Cruelty to animals Expose in Israel Raises Kashrut Question

A television expose show conducted an investigation into the slaughterhouse of Adom Adom - the meat department of Tnuva. As a result of the expose, the Ministry of Health said they would be opening an investigation of their own. The expose revealed serious instances of cruelty to animals.



A class action suit, to the tune of 100 million NIS, has now been filed against Tnuva, as a result of the expose. A haredi woman is leading the suit, claiming she has been a customer of Adom Adom meat for a long time claiming deception of the cruelty and of the slaughterhouse conditions, along with the cruelty itself.

That actually interests me less. The lawsuit is a lawsuit and will be determined in court. The Health Ministry will have to investigate and make a determination as to what actually happens, who is at fault and all the ramifications.

One point mentioned by the woman leading the lawsuit, Ruth Kolian, intrigued me. When discussing her lawsuit she said there are also halachic issues with what has been revealed - she said that if the rabbonim would have known what was actually going on, they would definitely not have given the strict level of kashrut certification that they did. Therefore, there is serious damage to the customers, and to the religious customers as well.
(source: The Marker)

If the mehadrin hechsher is working properly, why, or how, did they not know what was going on? Don't they have mashgichim in the slaughterhouse supervising the entire process? Isn't that especially one of the responsibilities of the certifying agency - to know what is going on? Don't they claim to be better than the regular kashrut agencies for specifically being present at all stages of the process, for retaining complete control to access of the meat production process - holding the only sets of keys, for example, constant supervision, etc.

How is it possible, as is being claimed, that "if the rabbonim would have known what was going on", that they did not know what was going on? If the answer is that they did know and they determined that from a halachic perspective there was nothing wrong with the process, that would be fine by me - perhaps the process must be reviewed regarding cruelty to animals, but the issue of halacha would not have been brought up. However, saying the rabbis were in the dark about what was happening means the strict level of supervision is basically a fraud.

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