Behaaloscha: 5785 - "It is a time of distress for Yaakov, but he shall be saved from it": Just a day earlier, the Chareidi parties wanted to topple the government in cooperation with haters of Israel. How could this be?! Presented by Rabbi Shimon…

00:00 Speaker 1 Please.

00:03 Speaker 2 We are living through very, very unusual times. “It is a time of trouble for Yaakov, but he will be saved from it.” From the trouble will come a window—a window for light, with Hashem’s help. Hakadosh Boruch Hu will grant a decisive victory over all the enemies of Israel, with Hashem’s help. I want to address what happened this week. All sorts of things happened, but I want to start with a story about my grandfather, z"l, the rabbi of Jerusalem. More than a hundred years ago, he met with the Arab leaders of his time. His aim was to prevent bloodshed and keep the tensions between Arabs and Jews from escalating, G-d forbid. They received him with great respect. There were a number of meetings. Once he traveled to Amman, Rabbath Ammon, and met with Hussein, who was then king of the Hejaz. On one occasion, an Arab leader asked him: “You fight against the Zionist movement, and we fight against it too. So let’s work together against the Zionist movement, which rejects Judaism. Why shouldn’t we join forces?” My grandfather gave him a very wise answer. What did he say? “Our aim is different from yours. We fight against the goyishkeit—the non-Jewish spirit within Zionism. You fight against the Jews. Those are two different things. So there can be no question of us working together. Our aims are entirely different.” That was his first answer. And why am I saying this? Just a day ago—and events here are following one another so quickly that we can hardly keep up—there was a debate in the Knesset aimed at bringing down the government.

02:43 Speaker 2 Yes, a charedi party joined forces with the greatest enemies of Israel—enemies of Israel in the literal sense, Arabs and antisemitic Jews—to bring down the government. It’s incomprehensible. How can a charedi party join forces with the greatest enemies of the Jewish people against Judaism? Join forces with Arabs who celebrated and danced when Jews were massacred on Simchas Torah, all to bring down the government over the draft law? Is this the time? How can they join forces, even just for appearances? Everyone knows the story of Chana and her seven sons, who gave their lives rather than worship an idol. When it came to the seventh son, who was a small child, the king said to him, “I’ll spare you.” He told him to bow to an idol, but the child answered, “You shall not make for yourself an idol or any image.” The king said, “I’ll spare you. I don’t want to kill you. I’ll throw down my ring, and you can just pick it up”—so it would look as though he had bowed. The child said no. Even if it was only for appearances, it would look as though he had worshipped an idol, and the child refused. And in our situation here, even just for appearances, to join forces with the enemies of Israel and bring down a government—I can’t grasp it. I don’t understand it. It’s beyond me. How can anyone do such a thing?

04:33 Speaker 3 How does it all get mixed up like this?

04:35 Speaker 2 And charedim, of all people. I don’t want to, how shall I put it, go into detail, because...

04:39 Speaker 3 Why? It’s already caught on.

04:40 Speaker 2 So as not to speak ill of the Jewish people, G-d forbid. But how can they do this, of all things? And that was only a day ago. Did anyone know we would now be in a situation like this, in such a war, Hashem protect us? How can people do such things? In any case, we hope that Hakadosh Boruch Hu will send great salvation to the Jewish people and subdue our enemies beneath us. With Hashem’s help, may we merit great and tremendous miracles very soon.

05:10 Speaker 3 Amen.