Chief Ashkenazi Rabbi of Israel HaRav Dovid Lau is going head to head with officials in the Ministry of Religious Services, whom he insists are not cooperating, and are preventing newly-appointed dayanim from taking up their posts.

Since the appointment of the dayanim, Rabbi Lau has been working on the task of assigning the new dayanim, promoting the veteran dayanim and forming the makeup of the dayanim in batei din based on the appointments. Rav Lau has been consulting with the director-general and legal advisor of the nation’s batei din.

It should be noted that according to the Dayanim Law, the President of the Batei Din, in this case, Rav Lau, is authorized to assign all the new dayanim alone. Acting with the consent of the head of the batei din, who once again is Rav Lau, the Director-General of the batei din may change the location of the dayanim after several months, but only with Rav Lau’s authorization.

As Minister of Religious Services David Azoulai is fighting a difficult illness, Rav Lau is working on his own. Complicating matters, on Sunday, the director-general of the Shas-controlled ministry announced party chairman, Minister Aryeh Deri, will be filling in for Azoulai, and taking a part in the assignments for the new dayanim. It appears the Shas leader has his own agenda as per the assignments of the new dayanim.

According to officials in Rav Lau’s office, “A few short hours before being sworn in by the President of Israel, an advisor to the minister phoned the head if the batei din, instructing him to hold off, and not swear in the new dayanim. This despite the opinion of Deputy Attorney General Raz Nizri, which was given in the middle of the night, that the director-general of the batei din refused to make the temporary appointments, appointments aimed at immediately strengthening the function of the nation’s batei din.

Rav Lau came out strongly against the officials in the Religious Services, citing HaGaon HaRav Ovadia Yosef ZT”L, who spoke out strongly against politicians involving themselves and interfering in the appointments and operations of the batei din. Rav Yosef is quoted saying “The batei din must operate as a professional body void of all political interests”.

Rav Lau worked to immediately assign 24 new dayanim to batei din in Yerushalayim, Tel Aviv, and other places where there are vacancies towards improving the operations of the batei din and cutting down on the severe backlog of pending cases. He succeeded, despite Deri’s interference, and they were sworn in on Monday.

President Reuven Rivlin spoke at a swearing-in ceremony at the President’s Residence for the dayanim. Twenty-four dayanim were sworn in at the ceremony before the president of the Higher Beis Din, Chief Rabbi Dovid Lau, Rishon L’Tzion HaGaon HaRav Yitzchak Yosef Shlita, Minister of Justice Ayelet Shaked and Minister of National Infrastructures, Energy & Water Yuval Steinitz, who heads the judicial appointments committee.

President Rivlin presented the judges with their letters of appointment, shook their hands and then spoke.

In his remarks, the president emphasized the important role of the dayanim: “Dear judges, your role is to render true judgement, fairly and according to halacha (Jewish law). This is no easy task, but there is an additional requirement that is even more demanding – that your judgments do not desecrate either G-d or man. It is not enough that your judgment be correct, it must also sanctify the L-rd. This makes the responsibility on you even greater, and even more perilous. With such a weight of responsibility, the price of failure is also likely to be higher. “In every ruling, desecration and sanctification are in the balance. Your responsibility and your duty is to judge fairly and to be free of any influence. Justice must be done and be seen to be done, as lawyers say.

“It can be difficult to satisfy the public, but the judge is required not only to be free from influence but to appear to be free from influence,” said the president and added, “behaving in a way that is beyond reproach, even when searching for misdeeds. We need to be clear. I tell you this as a Jew who tries to adhere to the 613 mitzvot (religious requirements) but does not always succeed. Your role and duty, to go out to the people, is particularly hard when large parts of Israeli society are secular.”

The president wished the judges well and said, “you face challenges different from judges in the past, but I am sure that you will meet them and bring people closer to G-d.”

Rishon L’Tzion Rav Yosef added, “every dayan who renders true judgment becomes a partner in the holy work of creation. You have a great duty and a great responsibility to render true judgment. If dayanim deal with a case where a woman has been prevented from divorcing for many years and her husband refuses to give her a divorce, the dayan must look on her as if she were his daughter. Just as he would protect his daughter, so must he look out for her. We read “I saw the tears of the oppressed, and no-one to comfort them”. What are the “tears of the oppressed”? Those women who are led on for years and not granted divorces. I come across cases that have not been resolved for 15 or 20 years. I tell you, gentlemen, If you see a case like that, the judges must have the courage to render judgment. Do whatever is necessary to make sure a divorce is granted.”

Chief Rabbi Lau said: “Dayanim must render true judgment, but also to think of each person before you as if they were your own son, according to halacha and the traditions handed down the generations, of course. More than once I have felt that when sitting in a rabbinical court I am helping people save themselves from themselves. People sometimes hurt those dearest to them and the role of the judge is to see beyond this and to help people get what is right and good for them from the court. That is our responsibility. I hope that the assignments to courts is resolved soon; any delay is a miscarriage of justice.”

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem/Photo Credit: GPO)