Recently one of the most prominent Batei Din (rabbinic courts) in Israel, the Bais Din of Rav Nissim Karelitz, issued a letter protesting the rampant coerced and invalid GITTIN (Jewish divorce procedures) occurring nowadays.
The Bais Din letter describes a number of situations that result in coerced and invalid GITTIN, so that the women who received such GITTIN remain ESHES EISH (married women) under Jewish law. Any future relationship these women have with men besides their husbands is considered adultery under Jewish law, and any children born to these women are MAMZERIM (illegitimate children who may not marry other Jews according to Jewish law).
The letter details some of the situations resulting in GET MEOSO ( GET MEUSO – Forced GET, coerced GET ) :
1. If a Jewish husband agrees to provide his wife a GET after the wife has received financial awards or division of property not according to Torah law;
2. Physical force used against the husband in violation of Torah law;
3. Threats to jail the husband in violation of Torah law;
4. Public embarrassment of the husband in violation of Torah law.
