A meeting of the rabbonim involved with the Vaad Hayeshivos was held at the home of HaRav Shalom Cohen, rosh yeshivas Porat Yosef and Nosi of the Moetzes Chachmei HaTorah.
The meeting at the home of HaRav Cohen shlita
After a brief message by the host, HaRav Shalom Cohen, in which he greeted the roshei yeshiva who took the trouble to come to his home, the meeting was opened by the chairman of the Vaad Hayeshivos, HaRav Chaim Aharon Kaufman who began by reading the letter of the President of the Vaad Hayeshivos, HaRav Gershon Eidelstein, which was addressed especially to those who attended the meeting.
Afterwards, he presented a broad overview of the Vaad's activities, including advisory meetings which preceded the issuing of the amendments geared to regulate the status of the yeshivos and kollelim and tens of thousands of others under its aegis with regards to military deferments in general as well as the handling of individuals of questionable status requiring special treatment.
He reviewed the legal status of the thousands of yeshiva and kollel students who needed army deferment, describing the situation that prevailed with the previous law which expired five years ago. Despite the successful efforts of chareidi politicians under the guidance of the Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah to ensure that the status of bnei Yeshiva is protected by law and their deferment taken care of, still, until the regulations implementing the law were agreed upon and published, institutions that were not on the old list of recognized institutions by the army authorities, such as new yeshivos and kollelim which were established after the previous amendments expired, could not get official recognition.
He further noted that despite the fact that during that entire period, the Vaad Hayeshivos toiled to back the politicians in consolidating the status of those thousands, the deadline for establishing their legal status was breathing down their necks before legal bottlenecks crept up to endanger it. With the recent approval of the amendments and regulations, the status of all those new yeshivos and kollelim and the thousands of students registered as yeshiva students was properly and legally organized alongside all the rest of tens of thousands of yeshiva and kollel students.
The roshei yeshiva noted from firsthand experience that of all those tens of thousands of Torah students who followed the accepted rules established for the past dozens of years, no problem whatsoever has turned up in receiving a deferment. There was not a single case in which someone who wanted to learn and followed all the accepted rules was denied a deferment of his army service. This was the primary goal set by Gedolei Torah.
They had requested a special examination of all the claims of difficulties. The result was that they found that there was not even one case. Rather, everyone who had abided by the rules had been exempted with no difficulty.
From the right: HaRav Yisroel Meir Weiss, another rosh yeshiva, HaRav Kaufman, HaRav Cohen
Rabbi Kaufman noted that even in rare situations where students had somehow been wrongly dropped from the lists in the army computer, nevertheless, when the facts had been presented to the army personnel, things had been straightened out and the status of every single one of them was corrected.
He also reiterated the importance of a unified stand across the board of all the various yeshivos and kollelim under the Vaad's jurisdiction as represented by it. He stressed how important it was for each one to establish his status at the proper time, as had always been required, since this avoided all possible problems.
It was mentioned that some bochurim who followed the advice of people who presented themselves as able to help them to bypass the accepted procedures, often caused terrible complications that could not be solved.
