Yehuda Cohen

Yehuda Rachamim Cohen was born on 7 September 1958, the son of Hana and Rabbi Moshe Cohen, who served as rabbi of Neve Yamin, a moshav near Kfar Saba. He was educated in the religious Zionist yeshiva world, studying at Yeshivat Hispin in the Golan Heights and at Mercaz HaRav in Jerusalem. He did his military service as a combat soldier in the Golani Brigade and later completed a bachelor's degree in industrial engineering and management.

Cohen built his career in Israeli local government. He was director general of the Maale Iron local council, which serves Arab villages in Wadi Ara, and of the Bedouin local council of Bir al-Maksur in the Galilee. In 2003 he ran for head of the Elkana local council, a settlement in western Samaria, and won after a second round against the incumbent Tzachi Fenton. He served one term and was defeated in the 2008 election by Tzadok Zohorai.

He went on to chair a series of municipal religious councils on behalf of the Ministry of Religious Services, including those of Kfar Saba, where he oversaw a financial recovery plan, Hadera and Netanya, where he served from 2012 to 2015, and he also served as treasurer of the Kiryat Ata religious council. Parts of his management in Netanya were criticised in a 2015 report by the municipal comptroller. From January to September 2018 he was the appointed head of the Bu'eine Nujeidat local council in the Lower Galilee, named by the interior minister Aryeh Deri.

In January 2023 the religious services minister Michael Malkieli appointed him director general of the Chief Rabbinate of Israel, following a search process begun under his predecessor Matan Kahana. In the post he managed the administrative arm of the Rabbinate, including kashrut supervision and the rabbinical bureaucracy, and his tenure saw friction with Chief Rabbi Kalman Ber over the running of the institution. In May 2025 Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sought to make him acting Civil Service Commissioner, but the appointment was frozen and did not proceed. Cohen left the Chief Rabbinate in July 2026 under an agreed arrangement. Shortly before leaving he granted a kashrut licence to the Tzohar rabbinical organisation, a decision the Chief Rabbinate Council later annulled.

Cohen was married to Sharon Cohen, an attorney, and the couple lived in the moshav Kfar HaRoeh in the Hefer Valley. They had children, and he remained close to the religious Zionist community in which he had been raised.

On 21 October 2026 Cohen was seriously injured when a concrete beam fell on him during renovation work at a home belonging to members of his family. He was taken to Hillel Yaffe Medical Center in Hadera in critical condition, sedated and placed on a ventilator. The Chief Rabbis of Israel, Rabbi David Yosef and Rabbi Kalman Meir Ber, asked the public to pray for his recovery.

He died of his injuries on 23 October 2026, the 12th of Cheshvan 5787, aged 68. The Chief Rabbinate of Israel published a notice of mourning and said funeral arrangements would be announced.

Cohen is remembered as a seasoned administrator who moved between Jewish, Arab, Druze and Bedouin local authorities and the religious councils of large Israeli cities, and who led the Chief Rabbinate's administration during a turbulent period. Colleagues in local government and religious services recalled his long record of public service.