Israeli military enlisting frontline rabbis, critic warns creating against “God’s army”
The Israeli military is mustering battlefield rabbis in what it calls a campaign to promote religious values in its frontline ranks. The move, announced in the latest issue of the military’s official weekly magazine, Bamahane, drew fire on Monday from one of Israel’s most popular newspaper columnists, who cautioned against creating a “God’s Army.”
Under the plan, a reserve army rabbi will be assigned to every battalion in the military’s northern command, whose areas of responsibility include the Lebanese and Syrian borders. “The assimilation of religion into combat battalions is increasing,” said an article in Bamahane, which gave details of the program being implemented after a year-long pilot project.
While rabbis have long served in Israel’s military, their roles traditionally have focused on overseeing adherence to Jewish dietary laws in its kitchens, Sabbath observance and religious ceremonies. Now, the Bamahane article said, “the commander of the Golani (infantry) brigade’s Battalion 51 does not move a meter without his rabbi.”
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Israel targets top rabbis for anti-Arab incitement backing “King’s Doctrine”
Israeli police briefly detained a leading rabbi Sunday as part of a widening probe into a treatise suspected of inciting the murder of Arabs. The investigation has pitted authorities in the Jewish state against far-right West Bank settlers and has led to scuffles outside government institutions in Jerusalem and a sit-down protest that choked off the main highway to Tel Aviv.
Rabbi Yaacov Yosef was seized by detectives on his way back from morning prayers, witnesses said, in a tactic similar to the arrest last week of a senior West Bank rabbi whose followers responded with street protests. ”They commandeered the car and took it away, together with my dad, to an undisclosed destination,” Yosef’s son Yonatan told Israel Radio. The rabbi was freed after an hour, police said.
The clerics had ignored a police summons to be questioned over endorsements for “The King’s Doctrine,” a book written by a more obscure settler rabbi offering justifications from scripture for killing innocent gentiles during religious war. ”Revenge, including strikes on the blameless and on babies, is necessary and important in fighting and defeating evil,” read a passage excerpted on Israel’s top-rated television news.
Israeli security officials fear such edicts could fuel Jewish attacks designed to scupper the eviction of settlers from occupied land they regard as theirs by biblical birthright but where Palestinians, with international support, seek statehood.
A police spokesman said Yosef had been interrogated in connection with “incitement to racism and violence” before being let go. Dov Lior, chief rabbi for the hardcore settlement of Kiryat Arba, was similarly questioned and released last week.
The National Socialists also thought it was right and necessary to kill the blameless and babies. Remember? How do people reach the point where killing the innocent is part of their doctrine, part of their phylosophy for living a life of service?
Israel’s army chief under fire about God reference in memorial rites
The Israeli military is embroiled in a public battle over whether God ought to be mentioned at memorial rites for fallen soldiers. The ferocity of the debate, going to the heart of Israel’s secular and religious Jewish divide, prompted the intervention on Monday of a parliamentary panel that urged Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s fractious cabinet to decide the issue.
The controversy is over whether Yizkor, the Hebrew prayer of remembrance, should begin at military ceremonies with the words “May God remember” or “May the people of Israel remember”. Military policy calls for the version mentioning God to be used, but enforcement has been patchy in an apparent nod to the sentiments of the Jewish state’s secular majority.
Media reports that Israel’s new armed forces chief, Lieutenant-General Benny Ganz, had sided with chaplains who insisted on using the “May God remember” phrase have drawn complaints the military is becoming too Orthodox.
“The people’s army is little by little becoming an army of God,” left-wing legislator Ilan Gilon said.
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Criticised Israeli ambassador backtracks on rare praise of Pope Pius XII
The comments made last Thursday by Mordechay Lewy, the Israeli ambassador to the Vatican, were some of the warmest ever made by a Jewish official about Pius. Most have been very critical of his record.
In an indication of how sensitive the subject of Pius is among Jews, Lewy was quickly assailed by some Jewish groups, including Holocaust survivors. In a statement issued in what appeared to be an attempt to calm the dispute within the world Jewish community, Lewy said his comments were “embedded in a larger historical context”.
“Given the fact that this context is still under the subject of ongoing and future research, passing my personal historical judgment on it was premature,” Lewy said.
The question of what Pius did or did not do to help Jews has tormented Catholic-Jewish relations for decades and it is very rare for a leading Jewish or Israeli official to praise Pius. Many Jews accuse Pius, who reigned from 1939 to 1958, of turning a blind eye to the Holocaust. The Vatican says he worked quietly behind the scenes because speaking out would have led to Nazi reprisals against Catholics and Jews in Europe.
Lewy, speaking at a ceremony to honour an Italian priest who helped Jews, had said Catholic convents and monasteries opened their doors to save Jews in the days following a Nazi sweep of Rome’s Ghetto on Oct. 16, 1943. In his speech on Thursday night, Lewy said: “There is reason to believe that this happened under the supervision of the highest Vatican officials, who were informed about what was going on.”
“So it would be a mistake to say that the Catholic Church, the Vatican and the pope himself opposed actions to save the Jews. To the contrary, the opposite is true,” he said.
Elan Steinberg, vice-president of the American Gathering of Holocaust Survivors and their Descendants, called Lewy’s comments unsustainable. “For any ambassador to make such specious comments is morally wrong. For the Israeli envoy to do so is particularly hurtful to Holocaust survivors who suffered grievously because of Pius’s silence,” Steinberg said in a statement. He said Lewy had “disgracefully conflated the praiseworthy actions of elements in the Catholic Church to rescue Jews with the glaring failure of Pope Pius to do so”.
ambassador lewy did not praise the pope!
he objectively said that jews were saved by the church and by clergy, and there is some chance that pius 12 knew about this. all this is a moot point. it cant be proven one way or the other – possibly not even after the vatican releases whatever records it sees fit to release.
Lewy has time and again also said that pius was silent on the holocaust. he remained silent even though american diplomats pleaded with him to speak up. (the response was that the nazis may make it worse for the jews. worse! get it. how much worse i dunno)
for this silence his being beatified may raise questions, but none that can be addressed by the State of Israel, for which beatification is an internal vatican matter. the catholic church can define as a saint whomever they wish, and certainly worse people than pius12 have achieved this questionable status. if the church wishes to demean the term, so be it. latin is their language and they can use it as they wish.
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what IS on record and IS a problem is Pius’ blatant antisemitism and his almost fascist objection to the state of israel. and lewy – as the editor of the JTA well knows – has gone on record on this account as well (drawing much more heated reactions from the vatican than what he’s received from the jews on this latest comment).
he referred to the jewish state as a communist virus (now there are those calling it a theocracy... sigh); the first time he mentioned the term “concentration camp” was in reference to palestinians (justified or not, one has to admit that concentration camps DID exist before the zionist state used them to round up and gas all those millions of palestinians to death). one can go on and on. the long and the short of it is that he was a product of that world in which the jews were to be eternally damned for killing christ, never to achieve statehood, to be the dregs of humanity for their religion... shame this kind of attitude still exists, but what can you do
Israeli envoy to Vatican voices rare praise of wartime Pope Pius XII
A leading Israeli official has praised Pope Pius XII for saving Jews during the Nazi occupation of Rome, a surprise twist in a long-standing controversy over the pontiff’s wartime role. The comments by Mordechay Lewy, the Israeli ambassador to the Vatican, were some of the warmest ever made by a Jewish official about Pius. Most have been very critical of his record.
Lewy, speaking at a ceremony on Thursday night to honor an Italian priest who helped Jews, said that Catholic convents and monasteries had opened their doors to save Jews in the days following a Nazi sweep of Rome’s Ghetto on October 16, 1943.
“There is reason to believe that this happened under the supervision of the highest Vatican officials, who were informed about what was going on,” he said in a speech. “So it would be a mistake to say that the Catholic Church, the Vatican and the pope himself opposed actions to save the Jews. To the contrary, the opposite is true,” he said.
In an indication of just how sensitive the subject of Pius is among Jews, Lewy was quickly assailed by a group of Holocaust survivors. Elan Steinberg, vice-president of the American Gathering of Holocaust Survivors and their Descendants, called Lewy’s comments unsustainable. “For any ambassador to make such specious comments is morally wrong. For the Israeli envoy to do so is particularly hurtful to Holocaust survivors who suffered grievously because of Pius’s silence,” Steinberg said in a statement. He said Lewy had “disgracefully conflated the praiseworthy actions of elements in the Catholic Church to rescue Jews with the glaring failure of Pope Pius to do so.”
The question of what Pius did or did not do to help Jews has tormented Catholic-Jewish relations for decades and it is very rare for a leading Jewish or Israeli leader to praise Pius. Many Jews accuse Pius, who reigned from 1939 to 1958, of turning a blind eye to the Holocaust. The Vatican says he worked quietly behind the scenes because speaking out would have led to Nazi reprisals against Catholics and Jews in Europe.
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Oy Gevalt! Yiddish cell phone launches in Israel
Israel’s “kosher” cellular phone market has a new model, a device with a Yiddish interface to help devout Jews combine tradition with modern technology.
Hundreds of thousands of mobile phones, popularly dubbed kosher because they block access to services frowned upon by ultra-Orthodox rabbis, have been operating in the Jewish state for years. Last month, Israel’s second largest mobile provider, Partner introduced what it hailed as the world’s first Yiddish cell phone, manufactured by Alcatel-Lucent.
Marc Seelenfreund, CEO of Israeli Accel Telecom which imports and distributes mobile phones to all Israeli operators, had a special team of translators work for months to develop an interface entirely in Yiddish. The language, a mixture of medieval German and Hebrew, was spoken by millions of European Jews for centuries, but it is now used mostly by elderly Jews and in some Orthodox communities.
Yiddish words such as chutzpah, schmaltz or schlep, may have entered the English language, but Seelenfreund said ultra-Orthodox Jews would appreciate terms like “outgoing call,” “ringtone” and “vibrate” translated into Yiddish. He said the market for “kosher” phones was substantial, estimating there are up to 400,000 users in Israel and another 500,000 in the United States.
Read the full story by Maayan Lubell here.
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Jobless ultra-Orthodox Jews weigh on Israel’s economy
Meir Gross is a Jewish ultra-Orthodox father of five who does not work. Despite warnings that Israel’s economy may be threatened by his fast growing, often unemployed, community, he does not want a job. Gross advocates a pious existence geared to study. He spends nearly his entire day learning Torah (Jewish law), which he says is the most important edict bestowed on the Jewish man, and it cannot be combined with a job.
“Torah study demands utter and complete devotion. We’re not interested in making money or in material luxury. We are content with very little and our true joy, and highest duty, is learning,” Gross said.
Ultra-Orthodox Jews, or “Haredim,” are a devout tight-knit community who make up 8-10 percent of Israel’s 7.7 million population, with eight children per family on average. Many are supported by the state and live well below the poverty line. A Bank of Israel report in March said about 60 percent of Haredi men don’t work.
But in 20 years the Haredim will make up 17 percent of the work force and many analysts say Israel’s economy will suffer enormously if things do not change.
“They are a real danger to Israel,” said Omer Moav, economics professor at the University of London and the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. “If we go bankrupt it’s the end of the story for us. Our strong army rests on a strong economy.”
The Haredim traditionally keep to their own towns or neighborhoods, where men walk the streets in traditional black garb and broad hats while women wear long dark dresses and cover their hair with hats, scarves or wigs. While some Haredim choose not to work, others say they would like to earn their keep, but face too many cultural hurdles searching for jobs among Israel’s secular majority.
The author either hasn’t done the job, or chose not to reveal a part of truth. And that truth is – the quirk about army conscription laws in Israel. According to it, the men are not subject to otherwise mandatory service as long as they are full time Torah students. It’s the military service they’re trying to avoid in fear that they might be compelled to desecrate Shabbat or eat something not sufficiently kosher (hint: OU isn’t sufficiently kosher for them), or do something else not compatible with their narrow worldview. That’s why Haredi women, who don’t face mandatory service, easily find their place in modern Israeli economy, unlike the men who keep their full time studies until their age makes them not eligible for service
New Israeli film claims discovery of nails from Jesus’s cross
Could two of the nails used to crucify Jesus have been discovered in a 2,000-year-old tomb in Jerusalem? And could they have mysteriously disappeared for 20 years, only to turn up by chance in a Tel Aviv laboratory?
That is the premise of the new documentary film”The Nails of the Cross” by veteran investigator Simcha Jacobovici, which even before its release has prompted debate in the Holy Land. The film follows three years of research during which Jacobovici presents his assertions — some based on empirical data, others requiring much imagination and a leap of faith.
He hails the find as historic, but most experts and scholars contacted by Reuters dismissed his case as far-fetched, some calling it a publicity stunt. Many ancient relics, including other nails supposedly traced back to the crucifixion, have been presented over the centuries as having a connection to Jesus. Many were deemed phony, while others were embraced as holy.
Jacobovici, who sparked debate with a previous film that claimed to reveal the lost tomb of Jesus, says this find differs from others because of its historical and archaeological context.
“What we are bringing to the world is the best archaeological argument ever made that two of the nails from the crucifixion of Jesus have been found,” he said in an interview, wearing his trademark traditional knitted cap. “Do I know 100 percent yes, these are them? I don’t.”
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Jerusalem bishop appeals Israel’s residency denial
Jerusalem’s Anglican bishop, a Palestinian, is engaged in a legal battle with Israel over its refusal to extend his residency permit. An Anglican official, who declined to be named, said Israel’s Interior Ministry had written to Bishop Suheil Dawani and accused him of improper land dealings on behalf of the church and the Palestinian Authority, allegations he denies. A spokeswoman for the Interior Ministry declined to comment, citing an upcoming court hearing.
Dawani was elected Bishop of the Diocese of Jerusalem in 2007, and as a non-Israeli was required by Israeli authorities to obtain temporary residency permits. These were granted to him in 2008 and 2009, but not last year. Born in Nablus in the occupied West Bank, Dawani lives with his family in East Jerusalem. Both areas were captured by Israel in a 1967 war. Israel annexed East Jerusalem after the conflict in a step that is not internationally recognized.
The church official said the church had petitioned an Israeli court to order the Interior Ministry to grant new residency permits and a hearing had been set for May 18. In the meantime, Dawani’s lawyer said, it appeared no moves were imminent to deport him.
The Council of Religious Institutions in the Holy Land (CRIHL), which represents Jews, Muslims and Christians, issued a statement Tuesday voicing concern about Dawani’s case. “The CRIHL calls upon the authorities who have jurisdiction in this matter to find a quick issue without delay,” it said. A statement from the Anglican Diocese of Jerusalem said it had appealed to Israeli President Shimon Peres, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and senior Anglican and political officials in the United States and Britain to intervene.
via Jerusalem bishop appeals Israel’s residency denial | World | Reuters.
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Exorcisms and charlatans flourish in impoverished Gaza
The shabby room in a one-story house in suburban Gaza was shrouded in darkness, and only the mutterings of a bearded exorcist broke the silence. A man lay stretched on a grubby mattress, writhing, as the faith healer recited Koranic verses to chase away an evil spirit. “Get out, you demon,” the exorcist, who calls himself Sheikh Ali, threatened the spirit. “Get out or I will burn you.”
There are a lot of demons to chase in this poverty-riddled Palestinian enclave, say a growing number of Koranic exorcists who have set up shop in Gaza, offering to end the torments of their sometimes highly disturbed patients. The growth of exorcist clinics is seen by some as a sign of rising religious fervour among ordinary Palestinians. Hamas, the Islamic militant group that runs Gaza, however, is increasingly concerned that many exorcists are simply charlatans.
Nobody knows how many exorcists are here, but Hamas investigators say they uncovered 30 cases of fraud last year alone. There have also been complaints that healers are using dark magic to cast spells on their clients, and the police say they have found evidence of sexual abuses committed during these sessions.
“We caught some suspects red-handed, practicing exorcism, using magic to separate married couples and other things, under the pretext of helping people,” said Lieut. Col. Abdel-Baset Al-Masri, head of Hamas’s police investigation unit. “It was all an act of deception and exploitation. Some people handed over fortunes and one woman gave all her jewellery to one of these exorcists.”
The idea of demonic possession exists in many religions, and belief in the existence of demons and spirits, known as jinns, is widespread among Muslims, but many mainstream clerics doubt they can possess the human body, and disapprove of the work of the so-called Koranic clinics. Sheikh Ali begs to differ. He says jinns can wreak havoc on human relations, driving a wedge between married couples or causing women to be infertile, and he says his work shows they can also take up residence in a human body.
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