Since the beginning of Israel’s current war, several newly married women have undergone a religious ritual known as halitzah. According to statistics from Israel’s rabbinic courts, the number of women performing halitzah has doubled, or even tripled, in comparison to non-wartime occurrences.
What is halitzah?
When a woman becomes widowed from a man who does not have children, the Torah explicitly mandates, in Deuteronomy, that the brother of the deceased husband must perform yibum — levirate marriage — and take the widow as a wife. If the brother refuses, the Torah instructs that the halitzah ceremony be performed, in which the widow removes a sandal from the brother’s foot, spits before him (on the ground), and rebukes him for refusing to take her as his wife.
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