Popa: Once again, yes, groups should be excluded at certain times. Examples would be a Yom Ha’atzmaut parade, at which it would be downright mind-boggling to see a chassidish Rebbe. Or if there was a conference to limit/eliminate secular education in schools, it would be wholly unnecessary and even chutzpahdik to have someone MO to speak. But not at the Siyum HaShas-this is about limud haTorah!!
DY: There is clear and fundamental difference between something b’yechidus and b’rabim. The point ‘far east’ is trying to make, is that we have no buisness imposing our beliefs on others who practice something b’tzina. It does not follow that one should be fine if someone’s shittah is to embarass people publicly and that we have to accept that. Why? Because that’s b’tzibur! That becomes everyone’s responsibility to respond to. Ma she’ein kein, when someone comes to speak about limud haTorah, and nothing about his beliefs of Eretz Yisrael, there is no reason to take to task for those beliefs.
Toi, Sports, and others: For all the talk of lending credibility by attending, besides my post about lack of identity above, if any Rov or Rebbe actually found value in rising above these machlokos and coming together for the Siyum haShas, they could easily do so without creating such problems. Because if their mere presence can cause such large assumptions to be made, kal v’chomer that if they gave a shmuz pre or post-siyum that their attendance in no way speaks of their haskama of religious Zionism, then their Chassidim would have no confusion of the Rebbe’s beliefs. So far all the power everyone’s ascribing these Rebbeim, do they not have enough power to get up give a shmuz to give clarity and avoid the machlokes?!