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In Parsha Matos, Sh’vatim Gad and Reuven approached Moshe Rabbeinu regarding their desire to graze their flocks and settle their families on the East side of the Yarden. To this, Moshe Rabbeinu replied, “Shall your brothers go off to war, and shall you sit here?” (Sefer Bamidbar, Perek 32, posuk 6)
Moshe was quite angry at the two Sh’vatim. He was concerned lest Gad and Reuven would avoid taking part in the wars for Eretz Yisrael, that other Sh’vatim might follow suit and B’nai Yisrael might be condemned to wandering in the desert another 40 years.
There are those commentators who hold that the hearts of Gad and Reuven were in the right place and that they had every intention, of their own volition, of taking part in the wars and, in fact, preceeding the rest of B’nai Israel into battle.
There were other commentators who viewed the desire of Gad and Reuven to settle on the East side of the Yarden as representing greed, a secular approach to Eretz Yisrael and a tendency toward separatism vs. communal responsibility.
Regarding Moshe Rabbeinu’s response to the pledge of Sh’vatim Gad and Reuven to fight in the upcoming war; “then you shall be vindicated from Hashem and from Israel,” Rabbi Artscroll cites Yoma (38a) on Perek 32, posuk 22;
It is not enough for one to know that one’s actions are proper in Hashem’s eyes. One must also act in such a way as to not engender suspicion on the part of human beings.
But, the most poignant explanation of the situation comes from the Tiferet Yehonatan who is quoted in the sefer “Torah Gems” where he states, on “Shall your brothers go off to war, and shall you sit here?”;
“‘…When your enemies attack Israel — you shall sit here’ — you will remain in peace in whatever country you are living in? Do not think so for an instant, because a war in defense of Israel is a war for the survival of the entire Jewish people whereever they are.'” (Torah Gems, Aharon Yaakov Greenberg, Parsha Matos, page 156.)
This explanation is as poignant now; nearly three years after the expulsion from Gush Katif and the Shomron and as the chickens of “disengagement” come home to roost despite whatever spin Olmert, Ramon, Bibi, Peres, etc. may have put on subsequent events in Gaza. The poignancy of the above citing comes into clearer focus in that the Sharon/Olmert regimes, who stole everything from the Gush Katif residents, stand in continuous, direct, blatant violation of the very laws they forced through Knesset regarding compensation and resettlement of the people that they expelled.
Now, nearly 3 years later, the former Arab workers, who lost their jobs because the Jewish businesses they worked for were forcibly put out of business by the regime’s expulsion of Jews, have sued their former employers for “wrongful dismissal” and the Olmert regime responds telling the former Gush Katif residents that the Arab claims are “your problem.”
The rockets, mortars, sniping attacks on Sderot, Ashkelon and other Negev locations continue despite a bogus ceasefire and as Hezbollah rearms in the North to levels far exceeding even pre-2006 war levels.
It was nearly three years ago that Israel left parts of the land of Israel because of the prevailing mindset of the typical Israeli in Tel Aviv, Haifa, etc. “the war is not at our doorstep”, “that the settlers are the root of the problem,” not an existential enemy sworn to our destruction. It was two years ago this summer that Israel paid a steep price for its regime’s malfeasance. Israelis of our generation can’t seem to relate to the point regarding Sh’vatim Gad and Reuven; We wish to settle our families on the East side of the Yarden and will fight alongside our brethren in the War to capture the Land of Israel.
And one could add to the list of travesty the outrage of freeing a serial murderous terrorist such a Samil Kuntar and numerous other avowed terrorists to kill and maim more Jews, in exchange for a couple of body-bags.
It used to be that the Israeli credo used to be to not to abandon one’s brothers on the battlefield. But that was before the advent of What Jerusalem Post columnist Caroline Glick calls the “New Israel” of Sharon, Olmert, Livni, Barak, etc.
But I’ll repeat once again a point which ought to relate to our generation, that is if most Israelis are not so myopic, or conveniently amnesic, as to not remember; we felt betrayed when we were attacked at the Munich Olympics, on the Holy day of Yom Kippur, or when an Air France plane was hijacked to Entebbe. Don’t dare feel betrayed, indignant again because, for the Secular Israeli who supported expulsion of his Jewish brothers and apathetically gave little thought to them, caring only for his own personal comfort and convenience, caring only for gaining “the normal life” of the nations, perhaps nothing Jewish could ever be sacred again.
So it is that for all of the above reasons, and probably more, every believing Jew belongs taking part in this battle, on all of it’s levels, to his fullest and beyond and to the extent that he can.
May we, the B’nai Yisrael be zocha that our brethren — the refugee families from Gush Katif be permanently settled and be made totally whole, that our dear brother Jonathan Pollard and captive Gilad Shalit and the other MIAs be liberated alive and be returned to us in ways befitting Al Kiddush Hashem and that we fulfill Hashem’s blueprint of B’nai Yisrael as a Unique people — an Am Segula, not to be reckoned with as with “the nations” and may we be zocha the Moshiach, the Ge’ula Shlaima, as Dov Shurin sings; “Yom Hashem V’Kol HaGoyim”, the Ultimate Redemption, bim hay v’yameinu — speedily, in our time”, — Achshav, Chik Chuk, Miyad, Etmol!!!
Good Shabbos!
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Moshe Burt, an Oleh, is a commentator on news and events in Israel and Founder and Director of The Sefer Torah Recycling Network. He lives in Ramat Beit Shemesh.
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