Israel gets same-sex divorce
2012-12-04 21:44
Jerusalem - An Israeli court has awarded the country's first divorce to a
gay couple, which experts called an ironic milestone since same-sex marriages
cannot be legally conducted in the Jewish state.
A decision this week by a family court in the Tel Aviv area "determined
that the marriage should be ended" between former Israeli lawmaker Uzi
Even, 72, and his partner of 23 years, Amit Kama, 52, their lawyer, Judith
Meisels, said on Tuesday.
Legal experts see the ruling as a precedent in the realm of gay rights in a
country where conservative family traditions are strong and religious courts
oversee ceremonies like marriages, divorces and burials.
While Israel's Interior Ministry still has the power to try and veto the
decision, it would likely have to go court in order to do so, Meisels said.
A 2006 high court decision forced the same ministry, headed by an
ultra-Orthodox cabinet member, to recognise same sex marriages performed abroad
and ordered the government to list a gay couple wed in Canada as married.
Same sex marriages are performed in Israel, but they have no formal legal
status.
"The irony is that while this is the beginning of a civil revolution,
it's based on divorce rather than marriage," said newly divorced Kama, a
senior lecturer in communications in the Emek Yizrael College.
He and Even, both Israelis, married in Toronto in 2004, not long after
Canada legalised same-sex marriage. They separated last year, Kama said.
