The haredi battalion Netzach Yehuda carried a Torah scroll, in a march that began at the completion of their military activity in the northern Gaza Strip and ended at the battalion synagogue at the Erez base.
Hundreds of soldiers, bereaved families, rabbis and other guests were waiting at the entrance to the base, and joined the procession, singing and dancing into the IDF base.
The event was attended by Rabbi David Yosef, Rabbi Yitzhak Bar Haim, one of the founders of Netzach Yehuda, bereaved families, First Sergeant Yaron Sebag, Battalion Sergeant, Lt. Col. Lior Doft, Battalion Commander and many soldiers of the battalion.
The Torah scroll was donated by the Haleb (Aleppo) community from Brooklyn, led by Rabbi Azriel Mansour, who contacted Rabbi Yosef Zvi Rimon, the chief rabbi of Gush Etzion, and told him that the community was interested in donating a small Torah scroll to the IDF units inside Gaza.
The Rabbi told the donors that a small scroll is suitable for the Netzach Yehuda battalion, which maneuvers inside the Gaza Strip and has lost many soldiers. According to Rabbi Rimon, the Torah scroll will give the soldiers a lot of strength and will light the way for them. The Torah scroll was donated in memory of the battalion soldiers who fell in the Swords of Iron War.
Before leaving the Gaza Strip in a procession towards the Erez Crossing, Lt. Col. Doft told the soldiers: "This is the gate where evil entered, today we are bringing in a Torah scroll. It is a great privilege to be part of the fighting and help the war effort. We will forever remember the fallen. We will rise up. We will fight and win."
Rabbi Yosef, a member of the Shas Torah Sages Council, added: "We have walked a long way and I heard you singing non-stop a song that I heard for the first time in my life, 'The people of eternity are not afraid of a long journey.' Your battalion is Netzach Yehuda, because we are the people of eternity [Netzach = eternity in Hebrew]. Why are we eternal? Because we have the Torah, we have a path, an eternal Torah. The same Torah scroll that was given to the People of Israel at Mount Sinai is with us to this day."
Rabbi Shaul Avdiel of the Netzach Yehuda Battalion noted that "the Torah scroll came through the broken fence, when the murderers invaded Israel on Simchat Torah, and we are now bringing in a Torah scroll, a Torah of life, a Torah that guides the Netzach Yehuda Battalion everywhere and at all times. This scroll will go with the combat soldiers into military activity in the Gaza Strip."
Rabbi Ro’i Suissa, Head of Haredi policies in the ground forces, emphasized that, "the introduction of the Torah scroll into the Netzach Yehuda Battalion symbolizes the important combination of Torah study and combat military service."
Rabbi Moshe Gabbai, the battalion rabbi, said at the end of the procession: "The physical dimensions of the scroll are extremely small, to enable it to be carried to operational activity, even far away from the synagogue, wherever we are called to fight. The ways of the Torah have been a light to our lives, everywhere, and the Torah scroll will accompany us, everywhere".