The judicial case surrounding illegal circumcisions within the Jewish community in Antwerp, which sparked a diplomatic row, has now led to two other investigations in Switzerland and Austria due to a dissident rabbi.
Rabbi Moshe Aryeh Friedman, 54, had questioned the medical training of people performing brit mila, the circumcision ritual in Orthodox communities, saying that people who performed these procedures were actually trained as butchers.
According to Friedman, these circumcisions might have led to mutilations and sometimes infections, which pose a great risk to newborns.
Friedman refers in particular to a practice known as "metziztah b'peh", in which blood from the circumcised penis is sucked out by mouth.
A practice that led to deaths in New York because babies became infected with herpes, De Morgen reported.
According to the Flemish daily, Antwerp Public Prosecutor's office announced last week that it intends to criminally prosecute two Jewish circumcisers for assault and battery and the illegal practice of medicine.
US Ambassador Bill White has strongly criticised Belgium demanding to halt the Jewish circumcisions be stopped.
The US envoy believes criminal prosecution puts an end to religious freedom, but the Belgian Government has vehemently refuted this, accusing the ambassador of interfering in both Belgium's domestic affairs and also its judicial process.
Chief Rabbi Moshe Friedman, born into the ultra-Orthodox Hasidic community in New York, and is no stranger to controversy, has also filed complaints in Vienna and Zurich, De Morgen reported.
"I have information that circumcisions are also being performed in Vienna and Zurich that pose a danger to babies in terms of hygiene and medical follow-up," Friedman confirmed to De Morgen. "I believe that these practices must be investigated and that they must be stopped," he added.
The Zurich Public Prosecutor's Office has confirmed to the Swiss newspaper Tages-Anzeiger that Friedman's complaint is currently being investigated.
Whether criminal offences were committed in Vienna or Zurich will reportedly have to be determined by an investigation.
