Israeli Restaurants Threatened With Lawsuits Over Alternate Kosher Supervision
Eatery Anger: Restaurateurs are fuming at the Israeli state rabbinate?s monopoly on kosher certification. Image by courtesy of jerusalem movement
JERUSALEM — Israel’s Chief Rabbinate has started warning restaurants that use an alternative kosher supervision they will face legal action if they continue to present themselves as kosher.
The warning notices circulated Wednesday came two days after Israel’s Supreme Court ruled that businesses cannot describe themselves as kosher unless they have official certification from the rabbinate. The ruling includes indicating that the business is kosher even if it uses other words to describe its food or services.
Many of the businesses receiving notices use Hashgacha Pratit, translated as private certification, a well-known private kashrut supervision service. Hashgacha Pratit director Ayala Falk told The Jerusalem Post that the organization is rewording the supervision certificate it gives to restaurants using its services in order to comply with the Supreme Court ruling.
At least 25 food businesses are certified by the private service.
A message from our Publisher & CEO Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism so that we can be prepared for whatever news 2025 brings.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
