Five Israeli hospitals have announced that they will not obey orders from the Chief Rabbinate and the Health Ministry to have security guards at entrance gates check visitors for leavened products — the ownership and consumption of which Jewish law forbids during the upcoming Passover festival, according to an article on The Times of Israel website.
Three hospitals, meanwhile, have announced that they will continue to follow the rules, which have become a norm in recent years, the article said.
The announcements follow a petition to the High Court filed by the Secular Forum NGO, together with lawmakers from the Zionist Union and Meretz parties, seeking a ruling against the conditioning of Passover kashrut certificates for hospitals on the institutions’ checking and confiscation of leavened products.
Where the rules are practiced, visitors are asked to leave at the entrance — to be picked up on their way out — any food other than whole fruit and vegetables or sealed packaged food stamped “kosher for Passover.”
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