling by the Safed Rabbinic Court. The ruling permitted an Aguna whose husband is in a vegetative state to remarry.
The secular court’s decision is a blow to Chief Sefardi Rabbi Yizhak Yosef and to the Rabbinical Court of Appeals.
The Supreme Court panel, which included Deputy Court President, Justice Elyakim Rubinstein, and Justices Hanan Meltzer and Yoram Danziger, ruled that the decision of the President of the Rabbinical Court of Appeals, Chief Sefardi Rabbi Yizhak Yosef, did not have the authority to hear the petition, which is why it is nullified.
“Judgment is with the petitioner [against Rabbi Yosef],” Justice Rubinstein wrote for the court. “Let the petitioner go home in peace and rebuild her life. All is done, praised Be God, Creator of the universe.”
Which goes to show that in Israel even the secular court is not entirely secular…