Today, Sunday, the deadline runs out for Har Bracha Hesder Yeshiva rosh yeshiva Rabbi Eliezer Melamed to openly declare that hesder soldiers must accept total subordination to IDF officers and commanders, or alternatively, face the consequences, most likely, being expelled from the hesder family and a cutting off of Defense Ministry funding as a result.
A letter prepared by Rabbi Chaim Druckman Shlita, a leading rav in the dati leumi community and head of the Bnei Akiva Zionist Youth Movement, calls for opposing protests within the military, with Druckman emphasizing his view that soldiers must adhere to orders.
In his letter, R’ Druckman makes reference to the recent incidents in which soldiers brandished anti-expulsion signs, stating his view and that of the hesder organization is the need for maintaining unity in the IDF and to adopt a tenacious position against protest within the military.
“Soldiers must realize that together with our tenacious and just fight for Eretz Yisrael, there are red lines and there is no place for protest in the IDF. It is our obligation to preserve the strength, unity and wholeness of the IDF.
“I turn to you all from the depth of my heart and request that you adopt a unified position, and to pass this message to the talmidim, that we all share in the responsibility to the IDF, and the hesder yeshivot”.
In statements released last week, R’ Melamed stressed he views serving in the IDF as a mitzvah, but he also pointed out that rabbonim cannot be puppets and they must be permitted to express their opinions.
(Yechiel Spira – YWN Israel)
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3 Responses
דברי הרב ודברי התלמיד, דברי מי שומעין?
Since at least 1956, the IDF has not been an army where soldiers “accept total subordination” to their commanders. That is when soldiers who obeyed orders to kill some Arabs who broke a curfew were charged, convicted, and sentenced by the courts for obeying a blatantly illegal order. It is established law in Israel that a soldier must not obey such an order, and he can be punished for doing so.
Once that principle is established and ingrained in soldiers, how can they then claim that the army’s effectiveness depends on absolute obedience? If it did then the army has not been effective for 50 years! And if soldiers must disobey orders for being blatantly against Israeli law, how can they then obey orders that are blatantly against Torah law? Is that not the greatest chilul Hashem, to teach that there is a law more binding than Hashem’s law?
Just a half century ago we heard the most notorious villians state, “We were just following Orders”. Does the IDF want robots, cleared of any brain activity, razing and destroying homes of their friends, families and neighbors while ARABS continue to build like wildfire thruout the land of Israel? I do not recall anger towards the soldiers that DISOBEYED the order to destroy an Arab home & raze it to the foundation.
a TWO FACED decision..
the israeli army doesnt allow arabs to join because they feel it is not proper to make them go to war against other arabs. yet its ok for them to pit jews against other jews by ordering the soldiers to throw others out of their homes its disgusting!!!!! (not that i want arabs in the army that would be scary and stupid)