A Society Based on Non-Responsibility

And the lethal results

Let’s put aside, for the moment, the basic deplorable nature of today’s mass charedi rally to protest helping the Jewish nation during a war. Let’s just look at the behavior of the attendees. And I’m not even talking about the dozens who harassed and threw bottles at female journalists. I’m talking about the hundreds and hundreds of adults, some together with their children, who did such things as climbing onto gas station rooftops of unknown load-bearing capacity and which lack barriers:

- and who illegally ascended unsafe towering buildings under construction:

- and who climbed on top of immensely tall highway signs:

- and who even climbed cranes:

Unsurprisingly, one young man tragically fell and died. It later emerged that he was apparently psychologically troubled and committed suicide. Yet bizarrely, this was then brandished by charedim as counter-evidence to the charge that there was crazy dangerous behavior at the event. (Other counter-claims that were advanced, before his suicide note was found, included that the Zionist police pushed him off.)

How on earth do you have a society in which so many adults engage in such utterly reckless behavior? The answer is that charedi society promotes an attitude that the laws of science (and certainly the opinions of scientists and all sorts of professionals) are irrelevant, Hashem is in charge, and rules are for goyim. And thus there is no responsibility.

This is apparent in so many ways. The lack of regard for driving regulations and road safety in charedi neighborhoods. The lack of concern for health, whether diet (charedim insisted on removing the tax on high-sugar drinks) or exercise (which is not encouraged in yeshivos and even frowned upon). The lack of interest in engineering approval for home construction. And the utter lack of regard for professional safety regulations, which resulted in 45 dead in Meron and another 3 in Givat Zev. At no point did the charedi rabbinic or political leadership take any responsibility for these tragedies. Instead, they blame the police or anyone else, avoiding the fact that these events were planned to not conform to the standard safety regulations that are required in Israel.

The behavior of these hundreds of people at the rally today is a microcosm of the problem of charedi society in Israel as a whole. There is no serious thought about whether or how Torah allegedly contributes to protection during a war. There is no concern or even thought about how as they soon become a third of the population, they need to think about national defense and contributing to the economy. There is simply no sense of responsibility. And we all suffer as a result.