The 8 Israel "Student" killed on 7 March at Mercaz Harav Yeshiva

On 7 March "Terror" attack on students of the Merkaz HaRav Yeshiva in Jerusalem is being called one of the worst terror incidents in Israel’s capital since the beginning of the Second Intifada. The attack, which now appears to have been carried out by a lone Arab gunman, resulted in 8 students being killed and close to 40 injured, including 5 still listed to be in critical condition at the time of this writing. Some of the students killed and wounded were as young as 14.

It is still unclear whether the "terrorist" who entered the Mercaz Harav yeshiva and killed eight of its students knew exactly what place he was entering. But the thousands of people who walked behind the coffins on Friday knew very well. "The flagship of religious Zionism" was the common expression used, the "holy of holies"; there was even a hyperbolic comparison to the Al-Aqsa Mosque in terms of sanctity. Some of the praise of the yeshiva is certainly well deserved, and nothing, of course, can justify the horrible killing of young boys in a library. Still, it would be appropriate to recall, even at this difficult hour, what this yeshiva has brought forth.

What is Mirkaz Ha’rav? Literally it means “the Center of the Rabbi” is a Talmudic college which combines religious education with active military service.

The yeshiva, one of the largest and most well known in Jerusalem, was founded in 1924 by Rabbi Avraham Yitzhak HaCohen Kook, who was Israel’s first Chief Rabbi. Rabbi Yochanan Eiseman, one of the Yishiva’s rabbis and teachers, said afterwards that despite this tragedy, in which the country’s “center for religious Zionism” was attacked, the institution will carry on and will not be deterred from teaching Torah and Zionism to its students. Another rabbi said that due to the yishiva’s role in promoting religions Zionism it’s as if “Zionism itself has been attacked”. Unfortunately, that’s nothing new.

The center is considered the “central nervous system” of the Jewish settler movement, known as Gush Emunim, or “block of the faithful.” It also issues usually extreme religious edicts which permit Israeli soldiers to kill innocent Palestinian civilians, including children.

One of the prominent rabbis affiliated with Mirkaz Ha’rav is Dove Lior, the settler Rabbi of Kiryat Arba. On Wednesday, Lior was quoted as saying that it is permissible for the Israeli army to kill Palestinian civilians, including children.

The Gush Emunim movement adopts the messianic teachings postulated by Rabbi Avraham Kook who viewed the creation of Israel in Palestine as heralding the beginning of the messianic age and the appearance of the Messiah or Redeemer.

Messianic Zionists also believe that Jews ought to try to induce and expedite the process of redemption by carrying out acts of violence and bloodshed against the Palestinians in order to generate turbulence and war, an environment they believe would expedite the appearance of the Messiah.

The heads of the Mirkaz Ha’rav vehemently oppose peace between Israel and the Palestinians and are strongly against the creation of a Palestinian state in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip.

Gush Emunim and religious Zionism in general are represented in the Israeli Knesset by a party called “Ha’a Mifdal” a Hebrew acronym meaning “the National Religious Party.”

The party advocates ethnic cleansing and or enslavement of the Palestinians as water carriers and wood hewers based on Biblical principles.

It is widely believed that a large percentage of the Israeli army’s high-ranking officers are affiliated with the religious Zionist movement.

The Wiki is here. More here.

Rabbi Lior, for example, head of the Council of Rabbis of Judea and Samaria, ruled in 2004 that the Israel Defense Forces was allowed to kill innocent people. How do these words sound now, after the attack in Jerusalem? Is the permission ours alone? Back then, Lior ruled that, "There should be no feeling of guilt at the morality of foreigners." He decreed that the Knesset could not decide to evacuate settlements, and that soldiers were allowed to refuse the order to evacuate settlers. Rabbi Druckman made a similar ruling.

In 2002, Rabbi Aviner, another graduate of the yeshiva, called for the execution of Israelis who refused to serve in the military. Back then the refusal came from left-wingers, of course. Aviner also ruled that war casualties are no cause for national grief, and he called for the abolition of Yom Hazikaron, the annual day of remembrance for fallen Israeli soldiers. He compared the road map peace plan to the appeasement of Hitler and considers the evacuation of settlements an "illegal crime."

Zionist dominated Western media drops any pretense of objectivity today. While the more than 120 Palestinians killed in Gaza in the past week were for them business as usual, an attack on an institution for the extremist settler movement is an ‘escalation’. A few years back when a brutal siege of the Jenin refugee camp ended, and Israel allowed in foreign journalists after a week of ‘clearing’ the crime scene, Zionists immediately went on the attack against anyone describing the flattening of the whole refugee camp as a massacre. Yet today, it sees nothing wrong in declaring the death of 7 Zionist militants a ‘massacre’- not just student.

The killing at the yeshiva is heartrending. No one deserved it. The innocents in Gaza and the victims at Mercaz Harav in Jerusalem were all an unnecessary sacrifice. They have already paid the highest possible price. Their families and those around them will probably adopt even more radical positions now, and so we will be led into another round of endless bloodshed.