About a week ago, the High Court of Justice struck with its hammer, with cruel and overwhelming force, on the heads of thousands of Abrechim and their families. Despite the legal flaws in the way the decision was made, and despite ignoring the reasons accompanying the decision - actual facts, which answer these claims, the High Court of Justice - the highest judicial body in Israel, chose not to conduct a fair trial.
The High Court of Justice ruling ordering the cancellation of the eligibility of the young men to receive income security was not innovative or different from the consistent manner in which it determines its rulings, with the exception of exceptional rulings that are exceptional in a positive way. However, this ruling also contained a fundamental and fundamental legal flaw, which also casts serious doubt on the legal legitimacy with which the decision was made.
For, despite the fact that the ruling in question has broad implications for each and every one of the petitioners and their families, none of them, or anyone on their behalf, was invited to present their claims and answers on the subject before the judges, while the petitioning parties were represented by a host of bodies and organizations, some of which are motivated by the principle of fighting religion and its representatives.
This right to submit a response and answer, and to raise a counter-argument, is one of the cornerstones of the legal system in Israel and around the world.
Are the blessed allowed to work?
Another point. In the reasons for the ruling, the author chooses to ignore the fact that kollel avrachi who receive state support are prohibited from earning a living outside of study hours (which is not prohibited for students), and that the students' subsistence stipends are higher than those of kollel avrachi. This is in addition to the fact that the stunt scholarships are accompanied by a host of benefits from the state on a variety of levels, while the basic criteria for scholarship eligibility are much easier.
Many of the academic study tracks are not intended and certainly do not prepare for employment. On the other hand, many good kollel scholars, precisely because of their perseverance and knowledge, become holders of Torah positions: local rabbis, city rabbis, yeshiva heads, and poskim.
Rubinstein also chose to ignore the fact that the scholarships provided to all cadets have suffered constant erosion over the years and, as is well known, have recently been cut extensively. It is precisely for these reasons that the income guarantee scholarship was required for those 15% cadets, who would receive a small addition to the scholarship that is cut anyway for all cadets in the country.
The judge forgot, or perhaps chose not to remember, the fact that the state limited the guaranteed income for the cadets to only 5 years in the lower grades, with the scholarship in the fifth year being conditional on the cadet undergoing professional training in that year. Incidentally, even then, the amount of the scholarship is cut that year, at the same time that he is allowed to earn a living part-time, unlike the other thousands of cadets who are prohibited from doing so.
Another calculated and elementary point that the judge ignored is the employment barriers that exist in the country for the Haredi public. Only recently are the first steps being taken to reduce and eliminate these barriers, but there is still a long way to go until they are finally removed.
Reinforcement in Judge Rubinstein's daily Daf Yomi
And I still haven't mentioned the importance of the value of Torah study in itself, and the axiom that the State of Israel is the only state of the Jewish people that also claims to present itself as a Jewish state. As such, it is incomprehensibly difficult to understand the man's war on people who study the Torah of the Jewish people.
It is difficult to ignore the fact that this ruling was given in the midst of the Omer, in preparation for the holiday of Matan Torah. In the coming hours, Jews from all over the world will be looking for a decent poor man, through whom they can benefit from the virtue of Rabbi Chaim Pelaji, which involves a donation of 104 shekels. Until today, citizens of the country have been able to do this jointly (1,040 shekels) every month.
It is possible, and this is a type of meritorious teaching, that the Honorable Judge Elyakim desires that the people of Israel be more generous and give it directly to those wealthy poor people who we are warned that from them and their descendants the Torah will come forth, and not through the bureaucratic apparatus of the state.
The day on which the implementation of the ruling is supposed to come into effect in practice is January 1, the 10th of Tevet, the Hebrew month of fasting and fasting, a day of preparation and time for calamity. And we, we have no power, except in the mouths of Torah students and supplicants in prayer. Apparently, their voice has weakened a little in recent times. Including, it is reasonable to assume, the voice of the Daf Yomi student, Honorable Justice Elyakim Rubinstein.
In a few hours we will turn together to receive the Torah anew. Perhaps after such a lofty and exalted holiday, the honorable judges, those who wear kippahs and set times for the Torah, and those who do not, will understand the flaws and deficiencies in the decision-making process.