The Efforts to Promote Utah Online Marriage Continue

Hiddush gives legal counsel to couples who seek to marry using the Online Marriage platform in Utah

24/03/2024 12:49

Tags: Utah Online Marriage ·  gay rights ·  Hiddush ·  the Supreme Court

Yehuda and Rene

Following our landmark victory in the Supreme Court in March 2023 (which accepted Hiddush’s position and ordered the Ministry of the Interior and the Population Authority to register as married all couples who marry through the online marriage platform in Utah), we continue our efforts to promote this alternative, and to assist the couples who seek to marry using this platform. We currently give legal counsel and representation to a WhatsApp group comprised of approximately 550 couples who are interested in a Utah marriage or who have already married in this manner. The expansion of the group reflects the growing interest in this alternative, which is the closest to civil and pluralistic marriages that Israel has ever reached.

We recently successfully represented a Jewish couple, who were illegally discriminated against by the Population Authority following their Utah marriage. The Population Authority refused to record their shared surname and the father's name on the birth certificate of their baby. Following our intervention, the birth certificate and the registration of the baby in the Population Registry was corrected, and the Population Registration Authority apologized to them.

The Population Authority's official published guidelines discriminate against granting status to a non-Jewish spouse when it comes to same-sex couples

In another case, we successfully represented a gay couple, comprised of a Jewish Israeli spouse who married a non-Jewish spouse from the Philippines in a Utah marriage. The Population Authority discriminated against the non-Jewish spouse and refused to issue him a work permit in Israel but reversed their decision after our intervention. During the course of dealing with this issue, it became apparent that the Population Authority's official published guidelines discriminate against granting status to a non-Jewish spouse when it comes to same-sex couples. We appealed to the authorities demanding that the guidelines be amended immediately. If our demand is not met within the coming month, we will file a petition to court on the matter. We are looking into the possibility of also representing the LGBTQ Association in Israel in this petition.

We wish to thank the Charleston Jewish Federation and the Jewish United Fund of Metropolitan Chicago for their support, enabling Hiddush to advance Freedom of Marriage and Jewish Pluralism in Israel.