Lithuania: Renowned Rabbi Condemns Organ Harvesting

Rabbi Yosef Shalom Eliashiv, ninety seven years old, was the leader of Jews in the Orthodox Church in Lithuania in central Europe. He is a well known person in Jewish religious circles around the world, renowned as the authority of contemporary Jewish Laws. The Rabbi recently denounced the atrocities of organ harvesting from live people perpetrated by the Chinese Communist Party.

According to the report of NTDTV, the Rabbi’s son-in-law, Rabbi Yitzhak Zilbershtein, heard the Rabbi’s comments about organ harvesting from live people and he stated the Rabbi’s opinions during a public occasion.

Rabbi Yosef said, “We heard that prisoners detained in the basement of some hospitals and their organs are being tested and matched so as to offer to patients who need them. These prisoners were killed and their organs were sold. Such behavior contaminated the name of God. We cannot look for treatments in such places.”

Professor Halevy is the former manager of National Transplantation Center in Israel and he is the incumbent manger for Shaarei Tzedek Hospital in Jerusalem.

Professor Halevy said, “I extremely respect the Jewish Rabbi’s comments over this matter and Jews and non-Jews are supposed to have common opinions about this matter. All people are created according to the image of God, so it can’t be acceptable to harvest human organs from live people in such criminal ways.”

One person who knows the Rabbi told journalist that the Rabbi has been very careful about his remarks and he only talks about that which is confirmed to be true.