Pre-army academies join call for soldiers to obey orders

The heads of pre-army preparatory academies, both religious and secular, on Thursday morning called for Israel Defense Forces soldiers to obey all military orders, including directives to evacuate settlements under the disengagement plan.

In a letter to Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz and IDF Chief of Staff Moshe Ya'alon, they also asked that the army be kept out of operations steeped in controversy to as great an extent as possible.

The letter is the latest of several positions taken by rabbis and other leaders regarding soldiers' refusal to evacuate settlements. Dozens of rabbis signed an open letter in the last few days in which they express their opposition to soldiers' refusing orders because it would damage the sense of cohesiveness of the army, even though some of the rabbis oppose disengagement.

These recent letters come in reaction to a petition by some 60 rabbis, including heads of hesder yeshivas - which combine Torah study and army service - calling on religious soldiers to refuse to evacuate settlements.

Thursday's letter was signed by the heads of all 23 preparatory academies but one, who did not get a chance to approve the final draft before it was sent. Religious pre-army academies provide a year of Torah study before students carry out their army service, while secular academies train students to excel in the military. Seventy percent of the 1,100 students at the academies are religious.

Meanwhile, the rabbis' letter calling on soldiers to carry out military orders is expected to be published at the beginning of next week.

One of the signatories to the new petition is Rabbi Shlomo Riskin, rabbi of the town of Efrat in Gush Etzion.

Riskin on Wednesday published a statement saying that while he is strongly opposed to disengagement and supports the proposal for a referendum, he considers refusal to be a danger to the future of the state.

He distributed his statement among the Ohr Torah Stone institutions which he heads.

"Refusal to obey an order given by the government is tantamount to a giant step toward civil war," Riskin notes.

He also states that he differs with the rabbinical ruling that the importance of the mitzva [precept] of the Land of Israel is equal to the importance of keeping kosher or observing the Jewish Sabbath.

"There is no absolute prohibition against giving up parts of the Land of Israel, if the need for this arises, to strengthen other parts of the country. Yonatan Ben-Zakai gave up Jerusalem and requested that the sages of Yavneh be brought to him, King Solomon ordered that 20 towns be transferred to King Hiram of Tyre. There are precedents.

"And despite the terrible pain, refusal is many times worse since it could lead us downhill to the very end of the existence of the State of Israel as an independent and sovereign state," he writes.

Rabbi Yehuda Amital, former leader of the moderate religious Meimad movement, has signed the petition letter alongside his colleague at the head of the Har Etzion yeshiva in the Gush Etzion settlement of Alon Shvut, Rabbi Aharon Lichtenstein.

Amital believes that refusal puts the future of the Zionist state in jeopardy, and that it is not legitimate to employ halakha [Jewish law] as a tool for preventing disengagement.

"Halakha states that one must think of the good of the country and that is defined by different people in different ways, so that the argument is political, and halakha has no status here," he says.

Rabbi Yoel Bin Nun, another signatory, is a vehement opponent of refusal even though he has been attacking the disengagement plan for months.

During the Jewish week-long holiday of Sukkot, he published a long article in the religious daily Hatzofeh in which he explained that "a public transgression, like a public mitzva, is committed by the entire public via its elected representatives, in legitimate ways and means according to the law and according to accepted public norms.... [There has to be a discussion about] the evacuation of people from their homes in a democratic dialogue of civil rights and human rights vis-a-vis government and parliamentary decisions... Even undemocratic decisions by recognized leaders of the people of Israel must be observed if they do not oblige the individual to commit a crime."

Among the dangers he envisions in refusal is a situation where the army cannot carry out the evacuation and the settlers who insist on staying will be left to their own resources; another is the difficulties the IDF will face in future in guarding areas that are disputed, because of refusal by left-wing soldiers, "something which [former chief] Rabbi Shapira is not aware of at all, to my regret."

Several other prominent rabbis are expected to sign the open letter.

	Shlomo Riskin, rabbi of the West Bank settlement of Efrat, is one of dozens of rabbis who signed an open letter denouncing calls on IDF soldiers to refuse orders. (Archives)