Friday, July 18, 2014

Revisiting Chareidi Protest of Draft - Moshe Rabbeinu's Speech to Gad and Reuven (32:6-15) – Justified Rebuke or a Misunderstanding? Parshath Mattot In light of Operation Protective Edge, the ground invasion just starting in Eretz Yisroel

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In light of the ground invasion just starting in Eretz Yisroel:


PARASHOT MATOT-MASEI Moshe's Speech to Gad and Reuven (32:6-15) – Justified Rebuke or a Misunderstanding?  By Rav Elchanan Samet Parshat HaShavua Yeshivat Har Etzion
http://www.vbm-torah.org/parsha.60/42mm.htm

It never made sense to me that Moshe Rabbeinu would not judge Gad and Reuven in a positive light and if mistaken should have apologized to them for having misjudged their intentions. The above article concludes that Moshe Rabbeinu was justified in Rebuking Gad and Reuven.  

Right now many are waiting for the Chareidim, ultra Orthodox Jews, to prove to themselves and to their brothers that they have not abandoned their brothers in a Milchemet Mitzvah, a mandatory religious War  against Hamas and will act like the Tribes Reuven and Gad to help fight the enemy with their brothers and even be in the frontline.

For this to happen the following needs to occur.  Those who led the protest against Chareidi draft need to speak with Clarity to the Chareidi community, ultra orthodox religious Jews, to end the confusion. 

 Contrary to what they led the people to believe, having a Jewish army is actually a Torah commandment and that being drafted into the Israeli army is not as they claim for the purpose of violating Torah but in fact  the opposite, for the purpose of defending the people, the Land and observing Torah from a dangerous enemy and an existential threat.  Operation Protective Edge is proof that this is the case and the soldiers are fighting this War knowing that G-d is their true Protective Edge and Iron Dome. The believing soldiers understand this prophesy of Jeremiah in this week's Haftorah (See Haftorah of Parshat Mattot)

   וַאֲנִי הִנֵּה נְתַתִּיךָ הַיּוֹם לְעִיר מִבְצָר וּלְעַמּוּד בַּרְזֶל וּלְחֹמוֹת נְחֹשֶׁת עַל כָּל הָאָרֶץ לְמַלְכֵי יְהוּדָה לְשָׂרֶיהָ לְכֹהֲנֶיהָ וּלְעַם הָאָרֶץ18:  Jeremiah Chapter 1:18: And I, behold I have made you today into a fortified city and into an iron pillar, and into copper walls against the entire land, against the kings of Judah, against its princes, against its priests, and against the people of the land.  19  וְנִלְחֲמוּ אֵלֶיךָ וְלֹא יוּכְלוּ לָךְ כִּי אִתְּךָ אֲנִי נְאֻם יְהֹוָה לְהַצִּילֶךָ: And they shall fight against you but they shall not prevail against you, for I am with you says the Lord, to save you.

Undoubtedly, the Israeli government, Netanyahu's administration, has also led to the confusion  of Jews and non Jews alike.  Netanyahu talks as if a Palestinian State is an option and an option for peace. 

 A Palestinian State in Judea and Samaria is not an option. 

 Netanyahu is a master politician and apparently feels he has no choice but to make statements for public consumption that do not reflect truth but rather what the international community wants to hear.  From his perspective, the alternative is to be demonized.

 The reality is that a Palestinian State means the destruction of Israel.

 Mark Langfan, chairman of AFSI Op-Ed: A "Sane Country" Would Not Create a PA Terror State http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/15285#.U8vK1fldUWI and his father William Langfan, Death Camp Liberator, Bill Langfan Warns Israel http://www.eish-l.org/s/epzre7 emphasized this reality when they speak of the existential threat facing Israel and the formation of a Palestinian State. 

 At it's very root, clarity needs to come from Torah  and Torah Leadership. This existential threat is a manifestation of a religious and Biblical truth.

  Israel is labeled by Obama and his administration and internationally as "Occupiers".  This is a Chillul Hashem, a desecration of G-d's Name.  The word Chillul comes from the Hebrew word Challal, which means a void. Israeli's failure to speak out with clarity, publicly, and with strength as per  the Torah position, has led to the confusion. 

 No authentic Rabbi will disagree with the following statements as they are obvious, yet the Rabbis have yet to be vocal..

  • The Land belongs to Hashem.  (Ki li Kol Haaretz as we learn from th Mitzvah of Shemittah)
  • Hashem chooses to whom to give the Land.  (First Rashi of Breishit)
  • Hashem chose our forefathers, Avrohom Yitzchok and Yaakov, and their descendants, the Nation of Israel exclusively to inherit the Land (numerous references in Tanach, Siddur, Tefillin, Mezuzah, Birkat Hamazon....) and noone else! How can we keep the Mitzvoth when we give the Land away? How can we reject Hashem's gift to us and by extension our Blessings and the Blessings to mankind that come through us?
  • Am Yisroel is obligated to keep the Mitzvoth of the Land (Covenant with our Forefathers). (known as Mitzvoth Teluyot Baaretz)
  • Security in the Land is the reward for keeping the Mitzvoth dependent on the Land and the opposite is true as well (See Tochacha sections of Chumash), 
  • It is a Mitzvah for all of Am Yisroel to protect the Land and fight for the Land and expel those who do not belong in the Land since they do not meet the higher standard that the Land demands and we must not act like the Miraglim who discouraged the people from inheriting and conquering the Land of Israel (See Parsha lesson above)
The tragic consequences of being silent in 2005 is obvious now.  Many of these points were made recently in the home of Mark Langfan chairman of AFSI and their recent meeting attended by a full house, by Dror Vanunu and Laurenz from Nitzan of Gush Katif Committee  and Mark Langfan Chairman, AFSI and Helen Freedman, Executive Director of AFSI.  
  • Gush Katif was the front line for Southern Israel
  • Gush Katif absorbed over 5000 katyusha rocket attacks in the years preceding the Expulsion from Gush Katif protecting the rest of Israel.
  • G-d protected the communities of Gush Katif  with miracles and while their lives were greatly disrupted they suffered relatively minimal casualties.
  • Once Gush Katif was abandoned to the Palestinians and taken over officially by Hamas, it became a launching pad into Southern Israel endangering many lives.
  • Gush Katif communitees exported $150,000,000 worth of produce of the highest quality. The desert bloomed after 2,000 years
  • Gush Katif communites were model communities in every sense.
  • Once destroyed, the earth became barren once more in spite of having sold the hot houses.  This is consistent with G-d's promise in the Tochecha in the Torah that the Land will wait for Israel to be productive.
  • Families were torn apart, children taught to believe in the country were betrayed and emotionally scarred very deeply
  • Farmers now in their fifties not only lost their homes and control over their lives, they were unable to find jobs.
The Chareidi world held no massive protests prior to the Gush Katif expulsion. I am not sure how much it helped to hold a Tefilla rally after the fact, to share in the pain.  In America the Rabbanim were advised that they had no right to tell the gov't of Israel what to do.  After all, they don't live in Israel. They excused themselves and their silence as taking their cue from Rabbi's in Israel.  The Rabbi 's in Israel initially took a stand against the expulsion as documented in Halacha Berura a sefer written by Rabbi Yissachar Dov Rumpler. but then apparently politics, blood money as Rabbi Rumpler calls it, helped change their minds and they were passive and basically joined with the gov't. 

 It's time to finally admit we made a tragic mistake by being Silent and and rectifying it.  Please read When Silence is a Sin.   http://shemittahrediscovered.blogspot.com/2012/05/bsd-more-on-great-assembly-at-marienbad.html

Please review my many blog posts covering the mass protests against the Chareidi Draft and see from the quotes of the leaders of this protest why I came to the conclusion that that these protests had many elements of Dibah Raah and Motzi Shem Ra ."The Hebrew term lashon hara (or loshon hora) (Hebrew לשון הרע; "evil tongue") is the halakhic term for derogatory speech about another person.[4] Lashon hara differs from defamation in that its focus is on the use of true speech for a wrongful purpose  By contrast, hotzaat shem ra ("spreading a bad name"), also called hotzaat diba, or motzi shem ra (lit. "putting out a bad name") consists of untrue remarks, and is best translated as "slander" or "defamation". Hotzaat shem ra is worse, and consequentially an even graver sin, than lashon hara.[4]"

  I did not see any justification based on Torah for a blanket, unconditional ruling to forbid Chareidim from joining the army. 

On the other hand, it is important for Torah Leadership to address the concerns that need to be addressed to ensure that the Israeli army camp is a Holy camp.

Posts covering Chareidi Draft on Shemittahrediscovered.blogspot.com
Yakov Horowitz writes:  " In his monumental "Yad HaChazakah," the Rambam (Maimonides), our great codifier of halacha (Jewish law), brilliantly converts nebulous terms like teshuva(repentance), into practical checklists of precise steps one needs to take in order to perform this Torah commandment. This was an extraordinary contribution to Jewish life for it gives us a structured set of sequential steps to take to improve our spiritual and physical lives.  

The main components of teshuvah according to Rambam (Hilchos Teshuva 1:1)  are:

1)      Feelings of remorse for past misdeeds
2)      A sincere commitment to avoid returning to the path of sin
3)      Confessing one's sins
4)      Personally apologizing for the sin
5)      Making retribution 
 
  
In this Zechus of being unified, and correcting our misdeeds, may Hashem protect our brothers and sisters in the IDF and other military units during the ground invasion and beyond and may He return them to the loving embraces of their families safely."

Shabbat Shalom Umevorach! and Shavua Tov!


Sincerely, 

Robin Ticker
Activist emails sent to my list  are L'Ilui Nishmat Yisrael ben David Aryeh ob"m (Izzy - Kaplan) and Howard Chaim Grief great activists and lovers of Eretz Yisroel, Am Yisroel and the Torah. Yehi Zichronum Baruch.  May their memories serve as a blessing. 

Most of these emails are posted on Shemittahrediscovered.blogspot.com 

Personal emails to individuals will not be posted to my blog. 
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