Marrige decision - Israel

Haaretz: In an unusual decision which came on the heels of intervention by the Prime Minister's Office, the High Rabbinical Court in Jerusalem recently ruled that a member of the priestly cohen caste may marry the daughter of a non-Jew.The case began in the summer of 2004, when Rabbinate officials told Shmuel Cohen and Irena Plotnikov that they could not marry, even though Plotnikov, an immigrant from the former Soviet Union whose mother is Jewish, had already had her Jewish status approved upon entering the country. The court rejected Cohen and Plotnikov on the basis that a member of the priestly cohen caste, of which Cohen is said to be descended, cannot marry a woman whose father is not Jewish.According to the court's decision, Plotnikov was recognized by the state as Jewish and was permitted according to principle of halakha to marry any Jew, except a member of the cohen caste. The Rabbinical Court ruled last week, however, that special circumstances applied in this case and ordered the original decision be rescinded. Chief Sephardic Rabbi Shlomo Amar, who is also president of the High Rabbincal Court, said that the court's decision was based not on PMO intervention, but on the opinion of Shas spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef.The Prime Ministers' Office intervened on behalf of the couple last summer when approached by Alex Tanzer, a social activist for the advancement of civil marriages. Tanzer had argued that because Cohen had served and was wounded in Israel's wars, he should be permitted to marry his fiancee......