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n Dig WW2 With Dan Snow starts tonight at 9pm on BBC1 Northern Ireland and follows at the same time on the next two Mondays.

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See page 14 MORNING EDITORIAL

Our role in defeating Germany

DURING World War two, Europe was plunged into a horrendous war against the brutality of Nazism. The worst horrors of that six-year conflict occurred in mainland Europe, where tens of millions of people were slaughtered in destruction on a global scale unseen in human history before or since.

Despite the terror of the Blitz, Britain's suffering was significantly mitigated by being an island. Even so; German bombers were able to reach the most westerly part of the UK - Northern Ireland - which experienced many more deaths in a single night in April 1941 than in any year of the Troubles.

Beginning tonight, the BBC will look at the role which the Province played against Hitler. Some of this was because of our geographical location, near the Atlantic, but it was also due to production at factories such as Harland and Wolff.

Dan Snow's documentary seems sets to focus on the positive sides of this story. But it is worth remembering that not everyone in Northern Ireland was supportive of the fight. The Province suffered workers' strikes during the war, and ongoing IRA attacks.

No credible commentator today would dispute that Hitler was deranged, and primarily responsible for war. There are historical reasons why a newly independent Ireland chose not to join the battle against him.

And yet, regardless of the context, it is an uncomfortable fact that Dublin was neutral in the face of such evil.

In Northern Ireland, we can look back with pride that we played our part in the. immense war effort, something for which Winston Churchill was deeply grateful.

The BBC documentary will help keep this story alive for a younger generation.

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A View from Israel: Conscription Now
By ISRAEL KASNETT
05/10/2012 14:46
Haredi leaders must accept that they are causing a nationwide ’hillul Hashem.’
HAREDIM in army during 1948 Photo: Printed in ‘Jerusalem’ by Trude Weiss Rosmarin
With the broadest unity government in 28 years, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu will now have more maneuverability to tackle domestic and foreign policy issues.

While political analysts say that the controversy over the impending eviction of the Ulpana neighborhood built on disputed land in the West Bank settlement of Beit El will likely be the new unity government’s first test, the main domestic issue requiring attention at this point is the Tal Law.

In 1948, then-prime minister David Ben-Gurion agreed to the draft exemption of 400 yeshiva students.

Since then, the country’s population has expanded rapidly, and with it, the haredi (ultra-Orthodox) sector. This translates into thousands of yeshiva students who, each year, receive an exemption from the army, leaving the rest of the country with the responsibility to defend its borders.

According to the Hiddush website, in the past two years there has been an increase of about 10 percent in the number of yeshiva students. The total number of students in yeshivot has increased from 103,000 in 2010, and now stands at 114,000.

The Hiddush website quotes Rabbi Haim Amsalem, and founder of Am Shalem, who said, “The select few who kill themselves truly studying Torah are the torchbearers of the Jewish People and should be given thorough and serious study without interruption. For everyone else, we must find the right formula to integrate them into sharing civic burdens and participating in the workforce. This is the desire of most Israelis and a large part of the ultra- Orthodox population.”

After years of resentment on the part of those who serve in the IDF, and their subsequent petitions to the High Court of Justice to look into the legality of automatic exemption of haredim, the court ruled that the defense minister does not have authority to determine the extent of exemptions.

In response to the court’s ruling, Defense Minister Ehud Barak created a committee in 1999 led by former Supreme Court justice Tzvi Tal to examine the issue.

Based on the committee’s findings, the Tal Law was passed in 2002 as a temporary law which needs to be renewed every five years. The bill enables a continuation of the exemptions to yeshiva students subject to the detailed conditions within the bill.

According to the law, at the age of 22, yeshiva students are provided with a “decision year” and can choose between one-year civilian service alongside a paying job or a shortened 16-month military service and future service in the reserves as an alternative to continuing to study.

A number of motions against the law were filed with the High Court of Justice claiming it violates the principle of equality.

In 2005, the state admitted in a response to a Supreme Court petition that the Tal Law had failed to change enlistment arrangements for haredim, as only a few dozen had enlisted to the army as a result of it. The law was extended in 2007 by another five years. In February, the High Court of Justice ruled that the law is unconstitutional. In an essay on this issue, Rabbi Alfred Cohen asks, “can a class of people legitimately claim that, as a group, they are serving different, equally vital, need for the salvation of the community? On these grounds, should they be exempted from military duty in order to fulfill their unique role in national security?”

Cohen cites a Talmud passage in Tractate Yoma that says, “Possibly the greatest sin in Judaism is hillul Hashem – desecration of the Name, which includes anything which lessens the respect and devotion of people for God and His Torah. Every sin can be forgiven, other than this one.”

In reference to a talmudic text that is often cited as evidence that maintaining the spiritual welfare of the nation is more important than maintaining its physical security, Cohen writes, “the persistent lack of clarity in resolving the issue makes it apparent that, the importance of learning Torah notwithstanding, it cannot be the only consideration in determining normative Jewish practice. Our rabbis have introduced many other factors which at times may mitigate the primacy of the mitzvah of learning Torah.”

Similarly, Rabbi Aharon Lichtenstein, referring to the statement by Maimonides that only a man who has divested himself of all worldly concerns could avoid the draft, asks, “can anyone confront a mirror and tell himself he ought not to go to the army because he is ‘kodesh kedoshim,’ sanctum sanctorum, in the Rambam’s terms?... Those who would single themselves out for saintliness should examine their credentials by the proper standard.”

THE MAIN plans to replace the Tal Law are those presented by the Likud, Kadima, Israel Beytenu, Yesh Atid and Independence parties.

Kadima’s alternative bill would require mandatory service for all within five years, allowing 1,000 students an exemption from service.

The Likud wants to reverse allowing an exemption for 1,000 students. Instead, it wants to present a minimum number for those in service, which will be increased each year.

Yisrael Beytenu’s bill would require all 18- year-olds, including Arabs and Jews, to enlist in the IDF or perform civilian service. The proposal allows for 1,000 yeshiva students and the same number of athletes and artists to receive an exemption.

Those who do not serve would not be allowed to receive grants or payments from the government. The bill states, “This law proposal prevents draft dodging and creates a situation in which those who cannot serve in the IDF can serve instead in the civilian or national service. The idea that Torah study somehow forbids seeking employment or justifies exemption from IDF service is incompatible with the Jewish faith.”

The bill goes on to quote Maimonides and uses him as an example of someone who combined work with Torah study.

According to Yesh Atid, anyone who does not perform IDF or civilian service will not receive government stipends, and the IDF would take first pick on whom to draft with the remainder doing national service for two years. The program would come into effect after a five-year intermediate period during which haredi men would be exempt from army service but would be able to participate legally in the workforce.

The Independence bill calls for the IDF to decide which 18-year-olds should serve in the military. Anyone not recruited by the army would be required to perform one year of civilian service.

The “Camp Sucker” protest movement called Yesh Atid party leader Yair Lapid’s plan for drafting haredim into the army and national service a “catastrophe.” A movement spokesperson said the program would sabotage efforts to pass a law in the current Knesset session to apply equal standards and rules to all Israelis as promised by Netanyahu.

Specifically, the movement said it objects to Lapid’s idea of delaying the enforcement of equal standards for five years.

AND THERE are problems with all of these recommendations. None of them deal with draft evasion by the secular. Today, a large number of secular youth, especially from elite Tel Aviv circles, do not serve in the army.

Studies have shown that at least 20 percent and up to 30% of secular men and women avoid the draft each year.

They also do not specify how the army can properly conscript haredim.

In recognizing the need to select a core group of people who fully devote their time to Torah study, there needs to be a system of eligibility for exemption.

A plan that allow only 1,000 students an exemption would create intense haredi infighting and mass corruption. It would, as Jonathan Rosenblum writes in his column, “tear apart haredi society the way the Cantonist decrees tore apart Eastern European communities in the late 19th century.”

There needs to be a nationwide exam that all yeshiva students would be required to take. The top percentile would be exempt from army service and the rest would be required to serve either in the army or in parallel programs such as a civilian force, police force or National Service. Firefighting, prisons services, soup kitchens, hospitals and old-age homes are also all viable possibilities.

The haredim are different from the rest of Israeli society – or any society for that matter; haredim in America consider holding a job as valuable, while in Israel it is not as important, if at all.

Much of Israeli society remains ignorant of haredi concerns and some of those concerns can be considered legitimate, but whether those concerns would be dealt with in a proper manner is doubtful.

It is also possible that some haredim might view these efforts as so damaging to their lifestyle and beliefs that they may just decide to pick up and leave the country.

The state cannot take an entire group of haredim, raised and imbued with values wholly different than ones the state embodies, and expect them to integrate easily into army life. The army is not sufficiently set up to deal with the sensitivities involved.[SNIP]

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Egyptian presidential hopefuls Amr Moussa and Abdel Moneim Abol Fotouh said in a televised debate on Thursday that Israel is an adversary and enemy, and pledged to review Egypt’s peace treaty with the country

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Both candidates said they would review Egypt's 1979 peace treaty with Israel, a country Abol Fotouh described as an enemy and Moussa called an adversary. Last month, Moussa told told an election rally in southern Egypt that the Camp David agreement was "dead and buried."

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An elaborate high-tech face-lift is planned for the tomb of Maimonides in central Tiberias, even though the medieval scholar decried pilgrimages to rabbis' tombs and even discouraged headstones.

The renovation, according to the Tiberias municipality, will include a glass enclosure for the entire tomb area, which will house a three-dimensional eternal flame. In addition, a powerful laser beam will emerge from the tomb that will reach a height of several kilometers, making it visible from dozens of kilometers away...

He wrote in his great halakhic work the Mishneh Tora that "For holy men, no headstones should be built on their graves because their words are their memory... and people should not visit graves."...

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Yemeni Al-Qaeda leader Fahd al-Quso, who was wanted in connection with the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole, was killed in an air raid in eastern Yemen on Sunday, according to a report by AFP.

Al-Qaeda, which has strongholds in southern and eastern Yemen, confirmed Quso's death in an SMS text message sent to reporters that could not be immediately verified.

“Fahd al-Quso, who was wanted by the United States for the attack against the USS Cole, was killed tonight (Sunday) in an American raid on the Rafadh region” in the Shabwa province, tribal chief Abdel Magid bin Farid al-Awlaki told AFP.

Quso was killed when two missiles slammed near his home in Rafadh, east of Ataq, the provincial capital of Shabwa province, the tribal chief said. He added that two of the suspect's body guards were also killed in the raid...

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The Supreme Court on Monday ordered two Arab squatters in Jerusalem’s Old City to vacate the homes they are occupying.

Lawyer Mohammed Dahleh said the court had rejected his clients’ appeal on the basis that the properties had been legally acquired by Jewish prior to the establishment of Israel in 1948.

“It went through the Magistrates Court, the District Court and now the Supreme Court,” Dahleh said.

The Supreme Court also ordered the plaintiff's – Ghazi Zalum’s house and Ismail Wazwaz – to pay all the legal costs.

Both properties – one a residence, the other a shop – are in the Al-Qarameh neighborhood between the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and the Temple Mount.

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Jordanian news site Ahbar Baladna reports that western spy satellites have recently spotted movements of Syrian heavy missile launchers northward and southward, toward Syria's borders with Turkey and Israel...

Syria has threatened in the past that in the event of foreign military intervention on its soil, it will not hesitate to fire missiles at Israel and Turkey in order to ignite a large scale regional war.

Turkish and French officials said ten days ago they were mulling a potential military intervention in Syria, where civil war has been raging for 14 months...

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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu can rest easy after reading the results of the latest Haaretz-Dialog poll: Not only does he trounce all his rivals on the question of who is most fit to lead the country, but an absolute majority of Israelis reject the aspersions cast on him last week by former Shin Bet security service chief Yuval Diskin.

Judging by this poll, Netanyahu is the only candidate with a realistic slot of becoming prime minister after the election slated to take place in another four months.

Asked which candidate is most suited to hold the job, 48 percent of respondents said Netanyahu. That is considerably more support than the other three candidates received put together.

His closest rival, Shelly Yacimovich (Labor ), got only 15 percent support. Next came Avigdor Lieberman (Yisrael Beiteinu ) with nine percent, and finally Shaul Mofaz (Kadima ) with six percent. That is a blow to Mofaz, who has been presenting himself as Netanyahu’s only realistic rival...

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Fourth Dolphin submarine starts long journey to Israel: An official ceremony was held in the German city of Kiel Thursday to mark the handover of a fourth submarine to Israel's Navy.

The Tanin ("alligator" in Hebrew) is considered one of the world's most advanced submarines and is the IDF's most expensive. The vessel is expected to reach Israel only in 2013 and dock at the Haifa Port...

A fifth submarine is currently under construction and will arrive in Israel in 2014. Recently, the German government approved the sale of a sixth submarine, which is expected to arrive in Israel by 2017.

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WASHINGTON - The general conference of the United Methodist Church voted not to divest from three companies that trade with Israel.

Two-thirds of the approximately 1,000 delegates to the conference voted Wednesday in Tampa, Fla., against a motion to divest from Caterpillar, Motorola Solutions and Hewlett-Packard...

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Is it possible to measure anti-Semitism and to influence its spread in society? Two German researchers who specialize in cultural economics claim that it can. The results of their research, entitled, "Hatred transformed: How Germans changed their minds about Jews, 1890-2006," were published this week on the research portal of the Centre for Economic Policy Research, based in London.

We will reveal its conclusions now: Your place of birth bears a great influence on your level of hatred toward Jews (and foreigners in general), but with the help of the appropriate (but measured) education – we can reduce levels of anti-Semitism (and hatred of foreigners)...

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A senior Hamas official said Wednesday that the Islamic militant group has been holding secret political talks with five European Union member-states in recent months.

The EU officially maintains that it will not deal with Hamas unless the group renounces violence and recognizes Israel.

Osama Hamdan, who handles foreign relations for Hamas, told The Associated Press that talks with European government officials focus on the Hamas positions toward Israel and paralyzed Mideast peace efforts...

Officials in Britain, France and Austria denied their governments are conducting talks with Hamas, while officials in Sweden and the Netherlands could not immediately be reached for comment...

Hamdan would not name the countries. Three Hamas officials in Hamas-ruled Gaza said Britain, France and Holland are among them...

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