What if he goes?
Will Israel’s beefiest religious party survive its founder’s demise?
DOLEFUL rabbis keep vigil at the doors of his hospital room, men on buses break into tears over radio bulletins about his respirator, and tens of thousands of black-hatted students pray at the ruins of Jerusalem’s Jewish temple for his recovery. Were Ovadiah Yosef to pass on soon, the funeral of the 93-year-old Baghdad-born founder of the Global Sephardic Association of Torah Guardians, better known by its acronym, Shas, could be Israel’s biggest ever.
This article appeared in the Middle East & Africa section of the print edition under the headline “What if he goes?”
From the October 5th 2013 edition
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