Ovadia Yosef just slandered the entire russian jewish community and claims they

[Lewinsky Stinks, Dr. Brennan Rocks]

Muman, you yourself posted links showing that he has not truly abandoned supporting land-for-peace. It is true that he has apologized for supporting Oslo and the Gaza "disengagement", but to this day he still supports land-for-peace theoretically, if he could really, really be convinced that it will lead to true peace in that specific case.

[DownwithIslam]

Muman, the fact that he is a learned Torah Scholar is precisely what makes Rabbi Yosef's activities so harmful. He has a lot more weight behind his positions than secular Israeli leftists, and therefore many more Jews will listen to him.

C.F.,

We are able to learn and grow and change our understanding. I believe that the Rav has said that he now understands better that peace will not be brought about by giving the enemies land. I think we all now believe that. I must admit that several years ago I was naive too and I thought that peace was possible. But I was on the fence and I feel that giving Gaza was a big mistake, as was evacuating Gush Katif and other Jewish settlements. I have changed my position and now I understand better.

I dont think that Rabbis should be involved in politics at this time. Israel politics seems so alien to me that it scares me.

But Muman, ROY had not learned from his mistakes. Literally weeks ago, he  gave a hechsher to the destruction of both the peace house and noam federmans house by staying in the govt.

[muman613]

Muman, you yourself posted links showing that he has not truly abandoned supporting land-for-peace. It is true that he has apologized for supporting Oslo and the Gaza "disengagement", but to this day he still supports land-for-peace theoretically, if he could really, really be convinced that it will lead to true peace in that specific case.

Yes, and the reason for that belief is based on his understanding of Torah which says that saving Jewish lives over-rides other obligations. So that if it would be true that by giving land to the enemies that it would save Jewish lives it would make sense to give the land. I understand this from a Torah perspective, because even though they could have the land now, in the future we can get it back. If we lose Jewish lives we cannot get them back.

This belief doesnt make him evil. As long as he understands that the basic premise of expecting peace for land is basically flawed he will live with this reality. I am not an expert on what he believes but I have trust that he believes that the answers are to be found in the Torah.

[muman613]

Muman, the fact that he is a learned Torah Scholar is precisely what makes Rabbi Yosef's activities so harmful. He has a lot more weight behind his positions than secular Israeli leftists, and therefore many more Jews will listen to him.

C.F.,

We are able to learn and grow and change our understanding. I believe that the Rav has said that he now understands better that peace will not be brought about by giving the enemies land. I think we all now believe that. I must admit that several years ago I was naive too and I thought that peace was possible. But I was on the fence and I feel that giving Gaza was a big mistake, as was evacuating Gush Katif and other Jewish settlements. I have changed my position and now I understand better.

I dont think that Rabbis should be involved in politics at this time. Israel politics seems so alien to me that it scares me.

But Muman, ROY had not learned from his mistakes. Literally weeks ago, he  gave a hechsher to the destruction of both the peace house and noam federmans house by staying in the govt.

I dont really understand how Israel politics works. I have heard that there are many parties and no religious party has any majority. So even if he wanted to prevent the destruction of the Federman home would he have been able to? You suggest that he would leave the government? Would that accomplish very much? I dont know...

[DownwithIslam]

Muman, the fact that he is a learned Torah Scholar is precisely what makes Rabbi Yosef's activities so harmful. He has a lot more weight behind his positions than secular Israeli leftists, and therefore many more Jews will listen to him.

C.F.,

We are able to learn and grow and change our understanding. I believe that the Rav has said that he now understands better that peace will not be brought about by giving the enemies land. I think we all now believe that. I must admit that several years ago I was naive too and I thought that peace was possible. But I was on the fence and I feel that giving Gaza was a big mistake, as was evacuating Gush Katif and other Jewish settlements. I have changed my position and now I understand better.

I dont think that Rabbis should be involved in politics at this time. Israel politics seems so alien to me that it scares me.

But Muman, ROY had not learned from his mistakes. Literally weeks ago, he  gave a hechsher to the destruction of both the peace house and noam federmans house by staying in the govt.

I dont really understand how Israel politics works. I have heard that there are many parties and no religious party has any majority. So even if he wanted to prevent the destruction of the Federman home would he have been able to? You suggest that he would leave the government? Would that accomplish very much? I dont know...

Muman, shas was the key to the coalition. The govt would of fallen the second shas pulled out. This is why I say that ROY is responsible for everything smolmert, livni and barak did.

[Lewinsky Stinks, Dr. Brennan Rocks]

Muman, you yourself posted links showing that he has not truly abandoned supporting land-for-peace. It is true that he has apologized for supporting Oslo and the Gaza "disengagement", but to this day he still supports land-for-peace theoretically, if he could really, really be convinced that it will lead to true peace in that specific case.

Yes, and the reason for that belief is based on his understanding of Torah which says that saving Jewish lives over-rides other obligations. So that if it would be true that by giving land to the enemies that it would save Jewish lives it would make sense to give the land. I understand this from a Torah perspective, because even though they could have the land now, in the future we can get it back. If we lose Jewish lives we cannot get them back.

This belief doesnt make him evil. As long as he understands that the basic premise of expecting peace for land is basically flawed he will live with this reality. I am not an expert on what he believes but I have trust that he believes that the answers are to be found in the Torah.

And there are "Christian" theologians who have genuinely believed that the New Testament teaches Jew-hatred and pogroms. Because of this, millions of Jews have been savagely martyred throughout history. The sincerity of belief is not what is in question, it is the outcome of that belief. Both the beliefs of Rabbi Ovadia Yosef and Christian anti-Semites have led to innumerable Jewish deaths. Yes, granted the latter have caused far more deaths, but despite the scale, the results have been similar.

And even if ROY genuinely does believe that anything to save Jewish life is worth it (although land-for-peace has only ever COST Jewish lives), how does that explain him once saying that Arabs are "our brothers" and friends?

[muman613]

Believe me, if I was involved in the Smolmert government I would get out as soon as possible. That rat-pack is destined for memory erasure. But I will hold off my condemnation of the Rabbi. As I said previously, politics stains everyone who involves themselves. I believe that the Rabbi has a stain on his reputation and it will be difficult to rectify it.

I grant everyone that the Rabbis decisions in hindsight were very poor. I wish he would pull Shas out of the government because it seems that the way Kadima is headed is toward catastrophe.

Let us let this topic go for a rest. I will lock it also so that we don't bicker over it more than we have.

Thank you,
 

[Chaim Ben Pesach]

Shas never apologized for the crime they committed against the Jewish people by enabling the Oslo accords to be imposed upon Israel.

The belief that you can surrender Jewish land to save lives is absurd, and is rejected by the vast majority of Israel's rabbis. If saving lives is the priority, then we can never wage war. Because in a war, lives will be lost. Yet we believe in the Torah concept of milchemet mitzvah (an obligatory war). How can we have milchemet mitzvah if saving lives is the number one priority?

With all due respect, HaRav Ovadia's decisions have indeed caused the deaths of countless innocent Jews. And his party, Shas, is the most corrupt party in Israel.

I am happy to see that HaRav Ovadia doesn't want people in Israel who sell pork. Which doesn't mean that Shas is not responsible for aliyah: Shas was directly responsible for the aliyah to Israel of the Arab Hitler Yasser Arafat and 80,000 Muslim terrorists as part of Oslo.

In the last election, Aryeh Deri, the founder of Shas whom HaRav Ovadia has praised as a "saint", urged people to vote for the radical leftwing Kadima party and served as a special election advisor to Ehud Smolmert. Deri was convicted of bribery, kickbacks and gross corruption, and served four years in prison. But HaRav Ovadia insisted that Deri is innocent.

BTW, I know Shas leaders and I believe that they genuinely dislike Ashkenazi Jews in general and Russian Jews in particuliar. Shas subtly appeals to anti-Ashkenazi and anti-Russian prejudice in their campaigns.

But at least Shas did one good thing: they expelled a Jew named Chaim Ben Pesach from Israel. We wouldn't want this Kahanist troublemaker preaching love of all Jews, including Ashkenazim and Russians, to Mizrachi youth. We wouldn't want this troublemaker telling Mizrachi youth that we are not allowed to surrender sacred Jewish land under any circumstances (most Mizrachi youth are also against giving up land, so this issue could be a problem for Shas). Most of all, we wouldn't want this troublemaker to remind Mizrachi youth that Shas has been proven wrong on every issue, while the Kahanists have been proven right.

Despite all that is written above, we should not disrespect Torah scholars like HaRav Ovadia. But when other Torah scholars disagree with HaRav Ovadia's radical left positions, we have a right to be respectfully critical.