In the wake of US President Joe Biden halting a shipment of bombs to Israel, South Africa’s Chief Rabbi Warren Goldstein has called out Western governments for their efforts to, in his opinion, weaken the IDF while it is still actively fighting Hamas.

“The only thing that stands between Jews in Israel and another Holocaust is the immense strength of the IDF,” says Rabbi Goldstein in a special Yom Ha’atzmaut address.

“Yet political leaders in both America and Europe - even as they state their commitment to ‘never again’ allow such slaughter - contradict that commitment by working to curtail the strength of the IDF.

He reserved particular criticism for President Biden: “The lesson for Israel is that its Western allies are unreliable and that it needs to diversify its sources of military support, and look to its domestic industry to supply as much as possible of the defense needs that it currently relies on the US for.

The Chief Rabbi also criticized the EU: "There was no Holocaust on October 7. It was horrific savagery perpetrated against Jews that inflicted unspeakable trauma and grief. But it wasn’t a Holocaust. And for only one reason. The IDF defeated the attackers. Without them, Hamas would have rampaged through the country killing millions of Jews.”

Despite this, he says, Western leaders are exerting pressure on the IDF not to fight this war.

“Those who seek to neutralize or weaken the IDF are placing the Jewish people in mortal danger. Iran and its proxies Hamas and Hezbollah have made it clear that they intend to destroy the State of Israel and commit another Holocaust, this time murdering the 7 millions Jews who live in their Biblical homeland.”

Rabbi Goldstein also emphasized how he believed Western governments were, as during the Holocaust, not interceding sufficiently.

In conclusion, he said the days of Yom Hashoah, Yom Hazikaron and Yom Ha’atzmaut were bound together in a “covenant of blood”:

“On Yom Hazikaron we remember the sacrifice and bravery of IDF soldiers who have given their lives defending the Jewish people. On Yom Ha’atzmaut, we give thanks to God for the blessing of a sovereign Jewish State. And together, with God’s help, they ensure we will not have another Yom HaShoah.”