The Plesner committee, tasked with drawing up an alternative to the Tal Law that exempts yeshivah students from mandatory military service, is expected to submit its recommendations this week. Committee manager Aviad Friedman, a successful religious Tel Aviv businessman who begins his day with a regular Gemara shiur, states that he will do everything in his power to draft as many yeshivah bochurim as possible into the military.
I don’t believe there is hatred of chareidim today but I believe there could be a healthier Torah world. I would like to see chareidi men fill a predetermined period of military service and then return to the beis medrash. And so I accepted this position because I believe that we must bring about a fundamental change in Israeli society. We can’t run away from it anymore.
Are you really motivated by the army’s demand for additional manpower or is there some underlying intention to change the face of chareidi society?
I believe that all of us on the committee [made up of Orthodox scholars political analysts and businessmen –ed.] are disturbed by that thought. G-d forbid we’re not trying to change anyone. We want everyone who comes into the army chareidi to remain chareidi when he leaves. Second we are investing a good deal of creative thought into allowing talented talmidei chachamim to continue learning for many uninterrupted years.
On the chareidi street most people will tell you they aren’t necessarily opposed to army service ideologically but the army with its social openness is no place for a yeshivah bochur. Is the army really capable of and willing to create more units such as the air forces’ Shachar or the Kfir Brigade which are “sterile zones ” off-limits to women?
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