TRANSITIONS

Rabbi Yosef Zvi Rimon named president of World Mizrachi, after role unfilled since 2022

As part of the appointment, the religious-Zionist leader will partner his education nonprofit, Sulamot, with the movement

Rabbi Yosef Zvi Rimon, a leading figure in Israel’s national-religious community, has been named the next nasi, or president, of the religious-Zionist World Mizrachi Movement, ending nearly two years of the post being vacant.

Rimon, considered one of Israel’s top experts in halacha, or Jewish law, succeeds Kurt Rothschild, who served as the organization’s president until his death in 2022 at 101.

Rimon’s appointment also brings a new “strategic partnership” with Sulamot, an educational organization founded and chaired by Rimon, Mizrachi said in a statement.

Sulamot develops educational technologies, curricula and programming for Jewish schools in five languages. Since Oct. 7, it has also provided aid to Gaza border communities and to Israeli soldiers. 

Since Oct. 7, the World Mizrachi Movement has been led by Rabbi Danny Mirvis, who has served as its acting CEO, standing in for the organization’s executive chairman, Rabbi Doron Perez, whose son, Daniel, was taken hostage and remains in captivity and whose son, Yonatan, was wounded while defending a military position near Kibbutz Nahal Oz.

As Perez focuses on his family and the efforts to secure his son’s release, Mirvis has led the organization, while closely collaborating with him.

In a joint statement, Perez and Mirvis hailed Rimon as “an exceptional leader and ambassador for Mizrachi’s values of the people of Israel, the Torah of Israel and the Land of Israel.”

In addition to his Sulamot nonprofit, Rimon serves as the chief rabbi of the Etzion settlement bloc in the central West Bank and as the rosh yeshiva of the Lev Academic Center-Jerusalem College of Technology.

“I believe deeply in the leadership of Mizrachi as well as the mission. Medinat Yisrael [State of Israel], Torah and Am Yisrael [People of Israel] — I feel very connected to this vision,” Rimon said in a statement. “Today the mission of Mizrachi is to bring unity in the Jewish people, to spread the light of Torah among the Jewish people, to bring the light of Eretz Yisrael to the whole world.”