The senior rabbi of the Lithuanian haredi Orthodox, Rabbi Aharon Leib Shteinman, said Israeli yeshiva students should not agree to enlist in national service.
The rabbi’s decision, quoted Dec. 10 in the haredi daily newspaper Yated Ne’eman, came a day after Israel’s Cabinet approved a temporary law that would allow yeshiva students to perform national service in place of the military.
“We must warn publicly against this serious and dangerous phenomenon, which only aims to destroy the foundations of our existence, against the essence and mission of a yeshiva student to devote his life to studying Torah,” the newspaper quoted Shteinman as saying.
The Cabinet’s decisions and similar actions are “harming the foundations of Judaism,” he reportedly said.
Shteinman previously has backed the formation of an all-haredi army brigade and the Tal Law that exempted yeshiva students from army service, according to the Jerusalem Post. The Tal Law was found to be unconstitutional. — jta