Only in Israel: About 20,000 Attend Funeral of Sean Carmeli, HaYa"D, Lone Soldier

Sean Carmeli, HaYa"D

cross-posted on me-ander

Yesterday morning we read about the lone soldier from the small Texas town nobody had ever heard of who had been killed in Gaza trying to destroy the Hamas terror infrastructure, Sean Carmeli. Later in the day, emails and facebook messages kept arriving in Hebrew and in English asking that people come to his funeral.

Israel values all of its soldiers; they are our children. Israeli kids are raised knowing that after high school they will be drafted. (I'm not getting into the chareidi draft issue here.) Religious girls frequently take the option to do Sherut Le'umi, National Service and volunteer in all sorts of places, schools, hospitals, memorials etc. Young men who are exempt for various medical reasons quite often petition the IDF to be accepted as official soldier volunteers and get positions suitable for them.

And then there are the new immigrants and foreign IDF volunteers who come to Israel either just to serve or knowing that their choice to be Israeli means that they will be drafted and serve in the army without a mother waiting at home to do their laundry and make sure there's hot food for them. They are the true idealists, and Sean Carmeli was one of them.

When an Israeli born and raised IDF soldier is killed, his funeral is attended by his family, childhood friends of all members, fellow students and those from the neighborhood and more. Funerals here for whomever, no matter what the reason of death, are usually humongous. Here in Shiloh, a small funeral, quickly arranged on a Friday before Shabbat can have a minimum of fifty to a hundred people, and the larger more public funerals, like the triple one for the three teenagers murdered by Arab terrorists a few weeks ago are attended by hundreds of thousands. Compare that to a very recent funeral in New Jersey for a policeman killed, Fallen Jersey City Police Detective Melvin Santiago laid to rest.

JERSEY CITY - The Jersey City police officer who was shot and killed while responding to a report of an armed robbery was laid to rest today.
Hundreds of police officers from around New Jersey and surrounding states came to St. Aloysius Church to pay their final respects to Melvin Santiago. 

IDF Staff Sgt. Sean Carmeli was laid to rest accompanied, honored by about 20,000 people.

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HaMakom yenachem...
May G-d comfort his family and friends

What Disturbs Me The Most About The New Israeli Government Coalition

There isn't yet a festive photo of the crew, that exclusive new club, THE ISRAELI CABINET MINISTERS.  But the Jerusalem Post describes the results of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's wily ego shuffling.  It's like trying to fit the contents of a mansion into a small apartment.  I'm copy/pasting the most important parts of that article:

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu late on Sunday night appointed Yuval Steinitz as Minister of International Relations and Silvan Shalom as Energy and Water Minister, resolving feuding over portfolios in a series of late-night meetings with Likud MKs, Army Radio reported.
Shalom is to also maintain his role as Minister of the Development of the Negev and Galilee and Regional Cooperation, Army Radio reported. Shalom will also be a member of the ministerial committee in charge of the negotiations with the Palestinian Authority.
In negotiations earlier on Sunday, the prime minister appointed Moshe Ya'alon Defense Minister.
Likud's Danny Danon will serve as Deputy Defense Minister.
Gideon Sa'ar will become Interior Minister, as expected. He said on his way out of his meeting with Netanyahu that he plans to bring reforms to the ministry, as he did as Education Minister.
Gilad Erdan received the Home Front Security and Communications portfolios, with a few extra responsibilities.
Erdan, who was considered a candidate to replace Ambassador to the US Michael Oren, will be responsible for the strategic relationship with the US. The position essentially means he is in charge of strategic dialogs with the US twice a year. In addition, he will be a member of the security cabinet, along with Netanyahu, Ya'alon, Yesh Atid leader Yair Lapid, Bayit Yehudi leader Naftali Bennett and Hatnua leader Tzipi Livni.
The Communications Ministry will be expanded to include the Israel Broadcast Agency and the Government Publications Bureau.
As planned, Bennett will be Economy and Trade Minister, Uri Ariel will be Housing and Construction Minister, Uri Orbach received the Pensioners’ Affairs portfolio, and Rabbi Eli Ben Dahan will be Deputy Minister of Religious Affairs.
Nissan Slomiansky, who was an MK for over 10 years, will be chairman of the powerful Knesset Finance Committee, and Avi Wortzman, former deputy mayor of Beersheba, will be Deputy Education Minister.

I don't know if anyone's happy, at least not in the Likud and Yisrael Beitenu parties.  There weren't too many pickings left over after Bibi handed out the goodies to Livni, Lapid and Bennett.

There's something that really bothers me about this coalition.  I felt it in my kishkes, and I had trouble saying what it really is.  Then I saw the latest Dry Bones, which put my feelings in clearer terms, not that Ya'akov says it in his cartoon.

Dry Bones

There's something inherently undemocratic in a government coalition which aims to change the lives of a large and growing sector of the country/society while refusing them the rights to join the coalition and help draft the laws to make the changes just and possible.

Yes, I'm referring to the forcing of chareidim to be drafted into the IDF.

Now please get me right.  I am not in favor of their (chareidi) universal policy idealizing a life a just learning Torah.  I don't see it as Jewish.  It's not.  It's more like the Christian monasteries and nunneries with the crucial difference that the chareidim marry and are encourage to have lots of children.  It's also a Christian, not Jewish, belief that "men of the cloth" shouldn't bear arms, serve in armies etc.

But I don't think its just nor moral for some sectors of society to try to legislate major changes in the lives of others.  It unfortunately smacks of the early days of the State of Israel when religious immigrant children were sent to secular Aliyat Hanoar schools and worse.

The making of changes must be done gradually and with the cooperation of the affected sector of society.  That means the the only fair, just and democratic way to increase the draft of charedim must be done with their cooperation.  In recent years more chareidim have joined the army, and more chareidim are studying key secular subjects and professions and working.  This will take time. 

Blocking chareidim from the government coalition means that the government will seem like (or actually be) a dictatorship, rather than a democracy.

Netanyahu, Lapid, Bennett and Livni are making a big immoral and undemocratic mistake.

Some Truth About the IDF, Religious and Secular Leftist Soldiers etc.

No doubt that there will be those claiming that they can prove the opposite, but...
I'm going to start by suggesting you read Our Shiputzim's fact-filled post about religious life (aka Orthodox Judaism) in the IDF-Israeli Defense Forces.

As I have mentioned several times, YZG and I are the very proud parents of a hesder yeshiva student/soldier, and thus, you won’t be surprised to hear that I firmly believe that hesder is the ideal answer to this issue...
MYTH: The IDF has it in for religious soldiers.
FACT: Not only does the army go out of its way to make sure that religious soldiers are given sufficient time to daven three times a day and to bench after every meal, but consider the following true stories:

Our Shiputzim continues the post with a list of true stories from the IDF of today.  I stress that it's today's IDF and not even the time that my sons served.  Real change comes slowly, and even if the Knesset passes a law to draft everyone, it will take quite a while for this to be useful and efficient and the best for Israeli security and social  needs.

Even thirty years ago, when I was the English Public Relations for Yeshivat Hesder Shiloh, our soldiers were being assigned to the Tzanchanim, Paratroopers.  The IDF's bottom line has always been practical, and practical means talking advantage of the most dedicated and motivated soldiers to give them the most challenging and difficult army positions.

Yes, there has always been a concept of חייב לעבור chayav la'avor, "must pass," aka protexia, that sons or grandsons of certain people have an easier time getting into some units, but push comes to shove and those same units are sociologically very different today than they had been ten, twenty and certainly more than a generation ago.

The children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren of Israel's Leftist secular "elite" now request desk jobs, not to be in the risky paratroopers or Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's Sayeret Matkal. 

The General Staff Elite ('Sayeret Matkal') is considered the best combat unit in the IDF, and one of the best Special Forces units in the world; a unit where the word 'professionalism' represents a way of life.
The warriors of the unit are selected with the utmost care, through rigorous tests and physical trials. The warriors specialize in commando operations and scouting (-including navigation and operation of a vast range of vehicles). In this unit, the most technologically advanced equipment that the IDF has at its disposal is put to use. The unit even has certain equipment that it alone uses.

Those troops, which were once a bastion of Israeli secularism now also have a large percentage of soldiers from religious families.  The IDF reflects Israeli society, and just like when we first made aliyah, came to live in Israel, over forty years ago we rarely saw obviously religious bus drivers and policemen, now not only do we see lots of dati le'uimi, national religious men, and even women sometimes, in those sorts of jobs, you can also see those who appear chareidi.

Yes, again I must say that Israel has changed and army, IDF, is pragmatic.  Those in charge may not have always expected to see strongly religious soldiers in certain positions and they certainly didn't expect so many soldiers to take time off to pray and insist on strictly kosher food and a succa on Succot, but they are pragmatic. They know that they must have the most sincere and dedicated and patriotic in critical positions and units.

It may have made for good "campaign promises" when party leaders like newbies Yair Lapid and Naftali Bennett promised change in the army and immediate forced draft of chareidim (in Lapid's case,) but forcing someone to be a soldier isn't good for the army.  It doesn't matter if he's extremely religious or extremely Leftist, the results are bad for the security of the country.

... forcing someone to be a soldier isn't good for the army. It doesn't matter if he's extremely religious or extremely Leftist, the results are bad for the security of the country.

That's the bottom line.  The IDF is changing with the socio-religious composition of the army,of its soldiers, and that's the way it should be.