Israel – Selling a house or land in Israel to anyone who is not Jewish is forbidden, Shas spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef said during a Thursday morning halacha lesson.
Join our WhatsApp groupSubscribe to our Daily Roundup Email
The rabbi cited the halacha as saying that the property should be sold to a Jewish buyer, even if he offers a lesser amount for it.
Dozens of students, Shas leaders among them, attended the lesson in the rabbi’s Jerusalem home.
“The words were perceived by those who were present as normal discussion of the halacha, and not within a context of current events,” said one student who did not want to be identified. He added that the rabbi spoke of a known and accepted law of the halacha, one that no one disputes. It should not be perceived as a reinforcement of a recent ban on selling property to Arabs declared by Safed rabbis, he said.
The rabbis from Safed signed a public statement that declared that under no circumstances should a home or a piece of land in Israel be sold to anyone who is not Jewish. The statement caused a violent clash to break out between Jewish and Arab students in the north Israeli city.
The rabbis cited the same law of the halacha as a reason for the ban. Another reason they listed was that selling or renting to someone who is not Jewish will ruin relations within the neighborhood, because the resident will disturb the lives of those living next to him.
Reb Ovadia didn’t paskin this halachah he just stated a laav from the Torah ” Loy Sichooneim”
reminds me of the ban in willi against selling to artists
What’s the big deal? The Arabs apply the death penalty to any Arab that sells to a Jew.
Is there not a principle in Halacha that allows Jews to transgress a mitzvah for the preservation of life? Can you imagine the discomfort and upset that many non-Jewish citizens of Israel feel when they hear such remarks, however accurate they might be? How would Jews feel if the United States or United Kingdom prohibited the selling of land or property to Jews? There would be an outcry! Sadly the Moschiach has yet to come, sadly Israel still is in a terribly dangerous situation. Would it not be better to limit the hostility between Jew and Arab in Eretz Yisroel and not exacerbate it with such remarks? Has the principles of darkei Sholom been abandoned? I am not a Jew and am probably very ignorant about the detail of Halacha, but I was always struck by Hillel’s teching in Avos to love peace and pursue peace. May this and his teaching to love all HaShem’s briyos guide us all.
Well I hope he realizes it works both ways and he should tell a people who agree with this pasak never ever get mad at someone who does not sell to Jews or neighborhoods that restrict Jews or the hasideim should immediately drop the lawsuit against woodbury. I wonder what he would say?
If you act this way to people do not be surprised when people do the same to you and take it like a man
Another reason they listed was that selling or renting to someone who is not Jewish will ruin relations within the neighborhood, because the resident will disturb the lives of those living next to him.
that is exactly what many communities say when frum people want to move in or put up an or build at more density. Now we know he agrees with them and should be against halacha to file a lawsuit.
But then again hypocrisy is not a problem with some frum leaders
So does he no longer support the heter mechirah?
Do the Rabbis now have to give a “hechsher” on a buyer? Sign off on a contract? What if the person is Jewish, but not frum? The different scenarios are mind-boggling.
I don’t know exactly the halacha but all I can say that I lately learned in sanhadrin that selling property in israel to non jews is oser (there’s a lot to it, its a whole omid gmarah)
As usual, Yosef does his best to stir up tensions and violence but simultaneously argue that he is not seeking to make a political statement. Every time he makes such a statement, like the other recent comments about wishing for the death of all Palestinians, he only marginalizes himself further from any relevance to the real world.
Even to a jew who not observe tora is against haloche to sell property in the holy lend, lo yaeshvu b’artzecho pen yachtiu oscho li, (sefer yeraeim)
Luckily the Arab effendis in the 30’s did not hold that rule halacha otherwise the Keren Kayemeth would not have been able to buy a Dunam of land. If not for that land Rabbi Yosef would be in Baghdad. He also stated that non-Jews were born to serve the jews and millions who died in Europe were sinners and their neshomos were purified in “gas chambers”. My little cousins apparently according to this godol were sinners
The mixing of religious and political agendas has become hard to track . Yosef has become the Levin of Eretz Yisroel. His statements are good for the newspapers and TV stations since they are so outrageous but no one really cares much any longer what they have to say on a substantive level. He could paskin tomorrow that a monkey should be included in a minyan and there would be some who would give that publicity.
“He could paskin tomorrow that a monkey should be included in a minyan”
Based on your continued chutzpah in calling Rabbi Yosef by his last name, you might still be ineligble to be included in a minyan.
So now the Rabbi wants to do to others what they have done to us. Instead of turning the cheek, he wants to discriminate against fine people. People who wish to purchase a home, are ones who have usually earned the money for it. And since they are also descendants of Abraham, I find the discrimination disgusting.
It is troubling that Arabs are able to buy land andhouse especially in the Galil and the sellers are Jews