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NJ court rules in favor of woman who used social media to lobby for Jewish divorce
(JTA) — Advocates for Jewish women who say their estranged husbands are abusing them by refusing to assent to a religious divorce are cheering after a New Jersey appellate court overturned a ruling against a woman in that state who used social media to advocate for her divorce.
A lower court ruled in 2021 that the woman’s social media posts constituted harassment and incitement. The American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey got involved in the case then, joining several Orthodox women’s rights groups who had already been working on her behalf.
The woman, who was identified only by her initials, LBB, in Wednesday’s 39-page court ruling, has been separated from her husband since 2019. She says that he has refused to give her a get, or ritual divorce document.
According to Jewish law, if a husband does not give his wife a get, she becomes an “agunah,” Hebrew for “chained woman,” who is unable to divorce and therefore to remarry — even if the couple has already completed a civil divorce. Men who refuse to deliver a get, often to gain leverage in a civil divorce proceeding, face no such restrictions under Jewish law.
A number of organizations in the United States, Israel and beyond have mobilized to press Jewish legal authorities to find a solution to the issue, which Orthodox women’s rights advocates consider a form of domestic abuse. Three Jewish groups filed legal briefs in support of the woman, including the Organization for the Resolution of Agunot, Unchained at Last and the Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance.
“We applaud the court’s upholding of the right of agunot, those denied a Jewish divorce, to advocate for themselves within their communities without fear of repercussion.” Keshet Starr, CEO of the ORA, said in a statement. “Get refusal is unquestionably a form of domestic abuse; today, the court has stood up for survivors and against abuse in all its forms.”
In recent years, agunot and their advocates have turned to social media to recruit support for their cause and pressure their husbands to deliver a get. That appears to be what happened in this case. According to the court ruling, in 2021 the woman in question created a video in which she asked viewers to “press” her husband to give her a get. She says she sent it to only two people, but it appears to have spread more widely, and to have led to other social media activism that identified him by name, along with a photo.
The man testified that he subsequently received a series of anonymous phone calls, some containing threats. According to the ruling, he “explained his belief that the Jewish community reacts violently to the withholding of a get and that identifying him as a ‘get refuser’ subjected him to kidnappings and brutal beatings.”
He also said his father was a get refuser and was subject to beating as a result. And he testified about a history of verbal abuse throughout their marriage.
The man also claimed that he did not withhold the get and that he had in fact given it to someone identified in the ruling as the “Chief Rabbi of Elizabeth,” who could have given it to the man’s wife. It is unclear which rabbi the ruling referred to: There is no broadly recognized “chief rabbi of Elizabeth,” a New Jersey city, and unlike other countries such as Israel or the United Kingdom, the United States or its cities do not have a chief rabbi.
In 2021, the man received a temporary, and later a final, restraining order that barred his estranged wife from contacting him and ordered her to remove social media posts calling for the get. The court that issued the restraining order ruled that the social media posts constituted harassment, an invasion of privacy and incitement, and were thus not protected under the First Amendment’s free speech provisions.
The appellate court’s three-judge panel rejected that reasoning, saying that her social media activism did count as protected speech.
“In sum, the judge’s finding that the Jewish community was prone to violence against get refusers — and the implicit holding that defendant was aware of and intentionally availed herself of such violent tendencies — is not supported by the record,” the decision says. “The video was intended to get a get. The video did not threaten or menace plaintiff, and nothing in the record suggests that plaintiff’s safety or security was put at risk by the video.”
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The post NJ court rules in favor of woman who used social media to lobby for Jewish divorce appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Former Columbia University President Appointed as UK Economic Adviser
Columbia University administrators and faculty, led by President Minouche Shafik, testified before the US House Committee on Education and the Workforce on April 17, 2024. Photo: Jack Gruber/Reuters Connect
i24 News – British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has named Minouche Shafik, former president of Columbia University, as his chief economic adviser at Downing Street, a move aimed at stabilizing the country’s fragile economy and averting a potential budget crisis.
Shafik, an economist of Egyptian origin with dual British and American nationality, has held senior roles at the Bank of England, the IMF, and the World Bank.
She later led the London School of Economics and was elevated to the House of Lords in 2020.
Her tenure in the United States was more turbulent. Shafik stepped down as president of Columbia University in 2024 after just a year in office, amid fierce criticism over her handling of pro-Palestinian protests following the Hamas attacks of October 7, 2023, and the subsequent war in Gaza.
US officials accused her of failing to confront antisemitism on campus, while students and faculty condemned her decision to call in police to dismantle protest encampments.
Since returning to Britain, Shafik has played an active role in policy and cultural institutions. She advised Foreign Secretary David Lammy on international aid reform, has chaired the Victoria & Albert Museum since January, and led the “Economy 2030” inquiry for the Resolution Foundation, where she argued for reforms to the UK’s system of wealth taxation.
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Israel Mulls West Bank Annexation in Response to Moves to Recognize Palestine
The Jordan Valley. Photo: Юкатан via Wikimedia Commons.
Israel is considering annexation in the West Bank as a possible response to France and other countries recognizing a Palestinian state, according to three Israeli officials and the idea will be discussed further on Sunday, another official said.
Extension of Israeli sovereignty to the West Bank – de facto annexation of land captured in the 1967 Middle East war – was on the agenda for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s security cabinet meeting late on Sunday that is expected to focus on the Gaza war, a member of the small circle of ministers said.
It is unclear where precisely any such measure would be applied and when, whether only in Israeli settlements or some of them, or in specific areas of the West Bank like the Jordan Valley and whether any concrete steps, which would likely entail a lengthy legislative process, would follow discussions.
Any step toward annexation in the West Bank would likely draw widespread condemnation from the Palestinians, who seek the territory for a future state, as well as Arab and Western countries. It is unclear where US President Donald Trump stands on the matter. The White House and State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
A spokesperson for Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar did not respond to a request for comment on whether Saar had discussed the move with his US counterpart Marco Rubio during his visit to Washington last week.
Netanyahu’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on whether the prime minister supports annexation and if so, where.
A past pledge by Netanyahu to annex Jewish settlements and the Jordan Valley was scrapped in 2020 in favor of normalizing ties with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain in the Abraham Accords brokered by Trump in his first term in office.
The office of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The United States said on Friday it would not allow Abbas to travel to New York for the United Nations gathering of world leaders, where several US allies are set to recognize Palestine as a state.
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Israel Pounds Gaza City Suburbs, Netanyahu to Convene Security Cabinet
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks to the press on Capitol Hill, Washington, DC, July 8, 2025. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein
Israeli forces pounded the suburbs of Gaza City overnight from the air and ground, destroying homes and driving more families out of the area as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s security cabinet was set on Sunday to discuss a plan to seize the city.
Residents of Sheikh Radwan, one of the largest neighborhoods of Gaza City, said the territory had been under Israeli tank shelling and airstrikes throughout Saturday and on Sunday, forcing families to seek shelter in the western parts of the city.
The Israeli military has gradually escalated its operations around Gaza City over the past three weeks, and on Friday it ended temporary pauses in the area that had allowed for aid deliveries, designating it a “dangerous combat zone.”
“They are crawling into the heart of the city where hundreds of thousands are sheltering, from the east, north, and south, while bombing those areas from the air and ground to scare people to leave,” said Rezik Salah, a father of two, from Sheikh Radwan.
An Israeli official said Netanyahu’s security cabinet will convene on Sunday evening to discuss the next stages of the planned offensive to seize Gaza City, which he has described as Hamas’ last bastion.
A full-scale offensive is not expected to start for weeks. Israel says it wants to evacuate the civilian population before moving more ground forces in.
HAMAS SPOKESPERSON TARGETED
Netanyahu confirmed on Sunday that Israeli forces had targeted Abu Ubaida, the spokesperson of Hamas’ armed wing. Defense Minister Israel Katz said that Abu Ubaida was killed. Two Hamas officials contacted by Reuters did not respond to requests for comment.
Gaza health authorities said 15 people, including five children, were killed in the attack on a residential building in the heart of Gaza City.
Abu Ubaida, also known as Hozayfa Al-Khalout, is a well-known figure to Palestinians and Israelis alike, close to Hamas’ top military leaders and in charge of delivering the group’s messages, often via video, for around two decades, delivering statements while wearing a red keffiyeh that concealed his face.
The US targeted him with sanctions in April 2024, accusing him of leading the “cyber influence department” of al-Qassam Brigades.
In his last statement on Friday, he warned that the planned Israeli offensive on Gaza City would endanger the hostages.
On Saturday, Red Cross head Mirjana Spoljaric said an evacuation from the city would provoke a massive population displacement that no other area in the enclave is equipped to absorb, with shortages of food, shelter and medical supplies.
“People who have relatives in the south left to stay with them. Others, including myself, didn’t find a space as Deir Al-Balah and Mawasi are overcrowded,” said Ghada, a mother of five from the city’s Sabra neighborhood.
Around half of the enclave’s more than 2 million people are presently in Gaza City. Several thousand were estimated to have left the city for central and southern areas of the enclave.
Israel’s military has warned its political leaders that the offensive is endangering hostages still being held by Hamas in Gaza. Protests in Israel calling for an end to the war and the release of the hostages have intensified in the past few weeks.