Aviad Hacohen

Aviad Hacohen (Hebrew:אביעד הכהן; born 1962) is an Israeli attorney and professor of law.

Aviad Hacohen is the son of Rabbi Menachem Hacohen, who was a Labor party member of the Israeli Parliament (Knesset), and Devorah Hacohen, a historian at Bar-Ilan University.

Hacohen studied at Netiv Meir yeshiva high school and afterwards at Yeshivat Har Etzion and Yeshivat HaKotel.

He served in the Israel Defense Forces in a hesder program combining yeshiva studies with army service.

He received his BA in law from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 1989.

In 1991, Hacohen began to teach as an assistant in the law school of the Hebrew University while studying for an MA in law, which he received cum laude in 1993.

Since 1994, Hacohen has served as the general counsel for the Israel Festival and of the movement “Hakol Hinukh” [“Everything is Education”].

He is a member of the Israel Bar Associationthe Jerusalem Committee of the Bar Association, the disciplinary tribunal of the Bar Association and various public commissions.

He is director and chairman of the Logistics Committee of the Birthright Program.

He is a member of the Center for Women's Justice Israel, the Yeshivat Har Etzion Foundation and the Takana Forum that addresses sexual harassment in the religious community.

In 1995 he began to teach Jewish law and communications law at Bar Ilan University.

In 1996, he was appointed Director of the Center for the Instruction and Study of Jewish Law at the Sha'arei Mishpat Academic Center, where he also served as a lecturer.

He received his PhD (cum laude) in law from the law school of the Hebrew University in 2003.

While working as a lecturer in law, Hacohen participated in research institutes and forums, including the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute and Mosaica, the Institute for the Study of Religion, Society and State which he founded and heads.

Hacohen is a member of the editorial boards of the “Jewish Law Yearbook” (published by the Institute for Jewish Law of the law school of Hebrew University); “Medicine and Law”, “Machanaim”, “Masehkhet”, “Sha’arei Mishpat”, “Halishka – The Magazine of the Bar Association in Jerusalem”, “Alon Shvut for the Graduates of Yeshivat Har Etzion” and others.

Hacohen serves as the legal commentator for the newspaper “Israel Today”.

His book “The Tears of the Oppressed,” an examination of the agunah problem, was published in the United States in 2004.

In this work Hacohen, relying on halakhic sources, proposes approaches for solving the problem of women unable to obtain a divorce.

In 2008, Hacohen was among the members (3 out of 30) on the Central Elections Committee for the 18th Knesset who objected to the disqualification of the Arab lists to participate in the elections, a position that was backed up later in a Supreme Court decision to overrule the disqualification.

Hacohen is identified with the philosophy of Modern Orthodoxy, including the integration of Torah and academic pursuits.

He expresses liberal economic positions and is among the founders of the organization Bema’aglei Tzedek.

He has taken a stand in favor of outright warfare against the trade in women, and has called for working to increase public awareness of people with disabilities and insuring that their special needs are met, and closing the economic gaps in Israeli society.

He has also expressed criticism of what he terms the negligence of the religious community in dealing with cases of sexual assault and refusal by men to give divorces to their wives.

In 2010-2011 represented Rachel Azaria, a member of the Jerusalem City Council in two petitions that sought to prevent gender segregation in the Mea Shearim neighborhood.

In 2011, Hacohen was appointed general counsel to Mifal HaPayis, the state lottery.

In 2011, his book “Parshiyot v’Mishpatim.” a collection of some of his articles, including chapters on human rights, criminal law and civil law and their relation to Jewish law, was published.