Solomon said warfare must be the primary occuation of Israel. Exodus 15:3 in the Authorized King James Bibles says THE LORD IS A MAN OF WAR. The Haredim should serve in the IDF or National Service to be a positive influence. They can clique together to encourage each other not to fall into moral or spiritual error.

The Religious don't want to serve after you threw out so many of their beloved from Gush Katif and done by the army.

Almost every one of my friends, both religious zionists and chabad have served in the army including many americans who have not made aliyah. In the 5 years I have lived here,. my roomates include a tzanchan oleh, 5 nachal charedi combat soldiers of whom only 1 made aliyah, and a former roomate that is now a nachal chareidi Lt and just made aliyah. Stern always talks about disbanding the hesder program and nachal chareidi, how can he expect people to enlist ? Take politicians out of the army and the army out of politix. Leftists dont serve because they dont want to, rightists dont serve because they see the army as a political tool. Most of the guys I was with in gush katif ended up serving in the army.. Stop religious discrimination in the army, the ones that want to become officers and go into combat are the religious zionists. But untill the army can be accomodating, we have a problem. A chabad soldier was sent to jail for requesting to keep shemita according to halacha...golani soldiers were imprisoned for wearing their tzitzit out...

and so do the other politicians children and by 'serve' I don't mean in some office, but in the fighting units.

MR stern is lying. he wants the hareidim in the army so he can force them to lower their standards and cease to live a moral life. he does nothing to stop sexual harrasment, which has reached epedimic proportions of 25% according to the army's own , doctored statistics. Worse he wants women to serve in every unit, such that even hesder and nachal hareidi soldiers will not be free of harassment. when the army stops lying, perhaps there might be room to talk. until then, those 25% in hareidi schools will never trust him.

these officers are certified liars...all one must do these days is to go to bakoom...and mumble "i don know " and shrug your shoulders when asked if you want to serve...do thjat and you are served an exemption...its easy

THAT'S WHY WE'LL NEED MORE MEN--TO REPLACE THE INCREASED DEAD AND WOUNDED. WHY NOT JUST STOP THE INSANITY!

make peace. we have nothing to fear everything will be good .They'll be no need for an army . We will have utopia and Olmert and Peres will be crowned gods. So why all the worry of Draft Dodging? Yes I'm being very sarcastic. but why now is the drafdt doging being mentioned before Annapolis?

because they will never serve, voluntarily under the likes of you. They need to bring their life style with them , not try to conform to your existing establishment. "The times, they are a changin"

For some people, the Army is a religion. If you serve in the Army - you are good. If you don't serve in the Army - you are bad. Everyone is measured by that yardstick. How stupid this thinking is. How far it is from Judaism.

And it's time the seculars serve G-d too.

very well put

Some Haredim do and some don't serve G-d. Some are good some are evil. Most are in between.

If Israel was about to be destroyed by its enemies because there are not enough people in the army, would the haraidim sit by and watch it happen? Would they come to their brother's defence? Or would they allow themselves to be massacred like they did in the holocaust? The haraidim must serve in the army if the generals require them to serve. Who else would know better? Are the haraidim cowards? Or are they really just lazy bums? only time will tell.

i will state further that the army is no longer being used to fight israel's enemies. instead it is being used to perform social engineering and to attack elements of the society that the leftist elite does not like. no money or training to fight hizbolah but biliions to expell jews from gaza. its pretty sick.

SO THAT THEY CAN BECOME RELIGIOUS. Neither is doing what ALL should be doing. I say this as a former yeshiva bachur AND combat soldier in an elite unit.

Religious Jews have more feelings towards other Jews than non-religious do because they know the meaning of "kol yisrael areivim". This is probably one of the main reasons for draft-dodging the last few years when this was the only task the IDF accomplished successfully.

We all need to meet in the middle in this country and respect each other as Jews. I could stand a lot more observance in my life, quite honestly. But not all Torah study is haredi Torah study. Thanks for your feedback.

The Haredi live in Israel. They should have no choice but to defend their country as they do precious little else. Enough said.

Olmert is giving all our weapons to Abbas, we don't need them anymore, Auntie Coondeleeza and Uncle Dubya are gonna make the arabs love us there is gonna be as old uncle shimmy Peres says"piss". The lion and lamb will dwell together thus no need for the hareidim to serve in the IDF, no need for an IDF who do they need to defend us from our dear loving friends the arabs????

It pains me to say this, ladies and gentlemen, but Rami from Nazareth is absolutely right. Everyone here complains (rightly) about the disloyalty of many Israeli Arabs, but undoubtedly the next greatest threat to our existence after the Arab fifth column is the Jewish one of the Haredim!!! You can all make excuses and whine and cry and scream and howl in rage and call the army immoral, but when push come to shove you know that without it you and all of your children and all of your grandchildren and everything you care about in this country would be brutally destroyed. So, either serve in the army, or get the hell out of this country. The behaqvior of Haredim is so far removed from the Zionist dream (and I'm not even referring to the fact that the vast majority of Haredim are anti-Zionist) that Herzl, Ben-Gurion, Jabotinsky and Begin would all be rolling in their graves.

THEIR CHILDREN LIKE THE ARABS, THIS WOULDN'T BE AN ISSUE ! THEY EDUCATE THEIR CHILDREN THAT BLOWING THEM SELVES UP IS A NOBLE PERSUIT;THEY'RE SUCESSFULL AT IT,WE CAN'T EVEN GET OUR YOUTH TO WANT TO STAY IN THE COUNTRY ! "Israeli society must instill motivation to serve" MOTIVATION IS NOT EVEN IN THE LEXICON OF OUR YOUTH !

A MODICUM OF COMPREHENSION AS TO WHAT IS MEANT BY: "INOCENT UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY" WHEN SUCH AS THIS CAN BE STATED: "Even if a person has been granted a legal exemption from serving, it does not mean that he is not dodging the draft" IT REEKS OF THIRD WORLD IGNORANCE !! GIVE A MAN A WELL PRESSED, STARCHED UNIFORM & A TITLE AND IT'S AMAZING WHAT HE'LL SAY !

IF THE ARMY HAS BEEN POLITICISED ? THE NACHAL HAREDI IS A BRIGADE OF HEREDI & ALMOST 50% OF IDF OFFICERS ARE DATI ! THIS IS RELIGIOUS BASHING ! IDF POLITICIZED ? DAMN RIGHT !

They are willing to punch each other in the head discussing what Rambam said, they can defend their families the same way.