Israel’s Chief Rabbi David Yosef Visits New Beth Gavriel Center in Queens

Israel’s Sephardi Chief Rabbi, HaRav David Yosef (HaRishon LeTzion), made a brief but packed visit to New York that culminated in a major gathering at the new Beth Gavriel Center in Forest Hills, the Bukharian Jewish Link reported on Sept. 18.

Accompanied for much of the visit by Rabbi Ilan Meirov, HaRav Yosef met leading Torah figures including Chacham Yosef Harari-Raful of Yeshivat Ateret Torah and the Skverer Rebbe. He is widely known for the multi-volume Halacha Berura series on the Shulchan Aruch.

Hundreds gathered at Beth Gavriel for an evening presented by Beth Gavriel. The Chief Rabbi congratulated Beth Gavriel leadership, including Rabbi Shimunov, Eliyahu Koptiev, and Simcha Elishaev, on completing the new center and offered a brachah that it continue as a source of Torah for the community. He also blessed outreach work with Jewish public-school students—a mission he has encouraged for more than a decade, according to the Link.

Addressing the crowd ahead of Rosh Hashanah, HaRav Yosef stressed that personal spiritual growth must extend to responsibility for others: every individual, he said, can strengthen another Jew’s connection to Torah and Jewish life.

For Queens’ Bukharian community, which has watched Beth Gavriel grow into a major center of tefillah, education, and programming, hosting the Rishon LeTzion underscored the congregation’s rising profile in New York Jewish life.

Sources: Bukharian Jewish Link. AI-generated editorial illustration accompanying this report; not a documentary photograph or official promotional image.