Circumcision in extreme circumstances
21.05.2000
Some immigrants who came to Israel from the CIS countries come across the problems typical for a state with domineering religious ideology. In particular, it concerns the procedure of divorce.
Because of the priority of the religious legislation, registrar’s offices are absent in Israel. The divorce between a Jew and a Jewess is resolved by Rabbi’s court, the divorce of mixed marriages is done by region courts of Israel. The divorce between citizens of Israel who are both not Jews is not envisaged at all.
A young Ukrainian couple emigrated to Israel from Ukraine: they had the right because their fathers were Jews, but since they had no Jewish blood in their mothers’ line, they were not considered Jews in Israel. Then they decided to divorce.
They could not divorce in their former motherland since they had no internal Ukrainian passports. The young people turned in the Ukrainian Consulate in Israel. They got a refusal.
In this extreme circumstances the young people had no way out but to become Jews, which is a very long and cumbersome procedure, including some well-known religious rites. Another way out was to pay a huge sum to a lawyer, who could attempt to divorce our heroes in distant Argentina.
The procedure is going on, the Supreme Court of Ukraine and a number of similar quickly acting organizations are involved.
Because of the priority of the religious legislation, registrar’s offices are absent in Israel. The divorce between a Jew and a Jewess is resolved by Rabbi’s court, the divorce of mixed marriages is done by region courts of Israel. The divorce between citizens of Israel who are both not Jews is not envisaged at all.
A young Ukrainian couple emigrated to Israel from Ukraine: they had the right because their fathers were Jews, but since they had no Jewish blood in their mothers’ line, they were not considered Jews in Israel. Then they decided to divorce.
They could not divorce in their former motherland since they had no internal Ukrainian passports. The young people turned in the Ukrainian Consulate in Israel. They got a refusal.
In this extreme circumstances the young people had no way out but to become Jews, which is a very long and cumbersome procedure, including some well-known religious rites. Another way out was to pay a huge sum to a lawyer, who could attempt to divorce our heroes in distant Argentina.
The procedure is going on, the Supreme Court of Ukraine and a number of similar quickly acting organizations are involved.