In response to the demanding woman's request, Serban's father claims that he supports the publication of his son's name and photo.

• The Tel Aviv Rabbinical Court // Photo: Yehoshua Yosef

The father of the divorcee's father in the affair known as "The Anchorage" appealed to the rabbinical court in Tel Aviv and asked them to allow the publication of his son's name and photo, namely to make them shaming, in order to pressure the son to permit his anchorage.

The affair began about 15 years ago. Spouses who lived in the United States came to visit Israel, and then the woman suffered a severe brain event and became a disabled person. Precisely while lying on a bed, the husband abandoned her and returned to the United States, leaving her in a difficult position to raise their two children alone and refusing to release her from their marriage.

The tribunal ruled several years ago that the person behind the long anchorage is the father of the husband, who is a fortune teller of one of the US Hasidim, after the woman's claims were tested and proved to be true. Due to the court's disgrace, although not a direct litigant in the proceedings, including the imposition of a daily fine of NIS 5,000 per day in lieu of imprisonment, as well as foreclosure of a property he owns in Jerusalem, the amount now amounts to more than NIS 1 million.

The father has been arguing for some time that the son is behind the anchor and that he is not responsible for it. In a letter he sent and published in Israel Today, he recently asked the son to grant the divorce and put an end to the affair. Now, in response to the aggrieved wife's demand to publish her husband's name in order to put pressure on him to divorce, the father replied that he agreed and claimed that he had acted against his son in the United States in similar ways. Among other things, in a document submitted by his attorneys Boaz Ben Tzur, Yael Nagar and Dr. Moshe Mittelman, he claimed that "he was fired from his job, ostracized by his brothers and his family, confiscated from important family events" and more.  

The grief-stricken woman demanded that the father's photo be published as well, and this was agreed on the condition that it was made clear that he was not a party to his son's refusal "but only those who supposedly did not work enough to convince his son to give a divorce." He claims "he has no hand and foot in his son's refusal, partly because of the fact that the woman has not been shown any evidence for over three years about his involvement in his son's refusal." Yet, 

According to the father's associates, "if the tribunal examines the case cleanly, it will understand that it should invest its efforts in obtaining a divorce through the son, and not the father." According to them, "For more than five years, the US citizen has been sitting innocent in Israel as he has been brutally abused by the tribunal for wrongdoing. He has never been involved in the failure to provide the divorce, has not spoken to his son for many years and he pays a high price to justify the system's failures. "

It should be noted that, contrary to the father's claims, the rabbinical court, backed by the Supreme Court, holds that he holds the key to ending the divorce case. "The applicant is given the key - and if not the key, then at least Fatah will bring an end to the affair, except that he manages to do it time and time again with a nose and a brow," wrote Judge David Mintz in his judgment regarding the imposition of a huge fine on the father.