David M. Weinberg, in a report in The Jerusalem Post, says that it is a good thing that the Israeli government has decided to wait until October to pass a new charedi-draft law, because in its current form, the plan “suspiciously delays treatment of the problem for years, and unwisely sets Israel up for violent confrontation in the future.”
The much-ballyhooed plan, says Weinberg, “involves little change over the next four years.” Instead, until 2017, “it gives a blanket and permanent exemption from military service to all charedi men. That’s 27,000 men (21 years and over at this moment) who will never serve in the army, along with 7,000 additional charedi boys who will turn 18 each year between now and 2017.”
The exemption, writes Weinberg, “pulls the rug out from under the positive trend toward charedi integration in the army that has been under way for several years.”
Weinberg adds: “What charedi man is now going to sign up for the successful Netzah Yehuda infantry battalion, also known as Nachal Charedi, or the Shachar air force unit when he can grab a blanket exemption? Then in 2017, the Peri plan slaps an across-the-board blanket draft order on the haredi community, and hits charedim with criminal sanctions if they don’t bend. It threatens to imprison every charedi man who doesn’t sign up by age 21 (except for 1,800 so-called exceptional Torah scholars).” Read more of Weinberg’s analysis here.
{Matzav.com Israel}
Will we ever learn? Read “A Divine Madness” by Rav Millerz”tl, useful for younger Jews who don’ t yet know and older Jews who haven’t forgotten what abandonng Torah means.