CWJ News

• April 25, 2012  Supreme Court Rebukes Rabbinic Courts for Revoked Conversions: The Israeli Supreme Court has severely rebuked Israel’s High Rabbinic Court and the Ashdod District Rabbinic Court for revoking the conversions of two women and their children and attempting to invalidate all the conversions carried out by Rabbi Chaim Druckman from 1999 onward. The women and children were represented by the Center for Women’s Justice (CWJ) in a petition submitted in June 2008.  Read more… 
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• February 3, 2012 Press Release: Supreme Court Rules in Damage Claim Appeal in CWJ Get Recalcitrance Case
  “Technical issues” cited as reason for turning down a husband’s request to have his appeal heard by the Supreme Court on the issue of damages owed for get refusal to his wife, a Center for Women's Justice client. While the case won’t receive a hearing, Supreme Court Justice Neal Hendel offers strong rebuke to recalcitrant husband and unabashed support for this case’s prior judgments in both family and district courts that awarded and upheld an NIS 700,000 award for his long-suffering wife. 
  


Attorney Susan Weiss, CWJ founder and Executive Director, “Though the Supreme Court of Israel has not yet given its full stamp of approval of the damage claims brought against recalcitrant husbands, the latest decision confirms that the Court views get recalcitrance as reprehensible and worthy of compensation. CWJ applauds 
the decision." Read the full statement here

• January 31, 2012 CWJ to Supreme Court: Include at Least Four Women on Committee for Appointing Rabbinic Judges                                                                                With the aim of correcting an injustice that stifled women’s voices in appointing judges (dayanim) for Israel’s religious courts this year, the Center for Women’s Justice (CWJ) has petitioned the Supreme Court to rule that the Committee for Appointing  Rabbinic Court Judges must include at least four women.                                                                                      CWJ’s petition states that the requirement to reserve four places for men without a similar number for women is a serious affront to justice and equality. “This practice contradicts the State’s commitment, under international law, to eliminating all forms of discrimination against women,” says attorney Susan Weiss, director of CWJ. “It also contradicts the 1951 Equal Rights Law, which mandates adequate representation of women in public bodies.”      Read the full Press Release here.                                                                                                  

• CWJ brings Supreme Court Case Challenging Restrictions on Mikvah Use. CWJ brought a precedent-setting petition in January 2012 challenging the Chief Rabbinate's domination of mikvah use in Israel. CWJ raises these questions in a petition to the Supreme Court on behalf of two unmarried women who wish to immerse themselves in a mikvah – but are barred from doing so by the Rabbinate’s regulations that mikvahs are for married women only. Read about it at The Forward
• CWJ's Founder and Directer Attorney Susan Weiss has been recognized  as one of the 10 most influential Anglo Immigrants. (28 September 2011) Click here for full article
• Recalcitrant husband to pay 680,000 NIS. CWJ gains traction in bid to compel Israeli civil courts to protect women’s rights: Recalcitrant husband to pay NIS 680,000. Read more on YNet English news
  

• Rabbinic Courts defeat the public, 2-0. How did rabbinic judges manage to convince us all of new law – that it is possible to cancel conversion? This campaign of intimidation must be stopped. Read more from Rivkah Lubitch on YNet English news. 
• CWJ in Haaretz. Read the article about CWJ's groundbreaking work in tort law for agunot in the Haaretz Special Passover supplement. Read more here...
  

• The Center for Women’s Justice marks International Agunah Day. 17 March 2011, International Agunah Day. The Center for Women’s Justice (CWJ) is marking International Agunah by calling on the legislators, judges, and decision-makers of Israel to use all the tools at their disposal to release women from the chains of unwanted marriage. It is unconscionable that in the year 2011 in the modern State of Israel, women’s basic right of freedom to be unmarried if she so chooses is not supported by the government.  CWJ calls for the following solutions: Read more...
  
  
• NCJW Calls for Divorce Reform in Israel. March 15, 2011, Washington, DC — On the occasion of International Agunot Day, March 17, the National Council of Jewish Women (NCJW) today called upon the Knesset to enact divorce reform in Israel...read more

• Making recalcatrant husbands pay -- literally, The Forward Sisterhood, by Debra Nussbaum Cohen, Feb 23, 201. A man withholding a Jewish divorce — known as a get — is liable for money damages to his estranged wife, according to a recent decision handed down by a Tel Aviv appeals court....
  

• Tel Aviv District Court Affirms: Get Refusal is a Tort From  Jerusalem Post, February 3, 2011:District Court sets precedent by upholding right of ‘aguna' By RUTH EGLASH 02/03/2011 06:27Woman’s bid to sue her recalcitrant ...
  

• New Rabbinic Court ruling: CWJ clients are Jewish Erev Yom Kippur 2010: After 2 years of prolonged litigation and interrogation, the rabbinic court has ruled that CWJ clients are Jewish despite 2008 rulings of Ashdod Rabbinic Court and ...
  

• High Court of Justice Ruling: CWJ vs Rabbinic Court Admin Sept. 19, 2010. Supreme Court President Dorit Beinisch called to reexamine the internal committees that discuss the rabbinical courts' requests for payment arrangements to divorce refusers. Since the issue bears ...
  

• Bagat"z Giyur Hearing held yesterday in the Supreme Court regarding CWJ's petition to revoke the decision of the rabbinic courts to repeal conversions of 2 of our clients. The Court agreed ...
  

• Knesset Conference CWJ takes part in Knesset Conference