A few years ago I crumbled to my husband’s pressure and agreed to a one-sided divorce agreement at the rabbinical court, which I now see really compromised the children’s interests. Are my children bound by the terms of the agreement until they are 18, or can matters be evaluated again, even at the family court?

The Supreme Court held in a petition in 2004 that minors are not “bound” by the contents of agreements made by them as part of divorce settlements between their parents,and, as a rule are not stuck in the legal instance chosen by them either. Minors are bound by such agreements  where the court authorizing the agreement was really satisfied that it served the minors’ interests , but without a substantial hearing as to the minors’ interests, separate from their parents’ agenda within the divorce process, they cannot be seen as being “parties” to agreements concerning them,regarding custody, visitation or maintenance.

This position was underlined recently by Jerusalem District Court in January 2011 when it heard an appeal against the decision of the Family Court to cancel terms of a divorce agreement affecting children that had been authorized at the rabbinical court a few years previously.The appeal court held that the family court had been correct in cancelling the agreement, and stressed that in general parents are often preoccupied with their own agenda when they divorce and tend not to put enough emphasis on the children’s interests,even if unintentionally.

It should be pointed out that sometimes, though, very rarely, divorce agreements authorised at a rabbinical court have clauses giving exclusive, continuing jurisdiction concerning the children.