Every single time we sent in ground troops they took serious losses. We tried staying in Bint Jabel (sic) and kept getting blown up. Our final incursion, just before the ceasefire, was also rife with loss of life.

Yours is just the loser’s boast of “Yeah, I coulda done it!”

This claim, Rosenblum implies it also, that with more guts we could have wiped the enemy off the map was proven wrong time and again on the battlefield. It is absolutely not certain that a full-fledged ground attack would have stopped the rockets.

Hezbollah was well armed with anti-tank rockets that were extremely effective. A significant number of our losses were in the tanks, and the Hezbollah were so well dug into the ground that air bombing was ineffective against them.

And furthermore your claim that Olmert’s self-interest was the challenge to his unilateral withdrawal strategy is also very weak. Olmert had much more at stake in the Lebanon war that he was actually fighting than he had in any theoretical withdrawal plan from the territories. Davka an opportunist would have chosen the bird in the hand, an easy victory over Hezbollah, over the little bird in the bush of withdrawal.

He sets out show us the connection “…between the corruption and venality of the current government and its disastrous conduct of the war in Lebanon…”

Then he details the venality of some in the current government in explicit terms, including judging guilty parties who have yet to have their day in court. Nu nu, you’re not supposed to do this.

But he still has to demonstrate how this “venality,” which means “susceptibility to being bribed,” is connected to their “disastrous conduct of the war in Lebanon.” Here Rosenbloom is at a loss for words. There is nothing “venal” in his explanation of their conduct of the war in Lebanon. Rosenbloom does apply them some negative epithets, labeling them the “gang that could not shoot straight,” or, “lackadaisical.”

But these are not at all “venal” traits.

Finally he quotes a Chazon Ish addressing whether or not someone is an “adam gadol” if they have a negia. Now, no-one, not even the PM’s office, is claiming that title for Ulmert. But anyway he persists in forcing the Chazon Ish’s words to apply where he wants them:

“…The lifetime habit of viewing each situation through the lens of “What’s in it for me?” corrupted our leaders’ thought processes and left them unable to focus exclusively on national objectives.”

But he never shows us how there was any venal “what’s in it for me” that these leaders followed to our detriment in their conduct of the war. Apparently he thinks that once a person has negios, his entire thought processes become corrupt, and he makes mistakes even without having any negios.

But the Chazon Ish specifically avoided saying this. That’s the whole point, that the Chazon Ish was not overdoing his judgment of his fellow. As Rosenbloom himself says, the Chazon Ish only says this person’s negios will find their way into all his deeds: “even his acts of chesed will be tinged with self-interest.” The Chazon Ish never says that because of his negios the person will make any stam mistakes. The Chazon Ish only says that you can be sure he’ll have other negios.

Where was the self-interest in their alleged errors conducting the war? Nowhere to be seen in Rosenbloom’s article.

I must say that I would prefer Netanyahu and since corruption and scandal is such a proper, a leader from one of the religious parties but I am no Israeli. The same Netanyahu that is now the runaway favorite to win election in Olmert’s no confidence vote was very recently trounced at the polls. Now, he has a chance to be swept back into power on the emotion of the war against Hizbulloh. So much for the parliamentary system that gives duly elected leaders short notice when things turn sour.

Again, I must shake my head over all the handwringing against the elected leaders of Israel. That whole crowd was well-known and the people said yes to them.

I simply wish to point out that at some point it must be conceded that the people do not mind corruption or bad and dangerous policy regarding the Arabs as much as we might imagine.

After all, America voted Clinton in office for two terms.

The question would then be what are the alternatives and their impact (on the individual and his society) qua the European army and Tzahal. Perhaps one day we’ll discuss those off-line.
KT

I also ran across an engaging article with similar sentiments . An excerpt:

We as a nation have shown ourselves to be strong, brave, unselfish, caring of one another, and unified in national purpose. How, I ask myself, did such good people end up with such leaders? (And I use the words “leaders” advisedly — they are no more than purported leaders.) Figuring this out and fixing it is part of what needs to be done.

I seem to recall that “Bnai Torah” Jews served in European armies during the last century or two(including some future gedolim), were these armies the proper environment for bnei Torah?

I don’t ask these questions to be argumentative, I sincerely would like to have a better understanding of the halachik/philosophical underpinning of the position described.

KT

OK, some say so, but for the most part the chareidi Rabbonim says its assur to go. *Thats* the blanket exemption: that it is not a proper environment for a Ben Torah

Aryeh – are those no longer in yeshivot subject to your analysis? What constitutes learning in a Yeshiva that allows one to be eligible for a blanket exemption under the halachot of a defensive war? Is learning in a Yeshiva an automatic exemption under halacha?

As I posted on an earlier R’ Rosenbloom post, his modern rhetoric does not lend itself to the self-analysis we all must do or to the dialog we should try to maintain with our disaffected brothers and sisters, especially in Elul.

Ani Ldodi vdodi li,

Agreed-In recent posts I believe I have detected something which I don’t recall previously so much in Rabbi Rosenblum’s posts-a big triumphalism of the chareidi way of life vs the medina.
One need not go to far unfortunately to find corruption in the US or Israel in politics or in religious life.
I just discussed today with my Israeli sibling-that it appears that a lot of datei leumi people died in the rect war. BTW only one chareidi from the Nahal Chareidi died recently-he was shot while manning a checkpoint in the West Bank. But in genral Tel Aviv and Chareidim did not suffer in the war-surprisingly the Kibbutzim suffered deaths out of proportion to their population. Thus, it appears it is not only the Chareidim who are piggybacking on other groups for their defense.