In talks engaged by Justice Minister Yariv Levine with dozens of active Likud members at the beginning of this week, he spoke about steps he is planning against the judicial system. In a recording released by Walla, he is heard saying, "I am saying to the heads of the judicial system that if you are prepared to come to an agreement with me — I am all for it. But such an agreement will necessarily result in the entry of people who never before sat in the High Court like Dr. Bakshi and Dr. Biton."

Levine was relating to the possibility of the High Court refusing to cooperate. In that event, the High Court will be denied the power to operate. "In the future term, five judges are expected to be replaced. In short, nine new appointments out of fifteen. This will leave us with a simple choice: either such a situation where the court will disappear — or leaving six judges, which will not enable it to operate in any form, or with a very drastic change."

Knesset representatives are liars. The army lies. The judicial system surely lies and everyone knows that everything is one deception but know one is prepared to admit it.

The battle against the Torah world and the desire to bring it to serve in the army is designed to destroy it. All the talk about the good will of the Torah persecutors being ready and willing to tailor themselves to the needs of the chareidim is one disgusting lie lacking any backing in reality.

We, for sure, need none of their bluff since, as far as we are concerned, we know for sure that the Torah world is the Protector of the entire Jewish people. It is its veritable sword, bow and arrow. Nevertheless, it is vital to discredit, once and for all, the deceptive sayings being flung around in the marginal edges of our camp, as if there exists a possibility to conduct a Torah life within the army barracks.

We are not the ones insisting this, but those with the sad experience behind them, those who believed wholeheartedly and naively the army promises to adapt themselves to the needs of those who keep the mitzvos and to be attuned to their needs, values, beliefs — they can testify.

Part 1

"I was enlisted to the army, to be a warmonger. The summons arrived while I was in the midst of delivering a shiur. I revealed my feelings and everyone burst into vociferous weeping... All the students fasted for two days, from young to old.

"The mouth cannot convey nor can the pen portray the weeping and wailing that carried on when I took leave of each and every student. Emotionally disheveled, their hearts torn asunder with deep longing... each one fell upon my neck with scalding tears until my heart was aboil, molten, and their voices rent the heavens. They wept and I wept in one solidified unit of love and G-d- fear.

"I made one last round, stroking and kissing each wall and pillar of the beis medrash, each corner where we had studied and seeded Torah, yir'a and mussar. And I exclaimed: Woe unto me for having to leave a place where the Shechina rests and to go live among gentiles..." (R' Chaim Zeitchik zt'l: Science and Life, p. 321).

*

"A bochur appeared in our town one day, oldish and nattily dressed with frock coat and Homburg, the typical Slobodka attire which was so different from the Novardok dress. R' Mordechai Stolman was fleeing an army draft which, in those days, was a serious thing. He had been told that in Novardok, one found ways to circumvent it. How? The Alter possessed three exemption passes which were used for hundreds of men. It was not the passes which saved, but the sheer bitachon and the atmosphere of bitachon.

"It defied logic. The yeshiva was surrounded by troops. A unit would enter the hall to examine the certificates. The students would duly present themselves, one after the other, bearing the same three certificates which changed hands rapidly.

"And so, Stolman came to Novardok and the Alter undertook to protect him from the draft on condition that he be mobilized into the `Novardok army' and go forth to establish a yeshiva... He made him commit himself by giving the token kinyan..." (R' Chaim Zeitchik).