BS"D
Combating Jew-Hatred Starts At "Home:"
The Israeli Army Continues to Persecute Olga Shamilov and Many Other Women Resisting the Female Draft
21 Adar, 5781 °° Parshas Kee-Sissah / Parah °° March 5, '21
By Binyomin Feinberg
Olga
Shamilov is an Israeli "Ba'alas Teshuva," a young woman who has
rediscovered her Jewish roots. Her plight exemplifies the predicaments
in which increasing numbers of religious Israeli girls find themselves
lately, vis-a-vis the Army Draft Office. As fully dedicated to
observance of Torah Law, Miss Shamilov has been resolutely
fulfilling the Torah obligations to resist enlistment in the Israeli
Army. According to all leading Torah authorities, from across the
spectrum, women and girls are prohibited from enlisting in the
[notoriously promiscuous] Israeli military. For over 16 months, since
her draft date on Oct. 27, 2019, she's been braving the threat of arrest
and military incarceration.
° Background:
Miss Shamilov's story first broke in The Jewish Press, on Nov.15, '19 (p.17):
"...
In related news, Olga Samilov, an 18-year-old ba'alas teshuva, reports
that she was denied her religious exemption despite properly following
procedures, at an August 14 (2019) hearing at the Tel HaShomer Draft
Office. The officer reportedly told her that the army decided not to
provide her an exemption, without providing any legal rationale or
pretext. Consequently, she was given a draft-date of October 27
(2019). She refused to enlist, and thus lives daily under the threat of
imminent arrest. Is she being discriminated against because she's a
ba'alas teshuvah without a support system?"
More
recently, during Chanukah, on Teves 2 (Dec. 17, '20), the Army sent her
a letter threatening her with arrest, claiming that she has been
"criminally absent" from the Army since her October 2019 draft date.
Consequently "... an arrest warrant has been issued against you," and
"delivered to civil and military police," the missive intones. The
letter proceeds to order Miss Shamilov to comply with Draft Authorities,
and give herself in - and bring along two weeks of provisions (for a
punitive stint in military prison?).
Consequently,
this young lady never knows what the next knock on the door may bring.
Israeli military police have been known to arrest and drag such girls
from their homes at 2:30AM. It's hard to accurately convey how it
actually feels to live like that for even one day, much less for months
on end. Ironically, in the country which markets itself to the free
world as the "Jewish" State - and ostensibly a "home" for Jews fleeing
religious persecution around the world - this female religious refusenik
is being persecuted for her very fidelity to her Jewish Faith.
In addition, the Israeli Army is doing all of this without a legal pretext. It's clear from military court documentation that Miss
Shamilov is indisputably religious, thus should qualify for an
automatic religious exemption. Even the Army Draft Office has no basis
to even question that. Furthermore, she properly followed procedures in
filing for her religious exemption. Specifically, she obtained her
Tatzhir Dat (certification of religiosity) via a Bais Din (religious
court), and properly submitted it to the Tel HaShomer Draft Office. She
was subsequently summoned to a Rayon Dat (a "religiosity interview"). On
Nov.19, '18, well over two years ago, she met the Army draft officers
(being uninformed of the halachic and practical objections to
submitting to these dangerous IDF religiosity interrogations). She
answered the questions properly. She was nevertheless denied her
religious exemption, without a rudimentary veneer of justification.
In
fact, the female Army interrogator in one such interrogation had so
little of substance to say that she was reduced to arguing that Miss Shamilov should
enlist because she [the officer] herself ostensibly hadn't encountered
anything in her own experience as an Army officer that contravened her
own values. (That draft officer apparently identifies with one of the
untraditional, leftwing national-religious factions.) In a polite but
firm manner, Miss Shamilov responded, conveying that her
own religious values diverge from those of her Army interrogator,
replying along the lines of: "I differ from you inasmuch as I strive to
constantly surpass whatever I have already attained."
Indeed,
the insistence on constant spiritual growth lies at the essence of
Judaism. Absence of that drive is the hallmark of the spiritual decay
that is central to movements that subvert Orthodoxy from within. We can
only pray that Miss Shamilov's ostensibly religious interrogator will one day recognize the wisdom of the response she evoked on that day.
° The IDF denial of Miss Shamilov's legal
entitlement to a religious military service exemption is not only
blatantly illegal - it's also discriminatory abuse against her as a
religious girl/woman. There is term commonly employed to refer to that
type of discriminatory misconduct: "antisemitism." A more accurate term
is "Jew Hatred" ("Sin'as Yisroel"). This form thereof, however, is
Sin'as Yisroel of the worst type. This is spiritual Jew-hatred -
discriminatory persecution of a girl for her faithfulness to Torah.
°
Worse, this is "spiritual antisemitism" employed in a manner
threatening to terrorize hundreds of other religious girls into forgoing
the battle over their religious exemptions, and enlisting into the
Israeli Army, in clear violation of Torah Law. This is the very
military where, according to Israeli government statistics, religious
girls are far more likely to lose their Judaism than maintain it, as
recently reported in several pro-Israel venues, e.g. "Matzav HaRu'ach,"
(Feb.4), and the most recent newsletter of the religious zionist
organization "Chotam" (Feb. 28 / Adar). For more information, Chotam
provided the following links. [Note, as with third party links in
general, we provide them for documentation and research purposes, but
cannot take responsibility for their contact.]
°°°
°
It's also noteworthy that the Israeli Army seems to feel comfortable
enough about their management of the otherwise totally out-of-control
Corona plague to seek to enlist women, whom they do not need for any
legitimate military purposes.
° For those wishing to daven for her, her Hebrew name is Olga bas Soroh Shirah.
°°°
The blatant injustice being perpetrated against Olga Shamilov (cf. "Ongoing IDF Anti-religious Hate Under Corona" https://daattorah.blogspot.com/2020/04/ongoing-idf-antireligious-hate-under.html)
is by no means rare. Many, many brave individuals like her - including
other long-time female refuseniks - continue to endure harassment, and
even persecution for their Jewish Faith. The following are just a few
known examples of young Israeli women facing the specter of imminent
arrest and imprisonment in military jail:
»» Ziva bas Mazal M.:
A
religious Ethiopian refusenik, from a religious family encumbered by
serious illness of one of her parents, Miss M. braved three weeks of
military incarceration in Sept. and Oct. 2019 over her devotion to the
Torah prohibition against enlistment in the Army. Her ongoing antireligious persecution by the Israeli military was reported in The Jewish Press on Sept. 27,'19 / Parshas Nitzovim, 5779 (p.105), Jan.17, '20 (p.80), and June 26, '20 (p.18), and here: https://daattorah.blogspot.com/2020/01/religious-persecution-of-ethiopian-girl.html; https://daattorah.blogspot.com/2019/10/racial-profiling-or-pure-antireligious.html; https://daattorah.blogspot.com/2019/10/making-racism-great-again.html; https://firstamendmentactivist.blogspot.com/2020/06/Israeli-Black-Lives-Matter-Too.html.
Miss M. remains without a religious exemption, and could potentially
be arrested at any time, and face extended jail time, if the Israeli
government opts to again put their international reputation at further
risk.
»» Tadalah bas Mantjavush:
»» Shuly bas R.:
»» Hodoyah bas Leemor:
Her
plight accentuates Israeli Army's Corona hypocrisy. The Israeli
government tends to take a hard line against those religious Jews who
violate Corona restrictions, rules of debated efficacy. On the other
hand, when it comes to drafting every religious girl they can get, the
Army and Draft Office sometimes act as if Corona doesn't exist.
» There are many more girls and women suffering Israeli Army persecution in silence.
» Additionally, there are many, many more who aren't at that stage of threat of arrest - yet. A few examples include:
Anna bas Miriam,
Loren bas Miriam,
Sapir Soroh bas Bellah,17;
Shilat bas Ester,17.
»
That's not to mention all of those teens and young women being duped
or goaded into willingly enlisting, by the Army - or by what some deem
to be its "plausible-deniability" agent (or its "surrogate enlistment
and trafficking" arm, if you will), the government-funded leftwing
organization "Aluma."
And all of this is being advanced under an ostensibly rightwing Prime Minister, Mr. Netanyahu.
These
are real-life examples of the aforementioned righteous individuals.
These are individuals confronting formidable, often seemingly
insurmountable odds, and ultimately prevailing. We need them -- far
more than they need us. They serve as our shlichim ("agents"). By
standing in their defense, we can hope to share, in some measure, in
their unimaginable merit, in both this world and the next. And we need
their merits now, perhaps more than ever before.
The
following insights of HaRav Shamshon Refoel Hirsch OB"M, the
world-renowned leader of (C E.) 1800's German Jewry, regarding Pinchos,
are ever relevant to us, especially now:
"... And if
someone, like Phinehas, is one among a multitude and every man is
against him when he dares to speak out for truth and to fight for the
Law - the more lonely his stand, the greater the number of his
adversaries, the more powerful is his word, the mightier his deed. He is
the savior of those against whom he struggles, a priest of atonement
for those who stand by in silence, for he accomplishes what they should
all have accomplished. Though every man be against him and he stand
alone, yet G-d's covenant is with him and allows not his word to be lost
or his deeds to vanish without trace."
A page earlier, Rav Hirsch explains:
"As
long as even one man has the courage to take up the struggle openly for
G-d's cause - which is no less than the cause of man's future - it is
not lost on earth and the intervention of DIVINE JUDGEMENT* is not
required. He (Pinchos -Ed.) had demonstrated for all time that whenever
the sanctity of G-d and His Law is being mocked and trampled on
(Chillul HaShem), EVERY* other consideration must give way."
{* emphasis absent in original}
(printed
in "Judaism Eternal," translation by Dayan Dr. I Grunfeld, vol.2, p.
293 (Soncino Publ., London, 1956)), in an essay at.the end of the volume
entitled "Pinchus ("Phinehas") - Eliyahu")
°°°
Deriving Inspiration from Current Tribulations:
One
of the many lessons that the ongoing Coronavirus plague accentuates is
the power of one individual to change the world. We see how even a
single infected person can spread a highly contagious disease -
globally. The last Mishna in Makkos instructs us that "Midah Tovah
Merubah," Divine Beneficence by far surpasses Divine Retribution, by a
scale of one to 500. If one person can potentially do so much harm,
imagine how much GOOD could he or she could do.
In
physical matters we see this phenomenon clearly, and specifically in
regard to Corona. Of course this plague was declared in Heaven. However,
from an earthly perspective, al-pi teva, imagine how differently things
could have been if the individual Chinese doctor who posted an early
warning about the Coronavirus outbreak would have been properly heeded,
rather than hounded by the Chinese Communists? One fearless sentinel, if
heeded, could have saved the entire world from this plague. In
spiritual matters, the potential of an upright individual is arguably
far greater. Just consider the Avos. Avrohom Avinu spearheaded a global
theological revolution, turning over the world, away from pagan
endarkenment, towards authentic Monotheism.
Of the many
positive lessons we can learn from this devastating plague, this is one.
This is not to assert that this is necessarily one of the reasons for
which we are being punished. However, it's clearly one crucial moral
lesson we can derive.
° In the
wake of the Corona magaifah (plague), most of us have experiencing
"Bidud," solitary confinement, to one degree or another. But, as readers
of these posts and columns know, we're not the first ones to experience
such isolation. For many months, we've been reporting on numerous
Israeli military draft Refuseniks, in incarceration, and sometimes
punished with solitary confinement. But how many of us really paid
enough serious attention to their plight, serious enough to do something
meaningful? Does it not behoove us to take their plight to heart,
which we clearly should have been doing long before the term COVID was
coined? Many would see this as fitting the "Middah Keneged Middah"
("measure for measure") profile delineated by Rashi on Brochos 5a
("Pish'paish") and Ru'ach Chaim on Pirkei Avos (4:14). Moreover, even if
it doesn't fit that criteria, fulfilling our individual and communal
obligations to these self-sacrificing individuals is something
undeniably incumbent on us, regardless.
Unfortunately,
instead of focusing on standing by those standing between Jewish girls
and massive immoral and antireligious persecution by the Israeli Army,
some of us are allowing ourselves to be largely distracted with Corona
related issues, as important as some of them are. This must change if we
are to save the next generation of Jewish mothers from an open
declaration of spiritual war being waged by the Israeli government and
military establishment. We cannot continue to abandon those standing
strong against the ever- escalating drafting of girls, and increasingly
religious girls. We can expect one result from such ongoing
obliviousness to their plight: an intensification of our own R"L.
And
we can surely perform far better than we are. Moreover, in recent
months, Israeli media [e.g. Ynet] has been reporting multiple stories on
the ongoing Army crusade against religious girls in particular. Chotam,
an Israeli, rightwing Mizrachi-type organization, has been active in
publicizing these reports. We thus have more than ample material to
substantiate our claims. Right now, concered individuals have
unprecedented opportunities to expose the sheer evil of the Israeli Army
crusade against the next generation of Jewish mothers. "Middah Tovah
Merubah;" there is so much we could accomplish by simply publicizing the
multitude of relevant news reports coming out of Israel, as widely as
possible.
It's in the merit of righteous women
that the Final Redemption will arrive (Sefer Kav HaYashar 82). We now
have an enviable opportunity to share in that indescribable merit. How
could we ever live with ourselves knowing what we willingly passed up?
