Police say they have arrested and filed a lawsuit against a man in his 50s from Ashkelon who allegedly made death threats against Religious Services Minister Matan Kahana.
The swift investigation and charges come just a day after the man allegedly called Kahana’s office and voiced the threats to an employee.
The threats refer to a series of reforms pushed by Kahana to overhaul religious conversions and the kosher certificate system, aimed at weakening the Chief Rabbinate’s monopoly over those issues.
“Tell him to stop harming the Rabbinate or rabbis, I’m telling you, he will end up like Rabin,” he allegedly said, referring to former prime minister Yitzhak Rabin who was assassinated in 1995 by a right-wing extremist.
“Someone will take him out because he’s harming rabbis and the Rabbinate,” the man said of the Orthodox Kahana. “He just has a kippa on his head, he isn’t even religious.”
The defendant’s remand has been extended indefinitely by the Ashkelon Magistrate’s Court, police say.
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