Home › Forums › Eretz Yisroel › Kollel Life in Eretz Yisroel is More Difficult and a Greater Sacrifice than Army › Reply To: Kollel Life in Eretz Yisroel is More Difficult and a Greater Sacrifice than Army
LU, I don’t agree with several of your conclusions but almost all of your points have some merit and are made in an articulate manner without rancor. That’s pretty rare in the CR when talking about these subjects. Kol hakavod.
I do have two issues with what you wrote.
Considering the way that you describe Torah learning and army service as meritorious in their own rights, I imagine that one could find an ideal solution in a system not too dissimilar from the existing hesder system. There are indeed a few Yeshivot somewhat to the right of the usual dati tziyoni types which participate in such a modified program. I wonder, could there be any solution which would bring more achdus, more good hashpooh on Israeli society in general, more understanding than something like this?
My second issue is my only serious criticism of your post. You speak of a Secular Zionist government trying to destroy the chareidi world. Really? There are more chareidim, receiving significant government money and resources although not at the highest levels, commensurately proprtional to reductions elsewhere in Israeli budgets; more yeshivos in Israel (and significant public funding for many of them) and more people studying Torah in them than at any point since maamad har sinai; There are government funded streets, utilities, fire services, police, infrastructure, energy, water resources, insurance, pensions, public transportation, all of which the Chareidi tzibur makes use of every day. There is significant though incomplete observance of halacha regarding shabbos, kashrus and mikvaos, not to mention civil defense and disaster preparedness.
When one is out to “destroy” something, as you claim, it is absurd to do so by funding, protecting, supporting and facilitating it.
Moreover, your contention depends on a fundamental conceit, that there is intent to destroy and a rationale for doing so. Frankly, if you bother to speak to all but the most radical secular ideologues (who have been out of government for more than 20 years in any case), they are not motivated to hate or change or destroy the chareidi velt.
You think they stay up at night figuring out ways to harm chareidim? They have many other things to think about, some of which are important, like how to earn a living, how to afford an apartment, or how to be safe in a crazy region, how their children are doing or how they are going to pay to fix the air conditioner that just broke; some of which are not important but entertaining or amusing, like who won kochav nolad, how to get to the beach tomorrow, or what that new restaurant is like. They care about responsibilities and privileges that affect Chareidim and they feel should be equitable, and they care about their individual rights being respected and infringed, but beyond that they frankly think about you way less than you imagine. And the vast majority of secular Jews are simply not ideological.
The threatened existence or “destruction” of the Chareidi velt by “di andere”, the Tziyonim (most of whom these days are traditional or religious, BTW) or anyone else aside from those who threaten ALL Jews and Israelis is an artificial construct, a straw man. Why it is used and who benefits I will leave to you to determine for yourself.