As legality of circumcision is debated, U.S. group recommends the practice

Last week, a major fear of Germany's Jewish and Muslim populations was born out when a criminal complaint was lodged against a German rabbi, David Goldberg, for performing a circumcision.

“Religious freedom cannot be used as an excuse for carrying out violence against an under-age child,” wrote an unnamed doctor, in a complaint he filed against Goldberg, according to local media reports.

In June, a German court ruled that circumcision amounted to "bodily harm" and banned it throughout the country. That sparked an uproar among Germany's Jewish and Muslim communities, who view circumcision of baby boys as religiously necessary.

A government spokesman, shortly after the court ruling, said the legislature would move to legalize 'responsibly performed' circumcisions this fall, but until that time the court ruling remains controlling in its jurisdiction and influential across Germany.

“I am shocked,” Cologne Rabbi Yaron Engelmayer, co-chairman of the national umbrella group of Orthodox rabbis in Germany, said to the Times of Israel. “De facto it looks as if doctors across the country are afraid (to perform circumcisions).”

American Academy of Pediatricians Says It Is Riskier Not to Circumcise a Baby Boy
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