Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

Israel Supreme Court: Both Same-Sex Partners Named On Adoption Certificate

JERUSALEM (JTA) — The names of both parents who adopt a baby in Israel must be registered on its birth certificate even if both parents are the same sex.

Israel’s Supreme Court made the ruling on Wednesday in response to a lawsuit filed by a homosexual couple who claimed they were being discriminated against since both members of a heterosexual couple are listed on a birth certificate.

The lawsuit was filed together with The Aguda – Israel’s LGBT Task Force, a gay rights advocacy group.

It also alleged that not listing both adoptive parents in a same-sex relationship unnecessarily complicates legal actions that require proof of the parent-child relationship vis-à-vis the parent not listed on the birth certificate.

The three-judge panel ordered the Interior Ministry to issue the baby a birth certificate bearing the name of both fathers, Haaretz reported.

A message from our CEO & publisher 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 during this critical time.

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

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.