Senior officer had advised army rabbis to refrain from answering questions from soldiers on settlement outpost-related mutiny.
By YAAKOV KATZ
The IDF's OC Manpower Maj- Gen. Avi Zamir condemned on Monday a letter from a senior officer in the Military Rabbinate that advised army rabbis to refrain from answering questions from soldiers on settlement outpost-related mutiny.In recent days, Lt.-Col. Rabbi Tzaduk Ben-Artzi, head of Jewish Awareness in the Military Rabbinate, dispatched a letter calling on army rabbis to respond to soldiers who ask whether they should refuse orders to clear settlement outposts by saying, "We do not comment on this issue."During a meeting with outgoing IDF Chief Rabbi Brig.-Gen. AvichaiRonsky, Zamir said the contents of the letter "represent a failure ofvalues, and are completely incompatible with the IDF spirit."Ronskysaid in response that he accepted Zamir's position, and that he "wouldcontinue to deal with issue." He pledged to update Zamir on the stepstaken.