this song and clip is released in time for Memorial Day, coming on Wednesday...

I guess this needs a sefira music alert...

#EyalGiladNaftali

From an Iranian..

I would like to share this little peace of music of mine with you in memory of our brothers Naftali, Gilad and Eyal who lost their lives.. May their soul rest in peace forever.
Shahriar, Iran

a guest post by Tzvi Zucker


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Tzvi Zucker, LMSW

On Monday, an hour before the discovery of the bodies of abducted teens Naftali Frenkel (16), Eyal Yifrah (19), and GIlad Sha'ar (16), was published, Israeli artist Eliezer Botzer was in a Tel Aviv studio recording the song "Land Without Character" about the search for the three over the past several weeks.
Botzer noted upon the song's release that the gag order was lifted as soon as the recording session ended.

I was driving home from Jerusalem last night and heard on the radio a brief interview with a commander in a military rabbinate unit of the IDF. They were talking about how for the first (so they said), the military rabbinate fully participated in the recent operation of the IDF in the Hebron area looking for Eyal, Gilad, and Naftali.

The participation of the military rabbinate was in the form of being out with the soldiers in the field, giving them motivational talks, describing to them how important a job they are doing, and generally keeping their spirits high.

It was not said explicitly in the interview, but it sounded like they were fulfilling the ancient role of the "Kohein Mashuach Milachama" - the priest that was appointed to escort the army out to battle and to speak to them with motivational messages.

One interesting thing said by this commander was that on his way to joining the soldiers one day, he was called by his father in an old age home. His father told him that the residents of the old-age home had put together packages for the soldiers and he wanted his son to come pick them up and take them to soldiers involved in the search. Our military rabbi said he was on the way to the area to join soldiers so would gladly pick up the packages right away and bring them with him to the soldiers.

The rabbi quoted one line from the letter that was attached to the packages. He described who the packages were from - these are elderly Jews, who were involved in so many historic operations themselves, such as the foundation of the State, one 90+ year old woman who was part of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, another old man who fought in the Palmach, etc. - and this is what they wrote to the soldiers (I am paraphrasing) .. we who laid the foundations of the State and the army want to thank you, for this sense of shared destiny, Jewish "gaurantorship", concern for the welfare of other Jews, this is precisely what we were trying to establish, and that is what you are involved in.

And the rabbi explained that all the issues of the State are important, but the State was not founded so that we could have a good economy,  live comfortable lives, etc. The State was founded for a sense of "areivut", and that is exactly what we saw in the recent operation.

I thought that was a beautiful message, and wanted to share it, that gives a great perspective on the State of Israel.

A lot of people have expressed, I think fairrly naturally, questions of faith in the wake up the murder of Eyal, Gilad and Naftali.

It happened after the disengagement from Gush Katif as well.

It is not unexpected. When people are told to daven to thwart the decree, they question when so much davening and act of kindness are performed but the decree moves ahead anyway.

I don't have such questions of faith. Not that I am a man of such great faith, but I dont seem to expect that the tefillos and acts of kindness must force God's hand in some way. Hopefully influence, but we usually don't have the full picture, so if we dont get the answer we wanted, it doesn't shake me.

What does bother me is something else,

Throughout the ordeal, and I think it happened in Gush Katif as well, and in many other situations in which the religious community felt it must get the decree turned around, is the great rabbis, and I dont say that flippantly, who said that they can see from this or that that the boys are alive, they are in specific places, and things like that. Whether it was the performance of the goral hagra, or other rabbonim who said such things, and there were plenty of them - what business did they have giving such false hope?

Do they have ruach hakodesh, that they should know such things, or do they not? If they do not, don't make it up. and if they do, why were they wrong? Are they false prophets? Were they making it up just to keep people optimistic?

Without weighing in on whether or not performance of the goral hagra requires a level of ruach hakodesh, it seems Rav Shteinman knew what he was talking about when he refused to perform it, considering the false results of the goral hagra that was employed.

That is what bothers me. Saying daven and hopefully we'll get good results - that doesnt bother me when we dont get those results. When rabbis act as if they are prophets and then give information that turns out not to be true - that bothers me. That makes me question things like daas torah and the "powers" of the rabbis..

According to what is being reported, the decision has been made by the families to bury the 3 boys together.

The funerals will begin from each house at about 3pm and leave towards Modiin cemetery, arriving at about 5:30pm for the joint funeral, in which the boys will be buried side by side.

יהי זכרם ברוך
ה' יקום דמם