Religious Services Ministry backs away from ousting Kiryat Shmona religious council chief

After the uproar and protests in the battered city, Rabbi Yitzhak Kakun, chairman of the religious council in Kiryat Shmona, will return to head the city’s religious services system. That is the core of the emerging compromise between the Ministry of Religious Services and Mayor Avichai Stern, which on Wednesday led to the cancellation of the hearing on the petition at the Supreme Court. Supreme Court Deputy President Justice Noam Sohlberg approved a joint request by the parties and halted the legal proceedings.

According to the agreement document submitted to the court, Religious Services Minister Yariv Levin will fulfill his duty to consult with Stern, and as part of that process Rabbi Yitzhak Kakun, along with another appointee from the area, will be appointed to the city’s religious council. They will remain in their posts until February 1, 2027, or until the permanent composition of the council is renewed, whichever comes first. The current arrangement is expected to remain in force until three months after the Knesset election, and when the next government is formed, the minister appointed will work to form a permanent council. The High Court hearing was canceled, as noted, and the parties were instructed to submit a final status report by June 21.

The Upper Galilee authorities argued in the petition that the Ministry of Religious Services acted while the city was in an impossible security situation and an unprecedented crisis, "in the dark and in haste," without any hearing or opportunity for Rabbi Kakun or the municipality to present their case, while violating the statutory duty to consult with the mayor, Avichai Stern. According to sources in the Ministry of Religious Services and the Kiryat Shmona municipality, the understandings that led to the resolution of the crisis were reached by ministry director general Yehuda Avidan and the minister responsible for the ministry, Yariv Levin, following pressure from local opposition council members from Shas and Likud in the city, דווקא because of an unexpected turn: earlier this week, the ministry’s director general was summoned for a warning interrogation at Lahav 433 headquarters in Lod on suspicion of fraud, breach of trust, abuse of office and threats in a completely different case, involving the religious council in Kiryat Malakhi. The serious suspicions marked the beginning of the collapse of what northern authorities had identified as an attempted political takeover by the Shas party of the religious council in Kiryat Shmona.

Last month, ynet exposed the maneuver carried out at the Ministry of Religious Services through the appointment of a "kriah council" and Shas activists from outside Kiryat Shmona during the war. The confrontation erupted when director general Avidan sent the party activist Shimon Malka, who serves as an appointee in Hatzor HaGlilit, to the city as a temporary authorized signatory, without any notice or coordination. The Kiryat Shmona municipality, together with the regional councils of Upper Galilee, Mevo'ot HaHermon and Metula, petitioned the High Court through attorneys Avi Gabay and Ronen Sklerash. They accused the party apparatus of trying to stage a political takeover and seize control of the financial mechanisms during the city’s most difficult period.

In their preliminary response to the High Court, the Ministry of Religious Services asked that the petition be dismissed outright, arguing that the temporary authorized signatory appointment was a "legal and technical move only" intended to prevent a management vacuum after the council’s term expired in February 2026, and that the claims of lack of authority ignored an arrangement that had existed in the regulations since 2009. In response to those claims, the attorneys for the northern authorities quickly submitted information about the serious suspicions now being investigated against the ministry’s director general, and noted that this entanglement added to Avidan’s earlier conviction for breach of trust in 2004, when he admitted to granting preferential treatment to associates. According to the petitioners, the ministry’s silence in its response to the High Court in the face of the suspicions presented about his ties to Malka "cries out for explanation." The ministry’s response did not include any denial of the claim that Shimon Malka is a Shas political activist or that the move was intended to push Rabbi Kakun aside for ulterior motives.

According to the agreement document, the government ministry agreed to leave the city’s religious services in the hands of Kakun, who has managed the system for more than 20 years and over the years has won broad appreciation from all the authorities in the area and from residents, and has even received commendations from senior officials in the Ministry of Religious Services. It appears that Kakun’s removal was not driven by a desire for revenge or to harm him, but rather by Shas’s wish to control the local council’s personnel and budgets, and thereby also influence the appointment of a chief rabbi in the city from the party’s ranks. In the ministry’s response, it was also stated that "the Ministry of Religious Services holds Rabbi Yitzhak Kakun in deep esteem for his dedication and extensive work on behalf of religious services in the city. Rabbi Kakun is a highly respected figure, both by the professional ranks in the ministry and by the residents of Kiryat Shmona and the regional councils, and he receives much praise for his leadership."

Attorney Ofer Bartal, representing Yehuda Avidan, responded to the criminal investigation concerning the religious council in Kiryat Malakhi: "Mr. Avidan demanded that the religious council chairman hold the employee a lawful hearing and not fire him in violation of the law. We are certain that the case will be closed once all the facts become clear."