An interview with Rabbi Dov Lior
Students and neighbors of Rabbi Dov Lior report that the elderly Torah Gaon has not been feeling well for several weeks. Over the past few years I have had the enlightening experience of interviewing him on several occasions. May this spreading of Torah be an added blessing for him and may the All Merciful grant him, HaRav Dov ben Raizel, a refuah shlema.
In Israel, Rabbi Dov Lior is considered a Halakhic Giant by all streams of Orthodox Judaism. The former Chief Rabbi of the City of the Patriarchs, and Rosh Yeshiva with Rabbi Eliezer Waldman of the Hesder Yeshiva in Kiriat Arba, now resides at the top of the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem, in the middle of an Arab neighborhood. Known as Minister Itamar Ben Gvir’s Halakhic advisor, he urged the Otzma Yehudit Party to form a bloc in the past elections with the other Religious-Zionist parties.
The sharp-speaking Rabbi was born in Galicia in 1933 to a Belz Hasidic family which fled from the Nazis during World War Two and found temporary refuge in Russia. Orphaned during the war, he was a passenger on the S.S. Exodus. Prevented by the British from disembarking in what was then called Mandatory Palestine, the ship was forced to return to Germany. Eventually, he managed to reach the shores of the Promised Land weeks before the establishment of the State of Israel.
He studied for many years at the Mercaz HaRav Yeshiva in Jerusalem under the tutelage of HaRav Tzvi Yehuda HaKohen Kook ZT"L. His strident remarks against Arabs reportedly prevented his nomination to the Israel Chief Rabbinate. Jewish Law, he decrees, forbids the use of Arab labor in Israel and the renting of housing to them. He is reported to have stated, “In order to prevent the death of one Jewish soldier, I am prepared to destroy all of Beirut."
According to Halakha, is it permissible to vote for a secular political party like the Likud?
According to the Halakha, a person who lacks the fear of Heaven and who does not observe the Torah is not to be appointed as a community leader. If there isn’t a religious candidate, then one has no choice, but ideally, a person should vote for candidates who guard the Torah and its commandments, and who believes that the Land of Israel is the indivisible Homeland of the Jews, bequeathed to us by the Creator of Heaven and Earth.
If, for instance, a candidate feels that our connection to the Land of Israel is based solely on historical reasons, or out of a technical need for a homeland, he could easily betray the Divine commandment that all of Eretz Yisrael must remain under Jewish sovereignty.
The Haredi parties in Israel do not have women candidates on their election lists. Is there a halakhic basis for this?
Yes, indeed. Without lessening in any way the supreme value of women, it must be understood that men and women have different tasks in the world. In today’s world of falsehood, the banner of equality is preached far and wide. This is particularly discernable in the Israeli Army, where women are assigned positions and tasks that don’t fit their natures, like physical combat or loading bombshells in tanks.
The notion of gender equality [in every field] is nonsense. This also applies to positions of public service. I once read in a general survey that women who went into politics did so at the expense of their family life. Golda Meir said that when she accepted a high position in the Mapai Party, her family life suffered greatly. In Mitzrayim, one of the ways of weakening the Jewish family was by assigning men’s tasks to women, and women’s tasks to men. There are exceptions like Devorah the Judge, but as a general rule, political life is not suited to women.
Does that mean that a person shouldn’t vote for a political party that has women on its list?
Sometimes it happens in this day and age that women engage in politics. If one votes for a political party that has women candidates, the vote should be for the men on the list, who are usually the majority.
For Jews who live in the Diaspora, in national elections, for whom should they vote - the candidate who will best benefit their country of residence, or the candidate who most supports Israel?
Of course for the candidate who recognizes that Eretz Yisrael belongs to the Jews. In past elections in America, a great many Jews voted for the Democrats like Obama and Biden who supported the Arabs. Can anything be more absurd and anti-Jewish than this? In Israel, people who are estranged from the Torah can also believe a gamut of upside-down things, but only a handful actually support the Muslim enemies who want to destroy us, Heaven forbid.
Prime Minister Netanyahu has been indicted for supposedly having committed several crimes. Is it permitted according to the Halakhah for him to continue as Prime Minister?
Yes, it is permissible. If it were a case of appointing a person to a public office, and that person has been charged with a crime, then, at the outset, the appointment should not be made. But in a case where the person charged with a wrongdoing already holds public office, the person is not removed from his position until the truth of the matter has been determined in court. This is especially true in the case of the Prime Minister since many upright people maintain that a false case has been purposely woven, with all sorts of slanderous accusations. He has been hounded day and night. It fills the news. They speak as if he is a criminal when the trial is still in progress.
How can this occur in a country guided by law? All of this tampering with justice, trying to influence the investigation and the outcome of the case, has caused the public to lose faith in the judicial system. Our Sages state in the Gemara (Yevamot 24) that if the accused person has enemies, we don’t automatically assume that he is guilty. Therefore, regarding Mr. Netanyahu, one can vote for his re-election.
According to the Torah, every man is considered righteous. So long as the person has not been fully convicted, there is no reason to consider him guilty. Not only that. The Torah demands a far more enlightened and humanitarian approach to the accused suspect than what we encounter today when a person is told via the media, in the eyes of the public, how many years he will be imprisoned, even when a trial is nowhere in sight.
The first thing the Head of the Sanhedrin would tell a suspect was, “If you didn’t commit a wrongdoing, you have no need to fear." The suspect should be made to feel and believe that he will receive a fair trial, and that the judges are only interested in revealing the truth. The loss of respect which the public feels toward the justice system will only be corrected when the system is purified from polluted motives and political agendas. Thus, in the upcoming election it is proper to vote for parties which will endeavor to establish a judiciary based on true justice.
During elections, we hear a lot about a Halakhic State versus a secular State. From a Torah point of view, what standing do the secular laws of the country possess?
According to the Torah, civilian laws like traffic law, tax requirements, zoning and consumer regulations, draft laws, and the like, decided upon by the government, must be obeyed. If the elected leaders of the government, and Knesset Members, legislate laws in an upright manner for the public’s benefit, so long as they do not conflict the laws of the Torah, they have halakhic validity, even from the Torah.
According to the Torah, is it a mitzvah to conquer Gaza and Lebanon?
Certainly it is a mitzvah. Gaza and Lebanon are a part of Eretz Yisrael. We controlled Gaza just a few years ago, then handed it over to the Arabs. We should transfer them to their own lands, in a humanitarian manner, even provide them with money to help them. It is possible to transfer a population from one place to another. At the end of World War Two, the Soviets controlled Eastern Poland, where I was living. In a particularly large area, they relocated all of the Germans who were living there to Germany.
Others places like Turkey have done the same. Throughout history, Jews have been expelled from countries. When the Jewish inhabitants of Gush Katif were thrown out of their homes, the world didn’t protest. The Arabs in Gaza are invited to move to one of the many Arab countries and express their Arab nationality there. Eretz Yisrael belongs to the Jews. Non-Jews who accept our rule over the country, in all of its borders, under certain conditions, can live here in peace, but those who reject Israeli sovereignty have to live elsewhere.
If the Hamas in Gaza and the Hezbollah in Lebanon continue with their belligerent actions, and the IDF is forced to conduct a full-scale war to protect Israel’s populace, what must Tzahal do to avoid killing innocent Arab civilians?
In a war, there are no innocent civilians. That concept is an invention of the Left. In World War Two, didn’t the Allied Forces bomb civilian populations? The Maharal, in his commentary on the Torah portion of ‘Vayishlach,’ asks, ‘What was the justice behind Shimon and Levi’s destruction of Shechem?’ After all, it was Hamor’s son who committed the crime against Dinah, not all the men in the city. The Maharal says their action was an acceptable strategy in war.
The sin against Yaacov’s daughter wasn’t a criminal act on a private, individual level - it was an attack on the Jewish People as a whole. The people of Shechem all agreed to the evil deed. They didn’t put the rapist in jail - they were all partners to the attack against the family of Yaacov.
A nation which is attacked has the right to counter-attack the belligerent nation, even if civilians are killed who have no direct connection to the conflict. The concept of innocent civilians is a distortion of the Christian world which probably initiated more wars than anyone else. What do they say? ‘If someone strikes your cheek, let him strike your other cheek as well.’ This is nonsense [to which they do not adhere]. When a nation is attacked and has to go to war to defend itself, there are no innocent civilians who have to be spared.
Israel doesn’t have to have a higher moral standard and take into consideration what the international community will say?
First of all, as Rabbi Kook emphasizes in his writings, the Nation of Israel does not go to war for the sake of conquest and killing, but to uproot evil and make the world a better place. What is more moral than that?
The nations of the world, by and large, want to see us destroyed - why should we listen to them?
In the United Nations, for example, again and again they vote to condemn Israel no matter what we do. We have to listen to the Torah. Even if we are attacked on Shabbat, we are commanded to bear arms and defend ourselves against the enemy. We don’t need any other permission. Why should we worry what the Gentiles will say?
Throughout history, we have been a thorn in their eyes. In ancient Egypt, to escape the hatred of the Egyptians, Jews tried to grow back their foreskins to be like their masters, and the Egyptians hated us all the more. Pleasing the nations of the world won’t help Israel’s situation - it will only place us in greater danger. Look at the situation of the Jews in Europe. So many of them try to be like Europeans, abandoning all connection to Judaism. Does it help them? No. Anti-Semitism increases all the same.
The Halakhah states: ‘Esav hates Yaacov." We can bring all of Hollywood to Israel with all of the counterfeit Western mantras of equality and pluralism and individual freedom, just like the Left tries to do, and it still won’t help us. During the Holocaust, the Nazis gassed the Orthodox Jews and the totally assimilated. Exceptions like President Trump, and other righteous Gentiles, certainly exist, but on the whole, the nations of the world don’t want us here in the Holy Land. The rebuilding of Israel in the Promised Land explodes the false doctrines of their religions and their claims that Hashem abandoned the Jews.
Why ask them what we should do? Does a lamb ask a wolf what he wants for dinner?"
Certain segments of the population say that the country is exhausted by war and that it is wrong for Israel’s leadership to constantly send our army and ground forces to war when Israeli soldiers are bound to be killed.
All war involves danger. The Halakhah states that ‘pekuach nefesh’ (saving a Jewish life) overrides the Shabbat. Even the chance of ‘pekuach nefesh’ overrides the prohibitions of Shabbat. This, however, is during regular times - not in times of war. The ‘Minchat Chinuch’ discusses this issue (mitzvah 425) and explains that in carrying out the Milchemet Mitzvahs of the Torah to conquer the Land of Israel, keep it under Jewish rule, and defend Israel against attacking enemies, the armies of Israel are commanded to fight even in the face of danger to life. This holds true when we have the chance of winning, and certainly in a war to conquer Gaza, the IDF would win.
In the time of Rabbi Akiva, he personally carried Bar Kochva’s weapon into battle, even against the mighty forces of Rome, because there was a chance of winning. Only, the Talmud informs us, transgression in the Israeli camp brought about the defeat. Sometimes, if you don’t go to war, you can put the whole country in greater danger. The smaller danger to individual lives is weighed against the greater danger to the populace as a whole.
In our modern War of Independence, there was terrible danger that our outnumbered and under-equipped army would be defeated, G-d forbid. Be Gurion bravely decided that we had to act. We suffered painful casualties, but we won the war. In the Six Day War, the fate of the entire country was at stake. The government ordered the digging of thousands of graves. Many of our brave soldiers fell, but in the merit of their sacrifice we won the war. When the soldiers of Israel go forth to battle, the Torah commands them not to fear and not to melt the heart of their brothers. Even though war involves a danger to life, when war is necessary, we are called upon to fight with ‘miserut nefesh’ with the willingness to sacrifice our souls, for the overall life of the Nation.
To our great chagrin, there even have been Rabbis who erred in their understanding of war. Leading up to the Oslo Accords, for example, there were Rabbis who said that giving up Jewish territory in the Land of Israel was permitted in order to save Jewish life - and what did it bring us? A few thousand Jews murdered and unending terror from Gaza and Judea and Samaria. The Ramban, in his detailing of the mitzvot of the Torah, regarding positive commandment number four, he unequivocally states that the commandment to conquer Eretz Yisrael and keep it under Jewish sovereignty is a Torah commandment which applies in all times and generations, and which overrides concerns of ‘pekuach nefesh.’ When the danger involves the whole Nation, the leadership is bound to enter into the danger which war involves in order to preserve the life of the Clal, the Nation as a whole.
What about the strategy of responding to rocket attacks by bombing some buildings in Gaza or Lebanon in order to win a respite for a number of months?
“This is no solution. The Israel Defense Forces must annihilate the enemy completely, as King David said, ‘I have pursued my enemies and overtaken them; neither did I turn back till they were destroyed,’ (Tehillim, 18:38). Our current leaders lack faith. Today’s leaders believe there is no solution. Ben Gurion, to his credit, and other leaders in his time, realized that we have to stand firm against our enemies. Otherwise, G-d forbid, you bring a tragedy upon the Nation for generations to come.
Do the Arabs who call for Israel’s destruction have the status of Amalek?
Absolutely. HaRav Soloveitchik declared that any nation which seeks the destruction of Israel has the status of Amalek. Eighty years ago, it was Germany. Today it is the Hamas and Iran, and all of their partners. If the nations of the world want to show how justice-loving and pluralistic they are, let them invite the Arabs of Gaza to come live in their countries, and they can send all of the Jews in their countries to us. That would be the best and most peaceful solution of all.
What can we learn from the massacre on Simchat Torah - October 7?
We can learn many things. When sufferings befall us we are called upon to examine why they occurred, not to question the Almighty, Heaven forbid, but rather to correct our wrongdoings. Certainly this is true for us today. In Israel, the barbaric attack by Hamas against our people on Simchat Torah must cause us to change our ways by understanding that the only peace that can be attained with unhuman terrorists is to destroy them down to their roots.
Also, the Holy One Blessed Be He gave Eretz Yisrael to us as a Divine everlasting gift. After a long exile, He allowed us to return. Then what do we do? We gave away chunks of His gift to enemies who swear to destroy us! October 7 is bringing us back to reconquer Aza, and Hashem will not leave us in peace until we return to all of our Biblical borders including Lebanon.
I have no doubt whatsoever that the tribulations which we are experiencing in Israel today have fallen upon us because of our treachery to the Land of Israel. Instead of allowing our people to settle all of our Land, the government restricts Jewish settlement, arrests young idealistic pioneers who seek only to carry out the will of Hashem, and awards chunks of Hashem’s inheritance to our enemies, all with the approval of the courts.
The vengeance of the sword comes from the pervasion of justice. And in the Diaspora, our people prefer to remain in foreign Gentile lands where they don’t belong rather than return to the Land which Hashem gave to our holy forefathers and their children the Jewish People for all eternity. Their rejection of the Land recalls the sin of the Spies in the Wilderness. For these treacheries these tribulations have befallen us.
Then Israel shouldn’t agree to President Trump’s peace plan for the area?
Anyone who supports this plan is a follower of the Spies in the Wilderness who betrayed the Land of Israel. It is impossible to agree. It is a trap. The Mandate for Palestine awarded both Palestine and Trans-Jordan to the Jews for a national homeland. Then before the creation of the Jewish State, the Peel Commission was formed to divide the Land. Eventually, the British gave Trans-Jordan to the Arabs and enforced the White Paper restricting Aliyah.
Rav Charlop said it was preferable to have one’s hand chopped off than to sign any document agreeing to give a portion of Eretz Yisrael to the goyim. In those times, we were physically and economically weak. We needed the support of the nations.
Today isn’t the same. Today we can uphold the commandment to conquer all of our borders and from that will come the greatest blessing. You can’t perform a transgression for the promise of a reward. You can’t agree to a deal that states if you will work 2 hours on Shabbat you will receive a million dollars. People said to Rav Charlop - if we don’t agree, we won’t have any State at all. He said better to remain in galut and not transgress the word of the Torah. So to today, it is better to reject the plans which surrender our Land to the Arabs than to open the door to a terror state in our midst.
Administrations in Washington come and go. Once you sign an international agreement, there’s no backing out. And who knows what a leftist government in Israel will agree to give the Arabs for the illusion of peace? We cannot be an active partner to such an agreement in any shape or form. It would be a clear continuation of the sin of the Spies, as the verse states: “They despised the cherished Land."
What is the reason for the explosion in anti-Semitism throughout the world in the wake of the war in Gaza?
The anti-Semitism which has spread across the globe in response to our holy and just war against the enemies of goodness and morality and the sanctity of life must lead us to realize that the Jewish People do not belong in the lands of the Gentiles where the hatred of the Jew has once again raised its ugly head, but rather in the Land which Hashem bequeathed to our forefathers as an eternal possession, as is written over and over in our holy Torah.
In our generation we merited the great blessing of returning to the Land of Israel to rebuild our Nation. If the returning exiles had all been devoted to Torah, no doubt our situation would be much different today. But a majority were estranged from the ways of Torah and enraptured by a variety of foreign notions and creeds such as socialism, communism, and democracy. What is democracy? I am told that Jews in America today who live as minorities in fear of the gentiles and the terrible anti-Semitism which has erupted, many of them remove the mezuzot from their doorways to hide the fact that Jews live inside the house. Is this democracy? There is a rottenness and evil in such a democracy like this.
Today the goal must be for all Jews to live in Eretz Yisrael. Rabbi Charlop writes that in our generation the most important matter is the return of Am Yisrael to Eretz Yisrael. In previous generations we did not have the physical possibility to return to our Homeland, but today, when Hashem has reestablished our sovereignty over a large portion of our Land, and when the eyes of the world are amazed at the miracle of the reborn Jewish State and gaze upon us with jealousy seeing how the Almighty is with us and not with them, certainly at this time of our Redemption every Jew must make every effort to join in the battle to defend and build our country, both its physical building and its spiritual building by increasing Torah throughout the Land.
We know that for older people in the Diaspora who are established in their ways, Aliyah is a challenging and difficult enterprise. But for young people who are just starting out, they must be encouraged by their parents and Rabbis to make their futures in Israel, the only place where there is a certain Jewish future for our people, and the only place where we can defend ourselves. Therefore all Rabbis throughout the lands of our dispersion are obligated to urge their congregations to strive to move to Israel, especially the young people to study and work here, to establish roots and build their family life in the Land which the eyes of Hashem gaze upon from the beginning of the year to the end.
The hatred of the non-Jew toward Yaacov is not a new thing. Long ago, Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai taught us the Halakhah that Esav hates Yaakov. We see it clearly all over the world. Why would a Jew want to stay in such places? I cannot understand it. Recently we said this very thing on Seder Night, that in every generation they rise up against us to destroy us, Heaven forbid. There are periods where the hatred is disguised and periods where the hatred is in the open. Today the animosity and the wild, irrational hatred is exposed. For this reason, if not for the positive reason that Eretz Yisrael is the Land of our life, the Land of the Jews, and a positive commandment of the Torah to live here, every young person who finishes high school in the Diaspora, if his or her parents have not made already made Aliyah, that child must be sent here, to Eretz Yisrael to finish his studies and establish his roots in Israel.
Therefore I call upon all Guardians of Torah and Jewish educators in the Diaspora to teach, in addition to the mitzvot of keeping Shabbat, Taharat HaMishpachah, Kashrut, and the like, the exalted mitzvah of living in Israel which our Sages equal in weight to all of the commandments of the Torah. In this generation, the mitzvah of living in Israel is the mitzvah that Hashem has busied Himself with more than any other mitzvah.
There were times when the Gentiles didn’t want us to study Torah, like in Russia not so long ago, and times when they forbade us from performing brit milah and learning Torah, like in the days of Hanukah. Today the nations of the world don’t want us to live in Israel. Whether it is the Hague, or the United Nations, or protests all over the world and the headlines which accompany them, the goal is to weaken our hold over our Cherished Land. Therefore settling the Land of Israel and keeping it under Jewish control is the mitzvah of the hour, and everyone is obliged to share in the national task.
Of course all of the commandments must be kept, but at this time of our history the mitzvah of living in Israel must be emphasized with all force. Let it be known to everyone that exile to foreign places outside of our Homeland is a punishment and curse, no matter how pleasant that exile seems to be. It is only temporary. The Land of Israel is our natural permanent place. The exile was never meant to last forever. Today, through the kindness of our Maker, and on the eve of Yom Yerushalayim, Hashem has answered our prayers of 2000 years for return and rebuilding, and woe be it if we turn our back on that kindness and pretend that nothing has changed.
We must work day and night as one nation to continue the ingathering, to continue the rebuilding, to continue all together in the battle to safeguard our inheritance from enemies without and within, striving alongside Hashem for the rebuilding of the Beit HaMikdash, may it be soon. To all of our brothers and sisters in impure gentile lands, I say, “Hazak v’amatz!" Be strong and of good courage! May the Master of the World bless you and strengthen you from Zion, as it says, “For the Torah shall go forth Zion and the word of the Lord from Yerushalayim."