Discarding Our Civic Obligations  

Does the fact that a person lives in a country mean, prima facie, that there is an attendant civic obligation of some sort for each such citizen? I think it does.

Generally, citizenship obligations include legally required duties like paying taxes and obeying laws, as well as civic responsibilities that strengthen the community. Legally, citizens must follow the nation’s laws and pay taxes to fund public services. Other important responsibilities include voting, serving on a jury, and defending the nation if called upon, such as through military service.

Specifically related to a major issue under current discussion in Israel today, is the question: Is the civic responsibility of defending the nation, something that applies to everyone in that nation or not? Is that obligation any less significant than paying taxes or generally following the law of the land? While some would posit that defending the nation can be addressed in ways other than military or national service, is that a satisfactory response to those in uniform who would ask, “Why me and not them?”

I strongly believe that every citizen has an obligation to observe the law and serve their country in order to fulfill their civic responsibilities. Growing up in the US I felt strongly that every able-bodied person should serve in the military. Against the wishes of my parents, I did volunteer, earned a commission in the US Army’s Signal Corps and served 26 months on active duty and 4 years in the reserves. My mother, whose own father punctured an ear drum to avoid serving in the Tsar’s army, never could understand my volunteering to serve.

Given all of this, it is simply incomprehensible to me as well as to millions of other Israelis, how the Charedi community, and specifically its vaunted rabbinic leadership, can be comfortable sitting idly by while the “others” go to battle and die to save all of us here, charedi, religious, and secular, Israeli Arab and Jew alike.

We have all heard the arguments that those who are studying in their yeshivot are also fighting for Israel’s survival in their own way. Maybe so, but they are not putting their lives on line and taking the risk that they may not come home alive, and may leave a widow along with a number of fatherless children to cope with the downside of their unplanned departure.

The Israel Defense Forces personnel section advises that the shortage of manpower and the continuation of hostilities or possible new hostilities on our borders, may result in their having to add 120 days a year to the reserve duty obligations of every reservist. Yet at the same time there are 25,000 charedim between the ages of 18-25 who are eligible to serve each year but do not do so.

Now before anyone starts screaming at me that there are plenty of non-religious people who do not report for duty, yes, that is the case and is yet another stain on this society.

Statistics show that overall conscription rates for the secular community tend to be high, with most estimates putting the conscription rate in secular society at 72% (i.e. 28% who do not serve for one reason or another). But I would be ok if 72% of eligible Charedim served or even 25% which is close to the number be bandied about in the latest legislation.

However, the issue is not the percentages. The issue is that a large and ever-increasing segment of the population does not believe that they have a civic responsibility to share in the defense of the country.

The farce of all of this is that the rabbinic leadership who support this effort not to have their young people serve, is in direct violation of what the Torah tells us to do. Jewish law distinguishes between an “optional war” (Milchemet Reshut) and an “obligatory war” (Milchemet Mitzvah). A defensive war to save Israel from an aggressor is considered an obligatory war. In such a conflict, all who are able are required to participate, with no personal exemptions, because the entire community is considered to be in danger. There is no equivocation here. The injunction to serve is crystal clear unless the leadership has some way of being blinded by the “fog of war” even before their people enter the fray.

There is no logical way around this. Civic duty applies to everyone in the country, religious or not. Religious leaders who base their objections to their students serving on fears that their religiosity may be negatively affected, should have no worry if they did their job properly as their teachers. And as their teachers, they are also responsible for encouraging them to serve as Jewish law so clearly demands.

Former US Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis said: “What I have desired to do is to make the people realize that the most important office, and the one which all of us can and should fill, is that of private citizen. The duties of the office of private citizen cannot under a republican form of government be neglected without serious injury to the public.” Words to guide us in these challenging times for sure. May they be internalized by all of  us.