After Finance Minister recommended chareidim to fill the void in Israel’s construction field, Shas MK Amnon Cohen recommends chareidim for the nation’s fire service.
Cohen, who chairs the Knesset Audit Committee, was referring to a state comptroller’s report addressing Israel’s fire service. Cohen feels chareidim can be trained to fill the manpower shortage, citing they are quick learners and have proven dedicated to their undertakings. He stresses “not to bother those who sit and learn” he stated in his memo to Public Security Minister Yitzchak Aharonovich, but added those chareidim who are not sitting and learning can be trained for this.
Cohen has turned to the commissioner of civil service asking that he modify requirements so that can adapt to the chareidi lifestyle towards encouraging chareidim to come onboard.
(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
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8 Responses
Under current Israeli law, Jews can only seek employment as fire fighters AFTER they complete military duty. If they repealled that law (which effectively means to abolish conscription for everyone), those hareidim who want to be baal ha-battim will find Jews – with no need for the government to “help” by trying to steer them into jobs no else wants.
One should ask why it is the secular Jews don’t want to be fire fighters? Lousy pay and hours? Note that you don’t hear the hilonim suggesting that hareidim be trained to be bankers or entrepreneurs – jobs that the hilonim want.
if a firefighter needs to be an idf member then either chedeim who want that job must serve or simple get another job.
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also what is wrong with with construction job?
bankers one needs an education something chedeim do not have sorry
Bankers and CEO need a particular set of educational skills which Haredim do not possess at the moment. Blue collar jobs for Yeshiva bochurim are on the rise in the states, guys who are good with the hands, have a work ethic & looking to make a living salary.
Firemen and police in Israel receive a benefit package and pension which is useful also.
Train MKs to get a REAL job….
#2 #3
For high level positions ,we all know,education is of minimal use.It may be an impediment.
The new air fire fighting wing(the only dept. with prestige) founded after the Carmel fire
…is closed to hareidim
Wow, Nos. 1-2 and 4-5 take the Luddite cake….
Akuperma, I’ll restrict my comments to refuting one falsehood only: that “Israeli law” rules out the proposal discussed. For years soldiers have been seconded to the police and (I think) the Prisons Service. A stroke of the defense minister’s pen is probably all it takes to extend that to the firefighters.
About Time, education is all that counts, in Torah and in everything else. And if you know of any public department that’s “closed to hareidim,” you must have you presented the evidence to the media, to the religious MKs, etc. How did they respond?
I suggested this some time ago. Firefighters spend most of their time waiting for a fire alarm; that time can be spent learning Torah. And since fires are a situation of pikuach nefesh, a firefighter is REQUIRED to stop learning in order to respond to the fire.
The only difficulty I see is that the physical performance standards for being a firefighter are very stringent. A man who have never engaged in physical activity won’t be able to handle them. Do charedi schools in Israel have any physical education or sports time?
There would also need to be two minor changes to charedi life: Firefighters wear fireproof uniforms, not suits. And beards would have to be sufficiently short in order to use the self contained breathing apparatus that firefighters use when entering smoke-filled buildings.