Israel -Rabbis in the Israeli army told battlefield troops in January’s Gaza offensive they were fighting a “religious war” against gentiles, according to one army commander’s account published on Friday.
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“Their message was very clear: we are the Jewish people, we came to this land by a miracle, God brought us back to this land and now we need to fight to expel the gentiles who are interfering with our conquest of this holy land,” he said.
The account by Ram, a pseudonym to shield the soldier’s identity, was published by the left-leaning Haaretz newspaper in the second day of revelations that have rocked the Israeli military.
They were leaked from a Feb 13 meeting of armed forces members to share their Gaza experiences.
Some veterans, alumni of an Israel Defence Force (IDF) military academy, told of the killing of civilians and their impression that deep contempt for Palestinians pervaded the ranks of the Israeli forces.
Haaretz and the daily Maariv, which also published the accounts, quoted over half a dozen soldiers and airmen. The institution’s director, Danny Zamir, confirmed that Thursday’s published accounts were authentic.
In longer excerpts in its Friday “Week’s End” edition, the daily quoted ‘Ram’ as saying his impression of the 22-day operation was “the feeling of an almost religious mission”.
There was a “huge gap between what the Education Corps sent out and what the IDF rabbinate sent out”, he said. The corps’s pamphlets told the history of Israel’s fighting in Gaza from 1948 to the present, but the rabbinate’s message imparted the sense that “this operation was a religious war”.
The rabbinate of the IDF provides religious services, including overseeing preparation of kosher food, providing prayerbooks and prayer sessions and religious counselling to any soldier wants to participate. Involvement is not obligatory.
RELIGION IN THE MILITARY
The Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) has put the Palestinian death toll during the war at 1,417 — 926 civilians, 236 fighters and 255 police officers. Israeli officials have disputed those figures. Thirteen Israelis were killed.
Israel faced global criticism over its assaults in densely populated areas of Gaza in the campaign, launched with the declared aim of ending rocket attacks from Hamas and other Islamist militant groups in Gaza aimed at its southern towns.
Hamas clerics have often called for “Zionist” blood to be spilled. The Islamists carried out dozens of suicide bombings in Israel before and during a Palestinian uprising that erupted in 2000, blowing up buses and cafes.
The Jewish state tries to balance the needs of its non-observant majority with religious tradition. While the military does not provide data on the disposition of personnel, observers report a disproportionately high number of soldiers and officers wearing skullcaps — a symbol of Jewish faith.
One week after the Gaza offensive ended on Jan.18 Israeli human rights group Yesh Din called on Defence Minister Ehud Barak to dismiss the chief chaplain, Rabbi Avichai Rontzki, who holds the rank of brigadier general.
It said he had distributed a booklet to soldiers fighting in the Gaza conflict quoting an ultra-nationalist Israeli rabbi as saying that showing mercy towards a “cruel enemy” was “terribly immoral” and advising soldiers they were fighting “murderers”.
Barak responded to the IDF revelations on Thursday by repeating Israel’s description of its armed forces as the most moral in the world. The IDF said its judge advocate-general had ordered an investigation.
They pushed it? So what …It’s true and that why they are fighting
Nu, it’s called milchemes mitzvah. What’s he complaining about? A chaplain is supposed to boost soldiers’ morale for the job they have to do; that’s what the rabbis were doing, so all should be OK. If the rabbis were telling the soldiers to sympathise with the enemy and go easy on them, *that* would be a problem.
It makes no difference what some un-named, leftist, self hating, IDF soldier said to the media. The fact is that the military action in Gaza was necessary to stop the terrorists from firing missiles into Israel. The left will always find something to criticize and they usually criticize the frum community or “Rabbi’s”. That makes good press. Who cares what anybody says? Do what has to be done. Do what is according to Halocho and what is right!
And the problem is, what exactly? There are specific halachos for conducting a milchemes mitzvah and milchemes reshus, and soldiers should be instructed in these halachos. When my son was in the IDF (the Nahal Chareidi) he had shiurim in these halachos.
If this is Chas Va’chalilah true, which I pray it is not, these rabbonim should be court-martialed and charged with murder or war crimes. This is beyond insanity and will result over time in the deaths of thousand of yiddin in retaliation by the terrorists.
The State of Israel is so perverse, I can’t stand even reading about it anymore.
Hashem! Please bring Your Moshiach now.
So now the world has a problem with the truth. What a shock.
it’s not a milchemes mitzvah because it’s a war started by a non-jewish state. don’t get me wrong, i want every muslim out of Jewish land, but this is no milchemes mitzvah.
Hashem yerachem. I’m beginning to see the rationale behind the respective approaches of the Satmar Rov zt”l and Yeshayahu Leibovich z”l.
Both sides suck!!!!!!!!!!!1
If someone has a problem with the Rabbis in the IDF, go BECOME YOUR OWN RABBI THERE, until then, Shut up!
Shabbat Shalom, 🙂
Who should be deciding military policy and procedure – rabbis or the generals? Like it or not, Israel needs the u.s. and if israelis start looking, sounding and acting like other religious fanatics, then at some point people will ask why should the u.s. give so much support to Israel which doesn’t even have oil to give in return. Unfortunately, Israel has to behave better than its neighbors.
OK. Israel is called the state of Israel. NOT THE ORTHODOX HAREDI COMMONWEALTH OF ISRAEL!
I hope who ever this “Rabbi” was is fired on the spot. This is after Israel’s De Facto Rav Elyashav telling non Jews what to do. The world gets crazier every day!
“observers report a disproportionately high number of soldiers and officers wearing skullcaps — a symbol of Jewish faith.”
I thought that Israel has a draft in force! And the religious are those that usually try to evade the draft. It doesn’t make any sense.
to #17 what an haratzos, what perversity of halochos…where do you take such garbage as ‘geniva convetions are dina demalchise..and if geniva convention will say you have to eat dovor achar..
it is a religious war we have every right I mean come on they have their jahad but we get bombed for starting our own religious war also they bomb our buses cafe’s terroize israeli citizens everyday it was about time we showed them what happens when you mess with the gibor
The Lubavitcher Rebbe said clearly during wars israel had, starting with the 6 day war the rebbe established the mitzva tank, and th rebbe said lcearly when a jew puts on teffillen in New York this protects an israely soldier fighting on the front line.
So yes, this is a religious war, when we fight for the sake of jews we win, when we say to the U.N. that our right to the land is becuase hashem gave it to us, and therefore there is nothing to discuss, and we wilol not give it up, only then will we win.
There was a “huge gap between what the Education Corps sent out and what the IDF rabbinate sent out”,
So let me get this straight. It was the rabbis that planned the mission, authorized supplies and equipment, and ordered the troops into battle. The Anti religious government merely went along with the rabbis so the rabbis would not punish them.
I have a serious problem with that scenario. So the rabbis gave a pep talk, so what? Could you imagine a leftist giving a pep talk? “you soldiers should know that you are going into illegally captured terrority that we have no right to enter. Yopu will be murdering innocent civilians. Even the soldiers that you kill, since they are rightfully defending their land, it is murder because you are in the wrong. You should not shoot the people trying to kill you, but rather give them a hug and tell them it’s the rabbis that made you do this and we have no problem living together in peace. It’s the rabbis that they should kill because tey are the source of all the animosity. That would be much better right?