A Random County in Utah Just Became a Player In Israel’s Marriage Debate
A new state law could end a pandemic-era workaround allowing Israelis to marry remotely without the involvement of the Chief Rabbinate.
For years, the so-called "Utah Wedding" has been the ultimate Israeli workaround. Born during the pandemic as a way to continue marriage ceremonies virtually on platforms like Zoom, Israelis have been using it as a loophole to enter into a civil marriage without having to religiously marry through Israel’s Chief Rabbinate system, the only authority through which Jews can marry and be registered as such in Israel.
However, a new bill introduced in the Utah Senate threatens to end this era of ‘remote matrimony’. The proposed legislation seeks to end Zoom weddings by requiring at least one member of the couple to be physically present for the ceremony to be legally valid.
The trend began in 2022 after a landmark ruling whereby Israel’s Administrative Court instructed the country’s Population and Immigration Authority and the Interior Ministry to recognize any marriage conducted under the pandemic-era “Utah Wedding” framework.
Roughly 30% of all remote weddings conducted in Utah County involve at least one Israeli spouse. After Utah residents themselves, Israelis are the largest demographic using the service.
No civil marriage exists in Israel, meaning that the religious Chief Rabbinate can often apply strict or exclusive conditions on couples who seek to get married in the country. This includes same-sex couples, or those where one spouse is not deemed adequately “Jewish enough” to be recognized.
Religious advocacy groups even began directing couples toward the Utah framework, and couples could later hold symbolic ceremonies with rabbis of their choosing, separating the legal act from the spiritual one. Even if a couple qualified for a religious ceremony, many would still seek a civil marriage, either by flying to neighboring countries like Cyprus or, in this case, conducting a religious ceremony on Zoom by someone in Utah.
If the bill passes, at least one member of an Israeli couple would again need to fly abroad to get civilly married to one another, reintroducing the geographic barrier that technology briefly erased.
Currently, the bill takes effect on May 6, 2026, unless something changes.