Religions Minister Yaakov Mergi said Monday that multi-tiered or "saturated" burial is a necessary solution for the shortage in burial space in Israel's cemeteries. He insisted that the solution is in line with Jewish law, or Halakha.
Speaking at a Religions Ministry conference in the Rimonim Shalom Hotel in Jerusalem, Mergi said: "We must begin burying in a saturated way." The conference launched the Ministry's campaign for saturated burials.
A few people demonstrated outside the hotel during the conference, against saturated burial which they say contravenes Halakha. The protest was headed by Rav Gedalya Axelrod of Chabad, former Head of the Rabbinical Court in Haifa. Axelrod said the saturated burial system amounts to "burial in concrete bathtubs" and not in the earth.