Municipal chief rabbi to face hearing over political comments

Justice Minister Tzipi Livni on Tuesday decided, for the first time, to bring a sitting municipal chief rabbi before a disciplinary hearing due to political comments he made publicly.

Livni has filed a complaint against the rabbi of Kiryat Motzkin, David Drukman, due to five anti-disengagement comments he made in the media. According to the civil service law, municipal chief rabbis - like all civil servants - are not allowed to make political comments in public or criticize government policies in public interviews or at press conferences.

"Drukman took advantage of his position as a rabbi and a civil servant and is not fit to continue to serve in his public position," the Reform movement's Israel Religious Action Center said on the decision to bring Drukman before a disciplinary hearing. The Religious Action Center has filed a High Court of Justice petition on the matter, following which the attorney general and state prosecution recommended that Livni file a complaint with the disciplinary court for municipal chief rabbis.

Drukman is accused of behavior not suitable to the position of a rabbi in Israel and violations of the religious services law and the civil service law.

Drukman signed a proclamation last December saying Sharon and his ministers were planning to throw "good and pure Jews" off their land. On a Chabad movement Web site, Drukman wrote that the move would "increase [Palestinians'] appetite for murdering us, our women and our children."