Rav Shlomo Aviner, long venerated Rabbi of the Religious Zionist movement in Israel and the Rosh Yeshiva of Ateret Kohanim in the Old City, issued a statement on Tuesday outlawing IDF service for religious soldiers until the military separates between the genders completely.
“Until the IDF separates between men and women – it is prohibited to enlist in the IDF,” the statement read, according to the report put out by the Kan news service.
Rabbi Aviner is considered to be one of the leaders of the Religious Zionist movement and wrote the edict in a response to a student who is about to enlist. The student asked if he should enlist in the military, knowing that he would be placed in a unit that does not separate completely between men and women.
Rabbi Aviner wrote: “If that is the case, then sadly don’t enlist. You need to request a completely separate unit. If that is not possible then do not enlist in the military. You cannot do the mitzvah of serving in the army by transgressing at the same time.”
(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)
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3 Responses
finally our Dati Leumi brothers are coming around and realizing what we have been saying from day 1 the Zionists shmad is alive and strong and their goal is to make us non-religious.
wow! such a chiddish! no mixed seating/serving in IDF…
pssshh such an einfal
nowecant – I doubt that you will find even a single D”L who thinks that ‘Zionists shmad is alive and strong and their goal is to make us non-religious’ or anything even remotely like that. The stance of the D”L tzibbur and rabbis is that the current Chief of Staff is not giving sufficient weight to the needs of the religious soldiers of the IDF in this specific subject. A group of senior D”L rabbis has been meeting with him and has convinced him to adjust his orders on the subject – but not enough. Talks continue. In the meantime, harav Aviner (who, to the best of my knowledge, is not one of the rabbis meeting with the Chief of Staff) decided to call on the D”L tzibbur to cease joining the IDF until the chief of staff agrees to certain terms. Senior D”L rabbis have denounced harav Aviner’s call and it doesn’t take a genius to recognize that it will not be accepted by the D”L tzibbur and that virtually no one will follow it (with the possible exception of those of harav Aviner’s own talmidim who have not yet joined the IDF).