IDF Rabbi Admits Comments On Female Soldiers ‘Inappropriate’
Yigal Levinstein Image by YouTube
JERUSALEM (JTA) — The rabbinic head of a religious Zionist pre-military yeshiva in the West Bank who said that the Israeli army drives female soldiers “crazy” and upsets their Jewishness acknowledged that he was wrong to denigrate female solders.
Rabbi Yigal Levinstein, who runs the Bnei David academy in the Eli settlement, in a letter to his students and to graduates of the yeshiva said that the tone of the remarks he made earlier this month to several hundred students visiting from another West Bank pre-military academy was “inappropriate,” though he also said that some of his comments were taken out of context, the Times of Israel reported.
He also defended the point of what he said in his comments, saying: “women have been taken hostage by the feminist movement” and that he made his comments to better prepare students for service in the Israeli military.
“I am trying to save the girls from feminist captivity and to fight for their honor as Jewish women and against liberals staining their honor,” Levinstein said in the five-page letter sent on Monday, according to Haaretz.
Footage of the speech was broadcast on Israel’s Channel 2 about a week after it was delivered.
“They draft them. They go in Jewish and they’re not Jewish when they come out — not in terms of genetics. Their whole system of values becomes confused, their priorities – home, career. They’ll make them all crazy. Agreeing to this is forbidden,” he said.
“Someone told me recently, ‘Don’t worry. They’re just practicing putting on makeup for their wedding day.’ I don’t know who will marry them. She’ll tell the kids battlefield stories at night,” Levinstein said.
Levinstein reportedly has been criticized for the remarks by his students, their parents and donors to the yeshiva.
Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman threatened to withdraw official recognition of the Eli pre-army academy and hesder yeshiva if Levinstein did not resign over his remarks. He has summoned Levinstein for a meeting, which the rabbi says he will not attend.
In the wake of the speech, leaders of religious Zionist yeshivas in Israel called on religious students to refrain from serving in mixed-gender combat units and called on the heads of the Israeli military to show sensitivity to the soldiers.
Channel 2 reported last week that IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot promised in a meeting with religious-Zionist rabbis that the military would increase the separation of men and women in areas such as sleeping quarters, bathrooms and battalions at the officer training base.
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover. All donations are being matched by the Forward Board - up to $100,000.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
