[VIDEO IN EXTENDED ARTICLE]
Many chareidim feel that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and the right-wing (Bayit Yehudi) have betrayed the natural alliance that existed in the past with the chareidim, particularly the dati leumi community. Today, the chareidi tzibur views Bayit Yehudi as playing a pivotal role in the “gezeiros shmad”, the ongoing effort to compel avreichim to leave a life of limud Torah to serve in the IDF.
A few hundred avreichim, men with families living in “chareidi settlements over the Green Line” including Betar Illit and Modi’in Illit decided to send a letter to the prime minister. In the letter they emphatically explain their willingness to voluntarily leave their homes, which are located in “occupied areas”, for true peace”.
In the letter they make reference to the decision of the Shaked Committee of 19 Adar I 5774, which delivers a serious blow to the continued limud Torah in Eretz Yisrael by bnei yeshivos.
“We resident of Modi’in Illit and Betar Illit, residents of settlements in Yehuda and Shomron, areas that are a stumbling block to peace, represent the lion’s share of areas occupied over the Green Line since 1967.”
They continue explaining “there is no significance to the mitzvah of Yishuv Haaretz is the latter is void of limud and kiyum Torah and therefore, we do not want to be stumbling blocks to peace for there is no reason to continue living in these areas”
The organizers explain they are willing to move their wives and families elsewhere, concluding “Obviously we live here happily and in peace but if it constitutes and obstacle to peace, we will leave voluntarily, without hesitation. It is better for us to learn Torah comfortable inside the Green Line than being a obstacle to peace between peoples”, say some of the organizers of the letter.
The video shows MK Yisrael Eichler speaking out harshly against Bayit Yehudi and PM Netanyahu, accusing the latter of hiding behind Yair Lapid.
(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
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14 Responses
Can someone explain to me what’s the connection between leaving their home to the draft low? I don’t get it the PM will be more then happy for them to leave their home voluntarily he’s going to give away the whole Country sooner or later.
exactly how can they afford to just give up their homes? then what??
now if all the chareidim in Israel would threaten to move to chutz laaretz where they are free to learn Torah. then maybe it would make a roshem.
This is getting weird. One day they are not paying the mortgagees as a form of strike and the next day they are voluntarily leaving their houses
The real question is what happens if the hareidim offer instead to support replacing Israeli rule with Arab rule. Realistically, the Arabs want to back to the status quo of 1913 – from their perspective Betar Illit is no different than Tel Aviv or Risha le-Zion. Secular Israeli could never live under Muslim rule (no gays, no political rights, etc.) – frum Jews would find it tolerable (Muslims don’t object to Jews learning Torah and doing Mitsvos – as long as they run the government).
If the establishment hareidi leaders (Degel ha-Torah, Agudah and Shas) can’t stop the move to conscription, in spite of a willingness to cut a deal with the zionists (e.g. we get to learn Torah, do what you want with the settlements), the the more “radical” (and more traditional, harking back to the era of R. Sonnenfeld and Dr. De Haan) will move.
I personally believe the zionists won’t let it go that far. They don’t want to fund hareidim any more than they fund Arab citizens, and want hareidim to stop kibbitzing on politics beyond demanding autonomy. But at a certain point the momentum for universal conscription becomes too hard to stop, and a real conflict with result.
This is a real Kiddush Hashem! Chareidim are not settlers. It was a mistake for Chareidim to ever place their lot with the Mizrachi and Datei Leumi. Rav Shach was against settlements. It is a travesty that some of the largest settlement blocs are Chareidi. Now Boruch Hashem the Chareidim realize that settlements is not the way to go. This is a silver lining to the entire IDF draft debacle.
This is a Porush political ploy for “media consumption”. Each group is bending over backwards to bow to the PM. Sickening!
written above
“In the letter they emphatically explain their willingness to voluntarily leave their homes, which are located in “occupied areas”, for true peace”
Are we still living in denial? does everyone still think its even possible to make peace with the palestanians, when they believe-& always will-that they have a commandment to kill jews C”V?
When will the State of Israel ever realize that you can’t make peace with the muslims i.e. bnei yishmael? the last ones to fight klal yisroel before mashiach comes
When they see how much housing is in other communities, they won’t jump so fast.
who are they kidding that they are going to move – well over 100,000 chareidim live beyond the green line today. Move where exactly? what kind of housing surplus exists today? good luck. Besides even if they move they will still be compelled to join the army except for those truly learning and the rest who leave the country voluntarily.
What are we supposed to take from this? It is very ill conceived. I can’t tell what they hope to gain, but I hope someone quickly provides them with a reality check. Despite my admiration for the chareidi dedication to Torah and mitzvot, two things continue to bother me and those are two perceptions which may be completely baseless, but nevertheless, they exist: the perceived lack of concern for anyone else outside their own group, along with the perception that their Torah seems to be disconnected from real life.
As far as I am concerned, if they would give voice to the lie that we are “occupiers” in our own land and side with our enemies who say that our existence here is an “obstacle to peace,” and furthermore, throw their fellow “settlers” under the bus in order to buy themselves some quiet to continue their learning, then I say their learning is absolutely in vain and Hashem doesn’t want it. It obviously has not done them any good at all up to now!
rkefrat and Devash:
It is a warning that hareidi are quite willing to ally with the enemies of the Dati Leumi and the settlement movement.
You are concerned about siding with “our” enemies. The most serious enemies of the hareidim today are not the Arabs (who some regard as a mere annoyance) but Bayit Yehudi, Likud Beiteinu and Yesh Atid. Torah is to Jews what food and air are to “modern people”, and therefore from a hareidi perspective, the Religious Zionists and as much a threat to us if they were planning mass murder. If the anti-settlement Jews, or even the Arabs, can help the hareidim survive their enemies, so be it. This alone should force the anti-hareidi coalition to reconsider its decision to go to war against us.
just curious. isnt Ramat Eshkol over the green line? technically
Yes #13, as is Givat Zev, Pisgat Zev, nearly all of Ramot, and most of Talpiot.