Health Ministry says ‘hametz law’ doesn’t let hospitals search or confiscate food
Responding to petition filed after pregnant woman’s cookies were taken by guard, ministry tells High Court new law only allows hospital staff to inform guests of rules at gates
The Health Ministry said on Sunday that hospital security guards were not authorized by a new law to confiscate leavened products during Passover, responding to a High Court of Justice petition against a medical center where a guard had seized cookies that were not kosher for Passover from a pregnant woman.
Israel Hofshit-Be Free Israel, a nonprofit that advocates for religious freedom, petitioned the High Court against the recently passed so-called “hametz law,” which allowed hospitals to ban leavened products from their premises during Passover, calling on the court to immediately intervene and ban potential searches of visitors’ bags at entrances to hospitals.
The ministry said in its response that the law only permitted hospital staff, under instructions from hospital management, to inform visitors and patients of the ban on such products at the entrance.
“The law does not enable [a hospital’s management] to authorize an employee to search a person for hametz, or to prevent a person’s access into the hospital for reasons related to kashrut for Passover,” the statement read, adding that the ministry intended to advise hospitals on the proper implementation of the new law.
“A security guard is only responsible for keeping the public safe from violence and terrorism, and is therefore not authorized to inform any person about the instructions regarding hametz, even if they randomly found hametz during the security inspection,” it added.
On April 2, a guard at Laniado Hospital in Netanya confiscated a snack from a woman several days before the start of the holiday, as some medical centers prepared to implement the government’s “hametz law” passed by the Knesset at the end of March.
The law bans hametz (leavened food) in hospitals during the week of Passover, during which observant Jews eschew such products, and leaves it to hospital directors to “use their own judgment in how to notify visitors and staff” either by posting their policies on their website or with signage at entrances, but it does not explicitly allow security guards to search patients’ or visitors’ bags to enforce the policy.
The hospital said in its response that contrary to what is claimed in the petition, its security guards “don’t deal with the hametz issue and there are hospital stewards who inform visitors about the hospital’s policy to prevent bringing in any food besides whole fruits and vegetables.”
Laniado said the stewards always ask for visitors’ permission to search their bags, arguing that in three cases in which visitors refused to respect the hospital policy, the stewards didn’t confront them or prevent their entry.
The hospital claimed the petition was based on media reports it views as “provocations,” saying the whole thing was a “premeditated action for PR purposes.”
Head of Be Free Israel Uri Keidar hailed the ministry’s response, saying: “Even under a Shas party minister, the Health Ministry understands that the law does not allow and will not allow them to rummage through anyone’s bags and delay any patient on their way to the hospital.”
“We believe that through this petition we will be able to eradicate this ugly custom immediately, and the State of Israel will eradicate the phenomenon of religious police that some are trying to establish here,” he said.
The petition was filed against Laniado Hospital, acting Health Minister Yoav Ben-Tzur of Shas, and the Health Ministry.
Ben-Tzur was made health minister to replace Shas party leader Aryeh Deri, who was fired from the position after a High Court ruling that he could not be a minister due to his recent criminal convictions and his ostensible promise last year to withdraw from political life as part of a plea bargain.
Several large hospitals have said they will post signage on hospital premises but not search belongings to enforce the restrictions. Some said they would set up designated spaces or lockers for anyone wishing to keep hametz there. Passover began on the evening of Wednesday, April 5.
But last Sunday, Hebrew media reported that an employee stationed at the entrance to Laniado Hospital, a religious hospital in Netanya, prevented a woman with a high-risk pregnancy from entering with a package of wafers that were not kosher for Passover, and she was required to leave the food outside. The hospital was founded in 1976 by Rabbi Yekutiel Yehuda Halberstam and is owned by the Sanz Hasidic sect, though it also receives state funding.
The woman’s husband, whose name was not disclosed, told Channel 12 a tent was set up at the hospital’s entrance where patients and visitors were required to hand over any food that was not kosher for Passover in exchange for a ticket to later get their food back, and gain entry to the hospital.
The new hametz law was sponsored by the ultra-Orthodox United Torah Judaism party, outraged after a 2020 High Court of Justice ruling blocked hospitals from searching bags to check for hametz in response to petitions decrying the searches as invasive and religiously intrusive. The court extended its ruling to army bases last year.
The fight over hametz in hospitals has become a symbol for both secular and religious Jews of their fight over religion’s place in the Jewish state, and of the legislative moves by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government — Israel’s most hardline to date.
The issue came to a crescendo last April, when the fight over hametz and its ties to religious values in the state was said to be the immediate catalyst for a member of the razor-thin coalition to defect, kicking off a three-month tumble toward the previous government’s collapse.
The Times of Israel Community.