As a Torah Jew, I am quite disturbed by a number of things I’ve seen lately, posted supposedly in the name of Gedolei Yisrael: signs saying that the legs of soldiers are being blown off for the sins of women uncovering their legs, calls for Jewish women to cover more to save Israeli soldiers or take off their wigs for the salvation of Israel, as if these women are causing our fathers, brothers, and cousins deaths!
Also disturbing is the idea being promoted that men need to spend all of their time learning Torah, even at the expense of helping soldiers, going as far as explicitly calling for yeshiva students to avoid visiting them in hospitals.
We are at war. Jews around the world are up against the worst anti-Semitism in years and the best our Torah leaders can do is tell women to cover themselves? Blaming women for the horrible injuries our soldiers are facing?
At the same time, many Rabbonim are absolving those learning in Yeshiva and Kollel of all personal responsibility, insisting that they have no need to help in any direct way, and should simply continue life as usual, with perhaps adding a few more minutes to their Torah learning and saying an extra paragraph or two of Tehillim.
