MK Meir Porush
MK Meir PorushTPS

Deputy Education Minister MK Meir Porush (United Torah Judaism) has issued a sharp condemnation of this week’s Supreme Court decision that ordered the Attorney-General and the State Attorney’s Office to take disciplinary action against the Chief Rabbi of Tzfat, Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu.

Their ruling was handed down in a unanimous decision by the President of the Court, Esther Hayut, and two other Justices.

“The total lack of sensitivity the Supreme Court displays toward the Torah-observant community as shown in its rulings and statements is astounding,” he said. “This decision to take disciplinary action against a rabbi of a city reveals the Court’s moral bankruptcy and the total loss of its ethical compass.”

Porush added that, “For the last two years, haredi Jewry has been demanding that the Supreme Court’s powers be limited, and now these calls are gaining strength due to the harassment we experience at the hands of the Court. Their latest actions will only enhance the impression of the general public that the Supreme Court is distancing itself more and more from the consensus and despises their ways of thinking.”

The Supreme Court’s ruling followed a petition filed by the Reform Center for Religion and State, and several other left-wing organizations, back in 2016, with regard to statements made by Rabbi Eliyahu concerning the Reform movement and the issue of Arabs on the Temple Mount.

Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu’s office responded in a statement that: “This is a politicized court. If the issue had been freedom of speech granted to those who share their views, they wouldn’t have found a single problem with presenting a picture of the Prime Minister on the guillotine or hanging from a rope. When it comes to rabbis or religious Jews, however, they twist the law in order to trample on basic rights. We will not stop speaking out and telling the truth – we have no faith in this court.”