The Israel High Court Building in Jerusalem
The latest attack by the Israel High Court on the practice of the Jewish religion is with their decision that hospitals may not ban the entry of chometz on Pesach, as they have always been doing. There were 3 judges sitting on the case, and the two non-religious judges prevailed over the single religious judge.
As part of the election campaign, Rabbi Gafni told Yated Ne'eman, "There are things we will have to do immediately at the beginning of the next government term," says the Chairman of the Finance Committee MK Rabbi Moshe Gafni, "before we cooperate on any other subject. These things must be taken care of. The status of Torah students is the apple of our eye but there are other matters which defy postponement, such as preserving the status quo of conversions and not changing a single thing from what was till now. There are other issues of religion and state which get shunted to the side: the High Court! Shabbos is under their control, chometz is Bagatz, and again, bnei yeshivos and conversion - everything is under their jurisdiction and when these issues get to their doorstep, the courts blatantly and arrogantly impose their own assimilation agenda which can even overturn and nullify Knesset laws. First thing in the new term, before dealing with anything else, we will have to legislate the law limiting the power of the High Court."
The decision of the president of the High Court denying the Rabbinate's request to rehear the case of chometz entry to hospitals with a larger panel, was a disappointment to the appellants but not a surprise. The position of the High Court on issues of religion is well known and the results are easy to predict.
This was true even at the time of the original petition to upset the arrangement that has been in place from the earliest days of the State in which chometz was not allowed into public hospitals during the week of Pesach. It is just a week and the majority of the people in Israel do not eat chometz, and the arrangement enabled everyone who had to be hospitalized during this period to avoid having to see chometz.
How simple and how desirable.
This was never considered "religious coercion" since it did not prevent anyone from eating chometz except inside the hospital, so that the religious patients would not be upset.
If chometz will be allowed into hospitals freely, it may prevent people from entering the hospital during this period, even if it is dangerous of them not to. This should weigh on the conscience of the judges who rule based on their abstract principles without even a minimal Jewish sensitivity.
No one was surprised by the decision of the court. The two anti-Jewish judges overruled the single observant judge by a vote of two to one.
The president of the court was reasonable to refuse the request for a rehearing. Why waste the Court's time when the result is clear in advance? The Court is always and consistently limiting and curtailing the rights of the religious community in Israel, whether with regard to chometz, or conversion or Torah study. This is clear anti-religious coercion.
