If there’s a clear sign that an increasing number of
Orthodox girls are interested in serving in the Israel Defense Forces after
they graduate high school, it’s the fact that a new campaign is being launched
against the trend from one of the country’s most prominent conservative rabbis.
Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu, the chief rabbi of the city of Safed
and a member of the council of the Chief Rabbinate, is formally lobbying the
heads of schools for Orthodox girls to refuse entrance to organizations who
wish to discuss options available to them in the IDF, and encourage them to
serve in the army.
He has announced that he has plans to form an organization
to travel to schools to discourage the phenomenon.
In a letter to Rabbi Asher Corsia, the principal of a
Modi’in Bnei Akiva school, that was distributed to students at the school and
published on an Orthodox feminist Facebook group, Eliyahu declared, that “army
service exposes the girls to inappropriate situations that damage a faithful
girl emotionally, and unfortunately, sometimes physically. Army service is
inappropriate for a Daughter of Israel.”
He said girls should be “encouraged” to seek out “quality
service” opportunities where there is adequate protection of “female sanctity”
and “spirituality.”
In Israel, Orthodox women are eligible for exemptions from
army service if they do national service in its place. Many, however, choose to
enlist in the army, and the army maintains several programs that attempt to
help women serve without violating their religious beliefs.
Eliyahu accused
organizations that encourage army service of “lying” when they claim women are
able to serve in the IDF and retain or even strengthen their religious beliefs
over the course of their service. He said that in conversations with girls who
had served and with their parents, it was clear that it was difficult for
religious girls to adapt to a setting that was “secular, mixed, with a
frivolous atmosphere of mingling between the sexes.”
He wrote: “We come to stress the absolute forbidden nature
of girls serving in the army, as army service greatly damages girls’ faith and
values. We recommend that educational institutions refuse to open their gates
to organizations that encourage army service and call on everyone to strengthen
their girls’ determination to serve their people and their country in a holy
manner.”
Eliyahu’s opposition to women serving in the army is nothing
new. In fact, he has taken his position a step further: not only declaring that
Orthodox girls must not serve in the army, but has severely restricted their
options as to the form of national service they do.
Last year, he said that
such service was only appropriate if it took place “in a private home or
another private space, where the girl is not under the supervision of
strangers.” He ruled out service in large public institutions, specifically
mentioning hospitals and police stations as inappropriate settings for service.
In the conclusion of the letter, he said he was planning a
meeting for all religious school principals on the topic and emphasized that he
was “creating a body that will go to schools and explain to the girls the
sinful dangers of army service” and asked for their “cooperation” in this
effort.
Eliyahu is no stranger to controversy. His remarks regarding
Arabs and homosexuals torpedoed his desire to run for the position of chief
Sephardic rabbi.
Even so - it’s bad enough that a senior on the government
payroll would publicly declare that young women in his community should not
only refrain from defending their country, but from helping the sick in
government hospitals or supporting law enforcement.
The fact that he would use
his position of authority to enter publicly-funded schools to actively preach
against it is truly outrageous.
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