Fast Draw – Hasidic Jews in the IDF

This post is also available in: עברית (Hebrew)

I’ll make it simple. In Israel secular Jews serve in the Army and Hasidic Jews – referred to locally as Haredi Jews – don’t. People have wanted this fixed for ages. It’s time for everyone to equally share the burden of security service. This website focuses on defense – usually technologies, but they also require someone to operate them.

Haredi integration into military and national service was mentioned in the past. Many ideas exist and there are places where these people, who mostly study Torah under the IDF’s protection, can prove useful. So the army made plans, everything seemed to be on the right track. A respected committee of experts created a long-term plan.

Then, yesterday, the Shaked committee made its decisions and tore down every previous achievement. Disregarding all earlier decisions, the committee replaced them with its own. It could have been alright if the decisions were made for the right reasons, but the reasons were very wrong – narrow political considerations took priority over national security.

These politicians have no shame. They can’t see beyond their own little political bubbles, stretching from the general assembly to subcommittee discussion rooms. Cynicism won again yesterday, and national security lost.

iHLS – Israel Homeland Security

The IDF still hasn’t made any official statements on the matter, but there’s a lot of anger behind the scenes. Even Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon will probably ask for another hearing on the matter. So far it all makes sense – proposals and counter-proposals, that’s democracy. The problem is security is very low on Knesset members’ list of priorities. They’d rather focus on their own political survival.

This website reviews all the technological and conceptual efforts made to protect this country from the rising threats it faces. Knesset members, meanwhile, act as if we live in Switzerland. We don’t. It’s time Knesset members realized even political survival, as a priority, has its limits.

If they won’t we may all have to pay the price. Instead of dealing with home front preparedness for emergencies they keep focusing on the worst kind of political survival.