The city that never sleeps (together): Tel Aviv has nudged Jerusalem out of first place in the rankings of Israeli cities with the highest number of divorces in a single year. On Monday, the Rabbinical Courts published the divorce date for 2015. According to the numbers, Tel Aviv had the dubious honor of the most divorces that year, with 763 couples calling it quits. Jerusalem, Israel's capital and largest municipality, which held the top spot for number of divorces for two years running, moved down to second place, with 728 couples divorcing in 2015, compared to 767 the previous year. Rishon Lezion, the nation's fourth-largest municipality, was ranked third, with 431 couples divorcing, followed by Holon, Haifa, Petach Tivka, Netanya, and Beersheba. Azur, a local authority outside south Tel Aviv, saw the fewest couples divorce in 2015, with only 23 local marriages dissolved in 2015. Even Yehuda (24), Binyamina (25), Arad (28), and Kiryat Tivon (29), also had some of the lowest numbers for the year. The rate of divorce in Israel did not change significantly in 2015, according to the rabbinical courts data. In 2015 a total of 11,114 couples divorced in the rabbinate, compared to 11,023 in 2014, an increase of less than 1%. What did increase was the total number of cases opened in the rabbinical courts on all the matters the court oversees, including divorce, alimony, requests for marital reconciliation, adoption, and inheritance. The courts opened 93,107 cases in 2015, compared to 89,551 in 2014. The rabbinical courts closed a total of 97,768 cases in 2015, compared to 96,837 in 2014. In addition, rabbinical court judges have recently been exercising their authority to mete out serious punishments to men who refuse to grant their wives a divorce, and in 2015 issued 147 punishments to a total of 47 recalcitrant husbands.
