It is unpleasant to say, but it must be said: the aggressive campaign to free our beloved hostages “at any price” is unnecessary, nationally harmful and ideologically very problematic. Unnecessary, for there is no Jew in the world who doesn’t want to see our 136 brothers back home. The mitzvot of redeeming prisoners has been deep in our Jewish consciousness since Avraham Avinu went into battle to rescue his kidnapped nephew, through 2,000 years of bloody kidnappings in exile, to Entebbe on the one hand and the exaggerated Gilad Shalit deal, on the other. Davka because we love each and every individual, we must be told explicitly in the Shulchan Aruch (YD 281) not to redeem Jews “more than their worth” (generally, about 1 of theirs for 1 of ours), and the great Maharam M’Rottenberg himself died in prison, for he didn’t allow the Jews to pay the exorbitant ransom the gentiles demanded for their rabbi. It’s immoral for Am Yisrael to educate the enemies to know our weak spot, for they will continue kidnapping time and again!
Check it out: in all of human history there is probably no other nation in the world that released 1,000 (!) evil convicted terrorists and murderers (!) in exchange for one soldier, in order to enable them to murder and kidnap again. Just like we feel sorry for the kidnapped, we are not childish (“just here and now”) and realize that we must feel sorry for the soldiers and the future kidnapped which will multiply. Davka because we value each individual, we must pressure the enemy into giving in.
The campaign is harmful because it doubles and triples the bargaining power of Hamas. Tachlis, Sinwar ym”sh has nothing left. The Gaza Strip today is the worst and most miserable place on the face of the globe. BH the terrorists are walloped by our heroic fighters in every single clash between them, and the military capabilities of Hamas are no comparison for the IDF. Their time is running out, and the only thing that remains for the devil in Gaza – are the kidnapped. He has no choice but to compromise, and not “demand” 150 evil terrorists for each 1 innocent kidnapped, not “demand” that we leave Gaza to enable him to reconstruct his tunnels and murderous network, and surely not to “demand” a Palestinian State! Would the allies have retreated and let the Nazis go if they would have offered freeing the POW’s? No, nations do not get down on their knees before the evil and soundly defeated (!) enemy!
How stupid can we be to turn Sinwar’s one and only card into a winning joker, with which he will bring the State of Israel to our knees and return us all to the pre-war situation and worse, enabling them to attack us again.
“And if someone from your family was kidnapped in Gaza, would you also talk like that?” I don’t know and it’s irrelevant. Because this is exactly where we get to the ideological issue. Chazal say “that a man can’t be judged in his time of sorrow” (Bava Batra 16b). We have no complaints against family members who are willing to pay any price to get their loved one back. For them, if Sinwar demands all of Israel’s nuclear weapons arsenal – let’s give it to him immediately, the main thing is that the kidnapped daughter returns home.
BUT, as a nation, we must not get confused between the return of the abducted, which is an important value that concerns the lives of INDIVIDUALS, and what is critical for KLAL Yisrael and for the continued existence and FUTURE of the State of Israel and the Jewish Nation. A small country surrounded by bloodthirsty enemies has no other option but to crushingly defeat our sadistic enemies. This is the bloody rule in the Middle East: Either you crush the ones who decapitate and rape you, or you will become the next meal for them and the other neighbors. We don’t really have a choice. Hezbollah, Iran and even Egypt and the rest of the Arab countries, are closely following what is happening here. Any future peace agreement with Saudi Arabia et al, depends if we are seen in the Middle east as formidable, or weak. If we capitulate too much to Sinwar, the implications will be nationally tragic. 200,000 evacuees in the north and in the south, who have already forgotten what their home looks like, will not be able to return home safely. Ever. The “security zone” has moved from outside our borders to inside our borders! And as the Chazon Ish answered: from wherever we retreat, the border will constantly and continuously move with us.
It will turn out that the 223 martyrs and all those who lost their legs in the IDF, the heroic lions, were actually deceived into thinking that they were giving up their souls in order to defeat Hamas. In the end, they were “used” for just another round. This could have terrible repercussions regarding army morale. The 360,000 reservists who left home and family and business because they were told that they were coming to avenge the blood of our 1,145 brothers who were slaughtered and raped and to eradicate the Nazi evil and insure “Never Again”, were simply cheated “big time”? And worst of all – the countdown will begin towards the next Oct. 7th, which is just around the corner, in the north, east and eventually again in the south and west.
So true, maybe we brought home 136 people, BUT we can’t endanger shedding the blood of 7 million. Yes, Chazal promised that there won’t be another exile, but we can’t rely on miracles. So what can we do, you ask?
A. Hug the kidnapped family members with all your might, but stop the suicidal media obsession of constantly giving them microphones.
B. Re-shift gears and finish what we started! Military pressure is what will eventually free the hostages (Hamas davka wants to keep them alive!), and at a much lower price and a much quieter future.
Even in exile when we were often hiding like mice, we never capitulated so much to our kidnappers! How much more so when they are the ones hiding like mice. We are no longer in galut, in Bialystok or Iraq. We must get into the mindset of deciding national decisions as Am Yisrael with the G-d of Israel behind us. Churchill and Roosevelt didn’t give in to the falling Nazis, and we today are also a nation which must stand on our national respect.
Without blinking. Without getting confused. Until the Hamas surrenders or considerably lowers their “demands”!