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Elections for Chief Rabbis of Israel were held in Jerusalem in 2024. The elections were initially scheduled for 2023, however they were delayed due to controversy surrounding the appointment of women to the Chief Rabbinate. [1]
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Elections for Chief Rabbis of Israel were held in Jerusalem in 2024. The elections were initially scheduled for 2023, however they were delayed due to controversy surrounding the appointment of women to the Chief Rabbinate. [1]
Chief rabbis serve as the head of Israeli religious infrastructure. This includes managing kosher certification, Jewish marriages, and deaths [2] [3] They also have significant influence over the question of "Who is a Jew?" [4] The position is held for a 10-year term, with incumbents unable to run for reelection.
The first round of elections was held on September 29 at the Ramada Hotel. There were five major candidates for the Ashkenazi election and three for the Sephardic. [1] David Yosef was elected Sephardic chief rabbi, making him the third member of the Yosef family to serve as chief rabbi. [5] [6] However, Kalman Ber and Micha Halevi both tied with 40 votes in the Ashkenazi chief rabbi election. [7] A second round was then held on October 31, which Kalman Ber won. [8]
Ovadia Yosef was an Iraqi-born Talmudic scholar, a posek, the Sephardi Chief Rabbi of Israel from 1973 to 1983, and a founder and long-time spiritual leader of Israel's ultra-Orthodox Shas party. Yosef's responsa were highly regarded within Haredi circles, particularly among Mizrahi communities, among whom he was regarded as "the most important living halakhic authority".
Shlomo Moshe Amar is the former Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Israel. He served in the position of Rishon LeZion from 2003 to 2013; his Ashkenazi counterpart during his tenure was Yona Metzger. In 2014 he became the Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem.
Yona Metzger is an Israeli Orthodox rabbi and the former Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Israel. In 2013, while chief rabbi, a fraud investigation was opened. Metzger later pleaded guilty to a number of corruption charges, was tried and convicted, and after a plea bargain was rejected, served prison time.
Shlomo Goren, was a Polish-born Israeli rabbi and Talmudic scholar. An Orthodox Jew and Religious Zionist, he was considered a foremost rabbinical legal authority on matters of Jewish religious law (halakha). In 1948, Goren founded and served as the first head of the Military Rabbinate of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), a position he held until 1968. Subsequently, he served as Chief Rabbi of Tel Aviv–Jaffa between 1968 and his 1972 election as the Chief Rabbi of Israel; the fourth Ashkenazi Jew to hold office. After his 1983 retirement from the country's Chief Rabbinate, Goren served as the head of a yeshiva that he established in Jerusalem.
The Chief Rabbinate of Israel is recognized by law as the supreme rabbinic authority for Judaism in Israel. The Chief Rabbinate Council assists the two Chief Rabbis, who alternate in its presidency. It has legal and administrative authority to organize religious arrangements for Israeli Jews. It also responds to halakhic questions submitted by Jewish public bodies in the Diaspora. The Council sets, guides, and supervises agencies within its authority.
The Old Yishuv were the Jewish communities of the region of Palestine during the Ottoman period, up to the onset of Zionist aliyah waves, and the consolidation of the new Yishuv by the end of World War I. Unlike the new Yishuv, characterized by secular and Zionist ideologies promoting labor and self-sufficiency, the Old Yishuv primarily consisted of religious Jews who relied on external donations (halukka) for support.
Rabbi Haim (Emile) Amsalem is an Israeli politician and a former member of the Knesset. Elected to the Knesset in 2006 as a representative of Shas, he left the party in 2011 and established Am Shalem. The new party contested the 2013 Knesset elections but failed to win a seat.
Avraham Yosef is the former chief rabbi of Holon and Sephardi representative on the Chief Rabbinate Council. He stepped down from his positions after pleading guilty to breach of trust, after using his office to promote his family's financial interests.
Yitzhak Yosef is an Israeli Haredi rabbi. The former Sephardi Chief Rabbi of Israel, he also serves as the rosh yeshiva of Yeshivat Hazon Ovadia in Jerusalem's Romema neighborhood. Since the end of his term as Chief Rabbi, he joined the rabbinic leadership council of the Shas party.
Aryeh Stern is the Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem, a member of the Chief Rabbinate Council of Israel, and the chief editor of the Halacha Brura and Berur Halacha Institute.
Sephardic Haredim are Jews of Sephardi and Mizrahi descent who are adherents of Haredi Judaism. Sephardic Haredim today constitute a significant stream of Haredi Judaism, along with Sephardic Hasidim, and the Ashkenazi Hasidim and Lita'im. An overwhelming majority of Sephardic Haredim reside in Israel, where Sephardic Haredi Judaism emerged and developed. Although there is a lack of consistency in many of the statistics regarding Haredim in Israel, it is thought that some 20% of Israel's Haredi population are Sephardic Haredim. This figure is disputed by Shas, which claims that the proportion is "much higher than 20%", and cites voting patterns in Haredi cities to support its position.
![<span class="mw-page-title-main">David Lau</span> Former Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Israel [2013-2024]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/32/David_Lau_1.JPG/320px-David_Lau_1.JPG)
David Baruch Lau is an Israeli rabbi who served as the Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Israel from 2013 to 2024. He previously served as the Chief Rabbi of Modi'in-Maccabim-Re'ut, Israel, and as the Chief Rabbi of Shoham. Lau is the son of former Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Israel Yisrael Meir Lau.
Moetzet Chachmei HaTorah is the rabbinical body that has the ultimate authority in the Israeli ultra-Orthodox Sephardic and Mizrahi Shas Party.
Hacham David Yosef is the Sephardi Chief Rabbi of Israel and Rishon LeZion. He has authored dozens of books in Jewish Law mainly based on the rulings of his father, Hacham Ovadia Yosef. His most notable work is a set of books named Halacha Berura, which is an encyclopedia like commentary on the Shulchan Aruch, with letters of approbation from his father and Rabbi Yosef Shalom Elyashiv.
Ashkenazi Jews in Israel refers to immigrants and descendants of Ashkenazi Jews, who now reside within the state of Israel, in the modern sense also referring to Israeli Jewish adherents of the Ashkenazi Jewish tradition. As of 2013, they number 2.8 million and constitute one of the largest Jewish ethnic divisions in Israel, in line with Mizrahi and Sephardi Jews. Ashkenazim, excluding those who migrated from the former USSR, are estimated to be 31.8% of the Israeli population in 2018.
The position of Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem was instituted centuries ago and was originally held by a member of the Sephardic community. Moses Galante served as Rishon LeZion, the title used from beginning of the 17th century to refer to the chief rabbi of Jerusalem. In 1878, the Ashkenazi community appointed their own representative. Since then, Jerusalem has had two chief rabbis, each representing their respective communities.
Elections for the positions of Chief Rabbis of Israel were held at the Leonardo Hotel in Jerusalem on 24 July 2013. The elections were to elect the chief rabbis for the Ashkenazi and Sephardi communities.
The Yosef family is an Israeli family noted for prominent Mizrahi Rabbis, and for its involvement in Israeli politics through the Shas political party. Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Israel from 1973-1983 and founder of Shas, was considered the pre-eminent leader of Mizrahi Jews during and after his lifetime. Yosef also founded the Badatz Beit Yosef, an agency for certifying a food's kosher status. The agency is one of the largest in Israel, and is a major source of wealth for the family.
Rabbi Kalman Meir Ber is the Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Israel and President of the Chief Rabbinate Council. Previously, he served as the rabbi of Netanya and as the rabbi of the Kerem Yeshiva in Yavne, among other positions.
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