Rabbi Yaakov Aryeh Alter, the eighth leader of the Gur Hasidic sect, recently invited his follower Yitzhak Goldknopf to his humble apartment to inform him that he was to represent the group in the next Knesset.
Alter, known as the Gur Rabbi, also directs the group’s political arm, the Agudat Yisrael party, one of two partners making up the United Torah Judaism (UTJ) party. The Gur Rabbi decreed in 1999 that the party would join the government led by Prime Minister Ehud Barak, only to order the party to quit the government 18 months hence and bring about its collapse.
