Shmuel Rabinowitz, at The Blogs

Shmuel Rabinowitz

Rabbi of Western Wall and Holy Sites of Israel

Jan 18, 2024, 12:27 PM

In honor of our common patriarch Abraham

Jerusalem religion images via iStock (montage by The Times of Israel)

A call from the rabbi of the Kotel to religious leaders of the communities of believers in Jerusalem: there is one father for all of us

Jan 30, 2023, 12:13 PM

Do Not Dare Compare

Shabbat is not just a day of not working. It is a day of holiness and of external and internal quiet. A day in which we Jews disconnect from the hustle and bustle of everyday life and convene with...

Dec 18, 2022, 12:29 PM

Light from the Western Wall

Chanukah 5783 In the Book of Kings, it says that Solomon made for the Temple “windows broad without, and narrow within.” Our sages explained that they were made this way because he did not need them for light. In every...

Apr 1, 2022, 12:43 AM

What do we believe in?

In the horrific documentation of the murderous terror attack in Be’er Sheva, there is one moment where you see the bus driver, Arthur Chaimov, calling to the terrorist over and over again to put down his weapon in an...

May 9, 2021, 3:16 PM

Featured Post

After Meron: We must never forget that we are brothers

Victims of the April 30, 2021, Mount Meron disaster: Top row (L-R): Chen Doron, Haim Rock, Ariel Tzadik, Yossi Kohn, Yisrael Anakvah, Yishai Mualem, Yosef Mastorov, Elkana Shiloh and Moshe Levy; 2nd row (L-R): Shlomo Zalman Leibowitz, Shmuel Zvi Klagsbald, Mordechai Fakata, Dubi Steinmetz, Abraham Daniel Ambon, Eliezer Gafner, Yosef Greenbaum, Yehuda Leib Rubin and Yaakov Elchanan Starkovsky; 3rd row (L-R): Haim Seler, Yehoshua Englard, Moshe Natan Neta Englard, Yedidia Hayut, Moshe Ben Shalom, David Krauss, Eliezer Tzvi Joseph, Yosef Yehuda Levy and Yosef Amram Tauber; 4th row (L-R): Menachem Knoblowitz, Elazar Yitzchok Koltai, Yosef David Elhadad, Shraga Gestetner, Yonatan Hebroni, Shimon Matalon, Elazar Mordechai Goldberg, Moshe Bergman and Daniel Morris; 5th row (L-R): Ariel Achdut, Moshe Mordechai Elhadad, Hanoch Slod, Yedidya Fogel, Menahem Zakbah, Simcha Diskind, Moshe Tzarfati, Nahman Kirshbaum and Eliyahu Cohen.

My nephew perished in the crush, and I see first-hand: the divisions among us do not matter. We are all in pain together

About Me

Rabbi Shmuel Rabinowitz is the rabbi of the Western Wall and the Holy Sites of Israel, appointed to the position in 1995, by then-prime minister Yitzhak Rabin and the chief rabbis of Israel.