Rabbi Dov Lando, the leader of the Slobodka Yeshiva and a senior leader of the non-Hasidic Haredi community, was heard in a recording of a private conversation in his home in Bnei Brak leveling strong criticism against the religious Zionists.
The conversation, which was republished, addressed, among other issues, the question of how young haredi men should relate to the service and sacrifice of members of the Religious Zionist community, who combine Torah study with IDF service and combat.
"The confused people with the knitted kippot, we won't talk about them. They have their own theories, and it's difficult with them," Rabbi Lando said.
He later tied the killing of soldiers to his perception of Torah study. "Those who are killed, they were killed because we don't learn enough. We could save even more," he said. "They are killed because their rabbis teach them a distorted Torah. And they do a lot of what they do not to save people, but for the glory of the state. They kill people for glory."
Rabbi Lando later portrayed Torah students as the ones who defend the residents of Israel. "There is no explanation why Arabs don't join together to flood the entire land, and G-d forbid, annihilate us all. There is no explanation," he said, referring to the protection provided by Torah study.
A significant portion of his remarks focused on the very establishment of the State of Israel. Rabbi Lando argued that Jewish life in the Land of Israel could have existed even without an independent state and even raised the possibility of international or Arab rule.
“I don’t know what would have happened if, at the beginning, there had been no state and they had established some kind of UN rule here - the situation would have been excellent," he said. “It is possible to live without a state, to live well with the Arabs... It was quite good when Arabs ruled here; that was the best situation. The Arabs ruled, they were respected, and people did not interfere with them. Money was brought into the country, and Arabs like money."
Rabbi Lando also accused the Zionist movement of intensifying Arab hostility toward Jews. “They caused the Arabs to hate us. The Arabs were never good, but they had to be respected," he said. According to him, Zionism, which he said sought “to save the Jewish people," brought “the physical disasters, not only the spiritual ones, upon the Jewish people."
Alongside the fundamental opposition he expressed toward the state and Zionism, Rabbi Lando also addressed the current reality and the dependence of the haredi public on state institutions and the security forces. “What difference does that make now? What are we supposed to do now? If we live among robbers and the robbers are saving us, what can we do? It is a problem, a very big problem," he said.
Addressing the conflict with the Palestinians, he said he no longer believes their commitments, but added that in the past it may have been possible to make certain concessions. “To say that one day they will stop? It is no longer possible to believe them. But perhaps certain permissible concessions could have been made," he said.
Toward the end of the conversation, Rabbi Lando also criticized Israel’s secular public. “The problem is that today’s secular people are not the secular people I remember," he said. “These are people who have no connection whatsoever to Judaism, nothing. It is terrible and awful. In my opinion, this is a very great desecration of G-d’s name."
He concluded with further criticism of the nature of the state: “The fact that the people of Israel, who are G-d’s people, established a state of apostasy and heresy - this is a very serious lesson."