Rabbi Kalman Bar appointed new Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi

Rabbi Kalman Bar was chosen to become the next Ashkenazi chief rabbi of Israel on Thursday.

Bar, who is haredi (ultra-Orthodox) and the chief rabbi of Netanya, defeated Rabbi Micha Halevi, who is religious-Zionist and the chief rabbi of Petah Tikva, in a runoff election at the Chief Rabbinate in Jerusalem. They finished tied in the first election on September 29, during which Rabbi David Yosef was elected Sephardi chief rabbi of Israel.

Bar was chosen by a vote of 77-58.

His election is a political victory for the Degel Hatorah faction of United Torah Judaism over Shas and the Religious Zionist Party (RZP). RZP and Shas reportedly had cut a deal by which RZP would support Shas’s candidate for Sephardi chief rabbi (Yosef) in exchange for Shas’s support of the religious-Zionist candidate for Ashkenazi chief rabbi.

The electoral body included 140 members instead of 150 after the Chief Rabbinate Council refused to comply with a High Court of Justice ruling forcing it to consider appointing women rabbis among its 10 representatives who would vote. The council responded by refusing to appoint its representatives, and the vote proceeded without them. Four of the electoral body’s members did not vote.

The body’s makeup, according to law, includes 80 rabbis and 70 elected officials. The 70 elected officials include mayors, religious council leaders, two government representatives, five Knesset representatives, and 10 public figures chosen by the religious affairs minister. The 80 rabbis include municipal rabbis, neighborhood rabbis, representatives from the religious courts and from the military rabbinate, and 10 rabbis elected by the outgoing chief rabbis.

The 150-member body is also responsible for electing a 15-member Chief Rabbinical Council.