Rabbi Eliezer MelamedHa'aretz
The head of the Har Bracha Yeshiva, Rabbi Eliezer Melamed, has written in a book distributed to all graduates of his yeshiva that soldiers are not allowed to participate in evacuating settlements. The book also accused senior Israel Defense Forces officers of being "contaminated by politics."
[Removing Israeli settlers from living on confiscated Palestinian land is actually required by international law and, in some cases, also by Israeli law.]
His statements have received renewed attention in light of Monday's protest by six soldiers of the Kfir Brigade.
...The prime minister, defense minister and IDF chief of staff all condemned the soldiers' action, as did the Association of Hesder Yeshivas.
...The incident caused some senior army officers to reiterate their call for removing two extremist yeshivas in the northern West Bank ...from the hesder program, which allows soldiers to combine Torah study with shortened army service. Some of the soldiers involved in this incident came from those yeshivas.
...An extremist right-wing group calling itself the Organization for Saving the Nation and the Land has already announced that it will pay each soldier NIS 1,000 for every day they spend in military prison.
IDF sources said that in both incidents, the soldiers were egged on and abetted by right-wing activists from outside the army... Both yeshivas are located in settlements in the Nablus area.
The book published by Rabbi Melamed of Har Bracha was entitled "Revivim." In it, he offered answers to halakhic questions pertaining to "nation, land, army."
..."A simple halakha [Jewish law] is that it is forbidden for any person, whether a soldier or an officer ... to participate in the strictly forbidden act of expelling Jews from their homes and handing over any portion of the Land of Israel to enemies," he wrote. "Those who violate this violate several commandments of the Torah ... Full story
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