yichusdik:
“MW13… is conducting himself in a menschlech way”
Thank you.
“American citizens in my class… had a legal requirement to register for the draft (even though there was no conscription at the time, registration was mandatory) and they did so, as penalties for not doing so were severe. Do yeshiva bochurim still do so? If not, why not?”
No, because there is no longer (as far as I know) a legal requirement to do so.
“My larger observation is that Israel is not America. There are, it seems to me, responsibilities that go beyond dina demalchusa dina, such as kol yisroel areivim ze bazeh, and how that is accomplished, the value and sanctity of Jewish life, and how it is safeguarded”
I’m not sure how kol yisroel areivim zeh l’zeh ties into this…
“Many years ago, I had an ongoing online forum discussion with a man from Kansas who was insistent on Israel’s colonialist and imperialist illegitimacy. I pointed out to him that where he lived was clearly traditional Kiowa land, and his “occupation” of it, deriving benefit from it, was clear hypocrisy if he was going to criticize Israel, and even more so because Jews were there in Israel thousands of years ago and he was a newcomer of two generations in Kansas. I wasn’t saying that he had to get up and leave, but I was pointing out the moral quandary that his advocacy put him in. Same here, except that I expect higher moral and ethical standards from Chareidim than I do from an anti-Israel agitator from Kansas. In short, again, hypocrisy is hypocrisy even if you can continue using the infrastructure without sanction.”
I do not see how believeing that the State of Israel shouldn’t have been created puts one into the same hypocritical “moral quandary” as this anti-Israel Kansasian. How does using a countries’ infrastructure show that one believes in its founding principles?
“there is an unfortunate perception among chareidim (especially in chutz laaretz) that chiloni Israelis have only one thought in their mind, one goal in life that animates all of their actions, and that is to spiritually destroy chariedim… Chilonim ( and there are many different motivations among them, they are not one homogeneous group) simply don’t care enough about the daily lives of chareidim to want to “shmad” them… Chilonim care about their business, their education, their security, their kids, their garden, their hobbies, their social life and a dozen other things more than they do about what kind of spiritual life the residents of Bnei Brak or Meah Shearim have.”
Exactly my point. The Chilonim are not doing this lishmah to support Torah and those who study it, which is what the Yissacher-Zevulun pact is all about.
“the willingness of the chilonim to defend every Jew and lay down his or her life as part of a social compact with all of their fellow citizens, allowing their fellow citizens to live a normal life including learning in Yeshiva or Kollel represents the mundane side of the equation pretty well. “
First of all, I simply don’t see this willingness of the Chilonim to support the Chareidim that you refer to. Actually, they quite often rant and rave about having to support the Chareidi “parasites”, and would be quite happy not to do so.
Second, even if the Chilonim would be happy and willing to support the Chareidim as part as a “social pact”, it would still be a far cry from the Yissacher-Zevulun ideal, where both are leading their lives with the sole intention of supporting and honoring Hashem’s Torah in every move they make.