sentences:  He was appointed Minister of Religions, and also as Minister of War Victims in the provisional government set up immediately after independence.He was elected to the first Knesset in 1949 as a member of the United Religious Front (an alliance of Agudat Yisrael, Poalei Agudat Yisrael, Mizrachi and Hapoel HaMizrachi) and retained his ministerial role in the first and second governments.He was the driving force behind a failed effort to reestablish the Sanhedrin.