A Get refuser by the name of Ronen Vital was located and arrested in Tel Aviv, seven years after he was last seen.
A Get is a Jewish religious divorce. Under Jewish law, a woman who receives a civil divorce may not remarry without also obtaining a Get. No court, civil or rabbinical, can authorize a Get if the husband refuses to sign the Jewish divorce document. In Israel they can only convince him via imprisonment, suspension of bank accounts and even preventing him from leaving the country.
Vital’s wife Orly turned to Yad La’isha, the Ohr Torah Stone network’s Legal Aid Center and Hotline for agunot (abandoned women whose husbands refuse to grant a divorce). Seven years ago, the case was heard by the Supreme Rabbinical Court. When the Rabbinical Court ruled against him, Ronen Vital fled, and a warrant for his arrest was issued. This move legally allowed for the public distribution of his image in order to help in locating him.
Vital was taken into custody and was brought before the Jerusalem Rabbinical Court on Tuesday morning, where he continued to refuse to issue the requested get. He cannot be forced to do so and many such men have spent years in jail rather than grant their estranged wives a Get.