The U-turns performed by Rabbi Rafi Peretz after promising that “my words are written in stone” last week and the recent months, have once again proven that the involvement of rabbis in politics is bad for the rabbinate, bad for Judaism, and bad for politics. Rabbis are not necessarily any better or any worse than other politicians. But politicians who…

The abusive diatribe recently leveled by Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef against Israeli immigrants from the former Soviet Union is merely a symptom, not the problem itself. The real problem is that the Chief Rabbinate, headed by Rabbi Yosef together with his Ashkenazi counterpart Rabbi Lau, makes life difficult for this immigrant population on a daily basis, applying an extremely stringent…

The Prime Minister decided to invoke his right to request immunity from prosecution. On the face of it, when the request is heard by the Knesset House Committee and then by the Knesset plenum, it will apply only to a specific and limited issue, namely, the question of when Netanyahu’s trial will take place—immediately, or only after he is no…

This has been a dramatic decade with regard to the religion-State relationship in Israel. It is true that, formally, the old status quo remains unchanged and has been maintained in the coalition agreements of the various governments over this period; in practice, however, there have been changes in almost all the significant aspects of this relationship, and the status quo…

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the head of the Likud, is up and running for yet another election campaign, as so many times in the past. This time, however, he is running despite three serious criminal indictments hanging on his neck. After lengthy deliberation, the attorney-general, who holds the statutory authority to file charges against him, decided to indict Netanyahu. Does…

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the head of the Likud, is up and running for yet another election campaign, as so many times in the past. This time, however, he is running despite three serious criminal indictments hanging on his neck. After lengthy deliberation, the attorney-general, who holds the statutory authority to file charges against him, decided to indict Netanyahu. Does…

The wrestling match between the political and the judicial, between the elected representatives and the professionals, is becoming ever more intense. The current justice minister, Amir Ohana, is the prime minister’s personal political appointee. His ministry is home to the critically important State Attorney’s Office, against which he has launched a fierce attack. He is doing so donning a suit…

Businesses and companies play a central role in our lives. We work for them, purchase their products and services, and invest our money in them. They influence our quality of life, standard of living, and life expectancy. They shape our ideas and beliefs through their power over the media, culture, the sciences, and politics. They hold title to a majority…

The recent elections were waged to a large extent over the issue of the relations between religion and state. As is often the case in election campaigns, this one exacerbated the already acute tensions that this issue routinely arouses, and demonstrated that even after 70 years Israel is still in the throes of a fierce conflict on the very character…