In tribute to this Sunday’s Yom Hazikaron — Israel’s memorial day for fallen soldiers — a lot of articles on the topic are circulating. One, by Israel National News, is titled “Families, ‘Ashamed of Haredi War Dead.’ ”
The gist of the article is that a group of hesder yeshiva students has taken the initiative to search for and map out the graves of their fellow comrades, fallen haredi soldiers, whose families buried them in civilian cemeteries, shunning military funerals at Mt. Herzl, where kaddish and other reflective ceremonies of gratitude take place to honor the fallen on Yom Hazikaron.
With their sensitive thoughtfulness in paying respects to these soldiers’ sacrifice on a national day devoted to doing so, these hesder yeshiva students’ intentions were indeed noble.
Upon first reading the article, my initial reaction was one of shock and sadness. How could families turn their back on their dead children, leaving their graves conspicuously absent of acknowledgement on such a day?
But then I had a second thought. I felt the article was misleading and disrespectful to the haredi community. A picture was painted of neglect and disrespect toward the dead. Almost, a shunning of sorts.
In fact, I am sure these families all ascend to the grave of their loved ones and observe the deceased’s yahrzeit. Just because they do not choose to observe the state’s national day of mourning for fallen soldiers does not add up to them ignoring their dead, as the article implies.
Many haredi soldiers who served along their brethren made a mental leap that their family has not necessarily made. Clearly, they chose to bury their children in civilian cemeteries. You can’t tell people how to grieve. To impose a way of remembrance on others who grieve differently can be disrespectful to the bereaved families. How they choose to remember their loved ones is what is important.
Granted, Yom Hazikaron is a day that would carry meaning for the deceased soldier himself or herself. Those who initiated this effort are doing so out of a sense of debt and to show respect, so that these soldiers’ graves do not go empty of a kaddish or remembrance on their Yom Hazikaron.
To that I say, had the effort been done privately, without fanfare of a formal military ceremony, and without denigrating the families’ way of mourning, I doubt that any family member would have an issue with fellow soldiers taking a moment to pay their respects on this day, to come by to say “thank you,” as well as to recite a kaddish at their grave, in their memory.
If anything, I would think strangers making the effort to go to this trouble would bring a touching and poignant sense of compassion and interconnectedness to a family.
The thought is noble, as is the gesture itself. However, how you go about this can make the difference between kindness and hurt.
As far as I see this topic generally, the issue of disrespect lies in the haredi community’s negative and dissociative attitude toward the Israel Defense Forces. It pains me greatly. I will never understand it.
I think is important also to emphasize the exceptions in the community. The noted, saintly, yeshiva dean and world renowned halachist and legal authority, Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach, conveyed a different message. His yeshiva was located in Bayit Vegan, the neighborhood near the IDF military cemetery on Mt. Herzl. From time to time students would come to the great rabbi to request permission to miss a day of studies in order to pay tribute to and pray at the graves of the righteous. Many of them are buried in Northern Israel, a three-hour drive away. Hence the request to miss a day of yeshiva. Rabbi Shlomo Zalman’s response? Words to this effect: “But why do you need to skip an entire day of studies? When I go to visit the graves of the righteous it is not a day’s task, as their graves are right here in the neighborhood, around the corner on Mt. Herzl.”
Respect cuts both ways.The community that identifies with and is grateful to the soldiers of the IDF needs to finetune its respect toward the haredi soldiers and their families, too. Doing so should be a matter of principle and ethics, but especially now, when the topic of the draft of the haredi community’s youth is so simmering and sensitive, it is a matter of wisdom as well.
In truth, no distinction should really be made between any of the fallen soldiers, religious or secular. It really doesn’t matter. Like Rav Shlomo Zalman said, every single one of them who fell in battle protecting the Jewish people and the land of Israel is now in one of the kivrei tzaddikim, the graves of the righteous. As the sun sets this Sunday evening, we remember them all.
Yehai zichram baruch. May their memory be for a blessing.
Copyright © 2014 by the Intermountain Jewish News
