(JNS) The Chief Ashkenazi Rabbi of Jerusalem, Aryeh Stern, issued an unprecedented halachic ruling that Israel has an obligation to help free Palestinians who have been imprisoned for selling land to Jews.

In a letter sent to Lt. Col. (res.) Baruch Yedid, head of the Arab Affairs desk at the Zionist movement Im Tirtzu, Rabbi Stern wrote that the obligation for freeing imprisoned Jews also applies to Palestinians who were jailed for selling land to Jews.

Stern’s letter came in response to the recent abduction of Issam Akel, a resident of Jerusalem who was arrested by the Palestinian General Security Service on the suspicion that he had sold land to Jews.