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Religious Divide Growing In Israel's Army

By Howard M. Friedman

Today's New York Times carries an article titled A Religious War In Israel's Army. It focuses on the growing influence of religious nationalists, many from the settler movement, in an Army that has traditionally been dominated by secular kibbutzniks. Many officers in the elite Golani Brigade are graduates of right-wing military preparatory academies. One soldier says that during the Gaza operation, the rabbinate distributed literature suggesting that the Army was engaged in a religious war against non-Jews for the holy land. Presently the military's chief rabbi, Brig. Gen. Avichai Rontzki, is a West Bank settler. Philosophy professor Moshe Halbertal, a member of the religious left and co-author of the military code of ethics, says that the debate in Israel is not just between religious and secular Jews, but also among religious Jews. It centers on the sanctity of land versus life; the relationship between messianism and Zionism; and the place of non-Jews in a sovereign Jewish state. (See prior related posting.)

Full post as published by Religion Clause on March 22, 2009 (boomark / email).