The Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet), soldiers and police have arrested 15 Hamas members in the past several weeks on suspicion of carrying out rock-throwing and Molotov cocktail attacks on Highway 443, which connects Samaria, Jerusalem, the city of Modi’in and Ben Gurion Airport.

Several of those arrested are returnees to terror, having previously been jailed for attacks against Jews. Military official said there is not only a growing trend of the “revolving door terrorists” phenomena, but that the terrorist also are improving their methods and involvement.

Israel previously has received hundreds of terrorists who signed a piece of paper promising they would behave nicely and would not return to terror.

Since then, the released prisoners who returned to their favorite occupation of terror have killed more than 120 Jews the past several years.

The IDF officer who was brought to a disciplinary trial 10 years ago for allowing his soldiers to shoot live fire at violent leftist rioters has been promoted to commander of the Shomron Brigade.

Col. Shai Kalfer, who studied at Yeshiva Shavei Hevron before enlisting in the Golani unit, will take over the brigade in the same area where his soldiers shot at rioters in December 2003 and injured lightly two protesters, one of them an American leftist.

When “demonstrators” are throwing rocks – not stones, but rocks and boulders – and metal objects at you, a normal soldier would shoot back. That is why he has a rifle.

But that is only true in the United States, Britain, France and other normal countries, without even questioning the behavior of the goon squads in Arab countries where shooting rioters is not good enough when they can be raped and tortured.

But Israel is the land of lots of Jews with the Christian view that turning the other cheek will show the enemy. Things work differently here, where the anti-Zionists must be right if they say Jews are wrong.

Partly due to the massive foreign media barrage every time a soldier raises his weapon at someone trying to injure him, he has to consult his lawyer because he is almost certain to be investigated as if he were a traitor, especially if he actually pulls the trigger.

Flashback to 2003: Kalper was a company commander in the Golani Battalion while on patrol at the anti-suicide bombing fence, AKA Apartheid Wall because it denies the rights of suicide bombers to express their frustrations at being alive and at Jews being alive.

Dozens of leftists and anarchists, who know as much about the Arab-Israel struggle as most of y’all know about the aborigine culture in Australia, pummeled Kalper and his soldiers with their favorite peaceful weapons, rocks and anything else that that is not nailed to the ground and can be thrown.

The soldiers took refuge behind their jeep and received permission to shoot at the leftists.

Kalper was hauled into a military court for violating the bleeding hearts’ laws, but the judges concluded that no criminal action was justified since the soldiers arrived at the scene without proper riot-dispersal equipment.

The file was closed, and Kalper was able to continue his military career.

The Maariv Hebrew-language newspaper wrote in 2007 wrote that he was one of the 10 most promising religious soldiers who might take the helm of the IDF as Chief of Staff in the future.

His promotion to command the Shomron Brigade is a step in that direction. The last religious officer who was brigade commander and considered to be a future candidate as the Chief of Staff was Col. Dror Weinberg, who was commander of the Hebron Brigade. He was one of 10 soldiers and officers gunned down in a Friday night ambush by Arab terrorists near the Patriarchs’ Cave in Hebron in 2002.

Maariv reported Monday that when the IDF was asked to respond to the apparently shocking promotion of a man who allowed his soldiers to defend themselves, the military replied, “This is an old incident that was concluded in a disciplinary court. The officer involved [Kalper} has fulfilled subsequent positions excellently and in our eyes could be advanced to bridge commander.”

After his yeshiva studies, Kalper enlisted at the age of 20 instead of 18, making him older than his sergeant,  and he was called “the old man” by his soldiers, who also  have called him the “greatest and most responsible fighter.” In the newspaper survey of religious officers in 2007, Kalper’s soldiers had nothing but praise for him.

It’s become clear to me that getting Haredim into the army and the workforce to “share the burden” is not and has not been about that at all, but rather, as the Haredim have been claiming all along, it’s about a war on Torah, Judaism, and observant Jews in general.

As I’ve said in the past, I think its important for Haredim to be part of the workforce, if for no other reason then to break them out of the poverty cycle. On a secondary level, I think having Haredim in the army would be good for the army, in the same way that Religious-Zionist Jews have been good for the army, for the values they bring with them that positively affect and change the organizations and environments they participate in.

And as Nachal Haredi has proven, Haredim do make very good soldiers.

So what convinced me?

The first hint is that if this really was about all citizens sharing the burden then why isn’t anyone trying to pass draconian laws forcing Israeli Arabs citizens to “share the burden” too?

But there’s a much bigger give-away.

Recently there have been virulent attacks on the Hesder system.

The Hesder system is a 5 year track which is divided between 16 months of army service and three and a half years of Torah study. Typically speaking, some Religious-Zionist students take this track as it allows them to develop their Torah studies and also serve their country. During their service, most serve in homogeneous units with other Hesder students.

After five years, the student-soldier is released from the army and allowed to go on to college and work.

Approximately 10% of Religious-Zionist students (around 750 boys) choose the Hesder track instead of the full three year army program each year. The program is actually open to any Israeli who wants to seriously learn Torah and serve. I believe it was based on the original Nachal program that combined a year and half of army service, with a year and a half of service creating new Kibbutzim.

The argument being bantered around is that it is not fair that Hesder soldier-students are not “sharing the burden” unlike other Israelis who do three full years of service, which, I guess, doing simple math would sound unfair.

But, life is hardly ever simple math, so lets look at some supporting numbers that tell a completely different story.

85% of Hesder students serve in combat units. A percent that is far above and beyond that of the general population. So when it comes to the burden they are undertaking, Hesder students are undertaking the dangerous part of that burden, unlike say, a news reader in the Army Radio unit, or an army cook who serves one week on and one week off.

And it’s no secret that Hesder students are rated as top quality combat soldiers. As Rav Eliezer Melamed has pointed out, in performance contests between units, its usually the Hesder soldiers that come in first.

10% of Hesder students go on to become commanders and officers in combat units. Officers, by the way, are required to serve 4 years.

And unlike the general population, where only around 10% of the general population shares in the reserve duty burden, the vast majority of Hesder student do decades of reserve duty in combat units, meaning those in Hesder are taking on far more than their share of the reserve duty burden.

As an aside, most Hesder students don’t make Yerida (emigrate) from Israel either.

The obvious conclusions is that if you want to produce top-notch combat soldiers, combat officers, and productive citizens, we should actually be expanding the Hesder system.

I now suspect it is exactly the statistics above that have expanded this war on religious Jews to include the Hesder program.

A Jordanian man named Yitzchak Rabin has won his 16-year-old battle to join the Israel Defense Forces.

Yitzhak Rabin Namsy, 18, earlier this week was granted Israeli citizenship and is eligible to enlist in the Israeli army.

The boy was named by his Jordanian parents in honor of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzchak Rabin, who signed a peace treaty with Jordan in 1994 and was assassinated in 1995. But the family suffered harassment in Jordan due to the name and were forced to flee to Israel, where they continue to live in exile.

Interior Minister Gideon Sa’ar personally traveled to Eilat to present the 18-year-old with his Israeli identification card, according to the Israeli newspaper Maariv.

A Knesset committee headed by Jewish Home Knesset Member Ayelet Shaked approved on Wednesday a bill that would put Haredi draft dodgers in jail but which also has galvanized Haredi leaders to prepare for all-out war.

The bill faced an immediate challenge by MK Shaked’s party colleague Moti Yogev, who called on the committee to vote on the measure a second time before it is cleared for a vote in the full Knesset.

Haredi leaders warned that they will show that if the bill becomes law, it will be impossible to enforce. Haredi anti-draft rabbis have warned that yeshiva students will overflow Israel’s jails before agreeing to don a military uniform.

Haredi Orthodox yeshiva students will face criminal charges for dodging the draft under a proposed law, after the intervention of the prime minister, Israeli media has reported.

Under the proposed military draft law, the Haredi men would be criminally charged for evading the draft, but the penalties would not go into effect until 2017, according to reports. In addition, draft orders for Haredim up to age 26 will not go into effect until up to a year after the law goes into effect.

The Shaked Committee that is preparing the draft law was set to meet Wednesday to vote on the final proposal of the bill, which will likely be brought before the full Knesset in March.

Lawmakers from the Sephardi Shas and Haredi United Torah Judaism parties have threatened to drop out of the committee.

The Tal Law, which allowed Haredi men to defer army service indefinitely, was invalidated by the Supreme Court in February 2012 and expired in August that year. Haredi yeshiva students since then have had their drafts deferred.

Soldiers in a new IDF company called “Defenders of the Negev” maintain an observant Jewish lifestyle and learn Torah while they work to protect the State of Israel.

Their service reflects an important goal of the IDF –  to help Haredi Orthodox Jews integrate into the army.

The combat soldiers, all “ultra-Orthodox Jews,” undergo six months of special training that focuses on infantry patrol, pinpoint operations and even basic lessons in Arabic that enable them to communicate with the population that lives in the area.

Throughout this process, these soldiers are able to preserve their religious lifestyle. During their basic training and course, they study religion and Jewish tradition with rabbis, just as they would in a traditional yeshiva. The soldiers regularly pray, study Torah and even have a special kitchen that prepares kosher food to an extra-high standard.

“They have everything they were accustomed to here,” explains Brig. Gen. Rafi Peretz, Chief Military Rabbi to the IDF. “Everything has remained the same, except for maybe spending the night in a sleeping bag.”

The difference between the “ultra-Orthodox” youth in the program and typical Haredi draft dodgers is that they don’t wear black hats and black suits. They are what in Israel is called “Hardal,” an acronym for Haredi national religious.

However, the IDF also has a program for Haredi black hatters to join the army and learn Torah, as some Haredi Zionists do as opposed to the masses who follow their anti-Zionist rabbis.

One of the “Hardal” soldiers is New Jersey native Eliyahu Frankel, whose father told the IDF, “He woke up one morning and decided this is what he wants to do, and we think he has been enormously successful here.”

Solder Eliyahu says, “I have been able to pray three times a day and study Torah. I decided to enlist in the IDF because I wanted to contribute to the country and protect its citizens.” He said his training has helped him “understand the other side and to stick together.”

Haredi black hats are welcome.

On Saturday, approximately 100 Arabs attacked a unit of IDF soldiers with rocks, near the town of Shaked in the Shomron.

One of the soldiers, a senior officer from the Nachal-Haredi unit, shot one of the stone throwers in the knee.

The stone thrower was evacuated for medical treatment.

Source: 0404