Former husband argued that his ex-partner’s inherited stake in a Tel Aviv building was worth about 150 million shekels ($41 million), but the court ruled that her private inheritance could not justify reducing her share of their jointly accumulated assetsA man who sought to keep all of his pension rights after his former partner inherited a valuable stake in a luxury building in Tel Aviv has lost his appeal. The Central District Court ruled that the woman’s inheritance did not justify departing from the principle of an equal division of the couple’s jointly accumulated property.The couple had been married for more than 25 years. After the woman inherited rights in a Tel Aviv building from her late father, her former partner argued during their divorce proceedings that she owned a 50% stake in a property worth about 150 million shekels ($41 million).Tel Aviv (Photo: Shutterstock)He also claimed that she received more than 100,000 shekels ($27,000) a month in rental income from apartments in the building, in addition to her employment income.Citing the resulting financial disparity and his medical condition, he asked the court to order an unequal division of their marital property. Among other things, he sought to retain all of the pension rights he had accumulated.The woman rejected his arguments, saying that he was a businessman and a partner in a startup company who maintained a high standard of living. The district court rejected the man’s position and ruled that there was no basis for departing from an equal split simply because one spouse had received a valuable inheritance.The couple’s jointly accumulated property will therefore be divided equally, while the man will receive no share of the Tel Aviv building.In its ruling this month, the court said the default rule under Israel’s Spouses Property Relations Law was an equal division of marital assets. The statutory exception allowing a court to depart from that rule was intended only for unusual cases in which an equal division would cause genuine financial hardship, the judges said. It was not designed to redistribute property privately owned by one spouse.The district court effectively upheld an earlier Family Court ruling that the man had failed to prove exceptional circumstances warranting an unequal split. The court noted that he would retain substantial assets after the division and had not sacrificed his professional career for his wife during their marriage.The judges said the woman’s inheritance was an external asset excluded from the balancing of marital property. Her former husband had no right to “take a bite” out of it or receive indirect compensation for its value by reducing her share of their jointly owned assets.Despite ruling against the man, the judges expressed disappointment that the former couple had failed to settle. “We cannot conclude without adding a personal note,” they wrote. “The parties would do well to remember that not every dispute must be decided strictly by law.”The court said it had proposed several settlement arrangements that would have required the woman to make concessions that were minor relative to the fortune she had inherited. “The respondent chose to dismiss our proposals out of hand, and that is regrettable,” the judges wrote.They noted that the man was not a stranger, but someone with whom she had shared many years of her life. “Given that the financial concessions we proposed were relatively negligible and clearly would not have harmed the respondent or her economic position in any meaningful way, we cannot but regret her refusal,” the judges wrote. “As is known, the law is hard as iron, while compromise is soft as butter.”In light of the circumstances, the court declined to impose especially high legal costs on the man and ordered him to pay the woman 10,000 shekels ($2,700).“The ruling speaks for itself, and in fact makes clear that this was the classic case in which it would have been right and just to exercise the court’s authority under Section 8(2) of the Spouses Property Relations Law,” the man’s lawyers said.They argued that the court itself had acknowledged that the outcome was unfair and had proposed settlement arrangements under which the husband would retain his pension. “Ultimately, however, it chose a mathematical division of the rights over distributive justice in the exceptional circumstances of this case,” they said.“We are studying the ruling and considering filing a request for permission to appeal to the Supreme Court.”