Responsibility Must Work Both Ways

Chareidi enlistment requires courage from the Chareidi community — and trustworthiness from the IDF

Two recent stories present both the promise and the danger surrounding efforts to increase Chareidi military service.

The first is genuinely encouraging. Chareidi recruits arriving at the Tel Hashomer induction center spoke openly about their desire to serve while remaining committed to their religious identity.

One young man said that he had waited and worked hard for the opportunity to enlist. Another explained that he would keep his black kippah and peyos because that is who he is. A father spoke emotionally about bringing his firstborn son to serve in a combat role in the Chashmonaim Brigade. Another family member expressed the principle that many of us have long advocated: those genuinely engaged in full-time Torah learning should be protected, while those who are not learning full-time should serve.

These recruits are not leaving the Torah world. They want to serve as members of it—and to return from their service knowing that they still have an honored place within it

These recruits are not leaving the Torah world. They want to serve as members of it—and to return from their service knowing that they still have an honored place within it.

Moti Leitner, chairman of HaTzibbur HaCharedi, was at Tel Hashomer that morning to accompany and encourage the recruits entering combat tracks. His presence conveyed something these young men have rarely heard from Chareidi political representatives: that they deserve pride rather than embarrassment.

“The days when the political leadership was ashamed of you are over,” Leitner told them. “We are proud of you, and we deeply appreciate you.”

That message matters almost as much as the creation of suitable military frameworks. Chareidi recruits need more than assurances that they can remain religious while serving. They need to know what will happen when they come home. Will they be treated as young men who abandoned the community, or as Chareidim who accepted a difficult responsibility on behalf of Klal Yisrael?

Leitner was assuring them that many Chareidim are proud of them and intend to welcome them back with honor. Their service should not cost them their standing in the Chareidi world. On the contrary, serving while preserving their identity should earn the gratitude and respect of the community they never wished to leave.

We will not be ashamed of you. When your service ends, you will still have a home among us

At almost the same time, however, a very different story emerged from Givati’s Rotem Battalion. Sixteen religious soldiers were reportedly punished after refusing to participate in an operational activity inside an armored vehicle with a female paramedic. Five Hesder students received ten-day prison sentences, while eleven other soldiers received shorter terms of confinement.

It is important to state the facts accurately. Rotem is not a Chareidi battalion, and the soldiers involved were Hesder students rather than Chareidi recruits. Nevertheless, what happens to religious soldiers elsewhere in the IDF will inevitably influence whether Chareidi families believe the army’s promises.

The published accounts present sharply conflicting versions of the incident. The soldiers and their supporters contend that arrangements protecting their religious standards were violated. The IDF says the activity was operationally urgent, that the brigade rabbi approved it, and that the soldiers’ refusal resulted in the cancellation of the mission.

Those are significant factual differences. Without access to the full investigation, I am not prepared to declare that the commanders were pursuing an anti-religious agenda. Nor can I simply assume that every decision described as an operational necessity was unavoidable.

In combat, circumstances arise that cannot be managed according to ideal peacetime arrangements. Saving lives and carrying out an urgent mission may require soldiers to work alongside people they would not ordinarily encounter in their preferred religious framework. A female paramedic needed for an operation is not an ideological provocation. She is a medical professional performing an essential task.

At the same time, religious soldiers are entitled to expect that commitments made to them will be honored whenever operational circumstances permit. If agreed religious arrangements can be set aside casually—or if soldiers reasonably come to believe that commanders regard those arrangements with contempt—the consequences will extend far beyond a single platoon.

Chareidi recruitment depends upon trust.

Parents sending a son into a Chareidi military framework are not merely worried about whether he will receive kosher food or enough time to daven. They fear that the environment may gradually separate him from the religious identity, community, and way of life in which he was raised. Some of these fears are exaggerated by people ideologically opposed to all enlistment. But that does not make every concern imaginary.

The IDF cannot ask Chareidi parents to ignore everything they have heard and simply trust that matters will work out. It must earn their confidence through clear and enforceable rules, the careful selection of commanders, meaningful rabbinic supervision, and an effective process for addressing violations. A designated Chareidi framework must remain genuinely Chareidi rather than serving as a recruitment device whose standards slowly disappear after the soldiers have enlisted.

This does not mean that soldiers can dictate operational decisions or refuse orders whenever they are uncomfortable. No army could function that way. It means that commanders must distinguish between genuine operational necessity and avoidable disregard for religious commitments. When disputes arise, the facts should be investigated transparently rather than buried beneath slogans from either side.

The Chareidi community faces a corresponding obligation. It cannot seize upon every difficult incident as proof that no Chareidi man can ever serve. If every operational exception becomes an excuse for rejecting every military framework, no accommodation the army offers will ever be sufficient. Absolute guarantees are impossible in military service, just as they are impossible in hospitals, emergency services, or many other areas of adult life.

The real question is whether the army is making a sincere and sustained effort to protect religious observance—not whether it can guarantee that a soldier will never confront an unexpected or religiously complicated situation.

Nor can the Chareidi leadership continue condemning the army wholesale while refusing to participate constructively in designing better arrangements. If it genuinely fears for the religious lives of Chareidi soldiers, it should help establish appropriate units, enforce standards, provide suitable rabbinic guidance, and intervene when commitments are violated.

Total rejection may preserve ideological purity, but it does nothing for Chareidi men already serving or for those who believe they should.

This is why the scene at Tel Hashomer was so significant. The recruits were taking a risk in more than the ordinary military sense. They were defying intense communal pressure and entering an institution they had often been taught to fear. They were trusting the army not to force them to choose between service and religious commitment, while hoping their own community would not reject them for the decision they had made.

Leitner’s embrace of the recruits therefore represented more than a political photo opportunity. It was a promise: You are not alone. We will not be ashamed of you. When your service ends, you will still have a home among us.

That is one of the most important roles HaTzibbur HaCharedi can play. It can help create a respected place within Chareidi society for those who serve—not only before enlistment, when encouragement is needed, but afterward, when they return to build families and futures within the community.

For decades, young men considering service have heard warnings about everything they might lose: their religious standards, their social standing, their marriage prospects, and sometimes even their relationships with their families. If Chareidi enlistment is ever to grow substantially, these young men must hear another message from within the community itself. They must be told that responsible service, performed in an appropriate framework, does not make them less Chareidi.

The IDF must deliver the corresponding message through its conduct. It must show recruits and their families that religious protections are not public-relations language offered during recruitment and forgotten afterward. The army will sometimes face genuine operational conflicts, and religious soldiers will sometimes be required to accept conditions they would not have chosen. But those exceptions must remain exceptions, and they must be handled with sensitivity and honesty.

Those who oppose all Chareidi enlistment will use every disputed incident to argue that the army cannot be trusted. Some will make that argument regardless of the facts. The IDF should not strengthen their case by appearing indifferent to legitimate religious concerns.

At the same time, those of us advocating greater Chareidi participation must be equally honest. We should not minimize real failures, assume the army is always correct, or dismiss every religious complaint as extremist propaganda. If we want Chareidi families to trust appropriate military frameworks, we must be among the first to insist that the promised protections are meaningful.

There will be no solution if only one side is expected to change. The Chareidi community must recognize that men who are not genuinely learning full-time have a responsibility to participate in the defense and wellbeing of the country. The IDF must recognize that successful integration does not require erasing the identity of the people it seeks to enlist.

There will be no solution if only one side is expected to change. Responsibility cannot be demanded from the Chareidi community alone. It must work both ways

The young men at Tel Hashomer demonstrate that Chareidi service is possible. The controversy in Rotem demonstrates how easily confidence can be damaged when religious soldiers believe their commitments have not been respected. Both stories deserve to be taken seriously, without exaggerating either one.

Together, they point toward the only workable path: service joined with religious protection, obligation joined with accommodation, and courage answered by trustworthiness. Responsibility cannot be demanded from the Chareidi community alone. It must work both ways.