 world is changing. It's an update on the orthodox view of the war with Rabbi Itzel Krasynchansky. Welcome to the show, Rabbi. Thank you, Jay. Always a pleasure to be here. Well, let's talk about Chabad at first. You know, Chabad was kind enough, generous enough to help some of the families in Israel come to the Washington rally last week. Can you talk about that? Yes. So, yeah, Chabad in Israel, which is a very large presence in Israel. There's even a whole village called Kvar Chabad, the village of Chabad. It was established shortly after the establishment of the State of Israel. But Chabad has chapters and centers and synagogues all throughout the country. And Chabad also, unfortunately, has whole staff that deals with terror victims and throughout all the wars and their families and helps them, you know, pick up the pieces and helps them in a myriad of ways. So now, just last week, Chabad arranged for the families of the hostages who are in Gaza, 240 hostages or so. So there was about a couple hundred people that were flown in from Israel to participate in the rally that took place last week in Washington, D.C. More than just the rally, they arranged for them to meet with congressmen and senators and politicians who are in Washington and to plead their case and to make them aware of their plight, the plight of their loved ones. And before they actually flew into JFK, New York, and they went first for like a spiritual pilgrimage to the holy resting place of Rabbi Schneersen, who is the Chabad Rabbi, who was the tower who was passed away a little over 20 years ago. And he was not a towering spiritual figure. And people come to his resting place from all over the world and pray and they were there. And I was in New York last week myself. I did not go to the rally. I flew back that day, but Pearl actually did go to the rally. And she can tell us about it because she shows up soon. But I was there when they pulled up to the Rebbe's grave site, the holy place, a couple of chartered buses, and there were lots and lots of people. The word got out that they were coming and there were lots of people there welcoming them very, very warmly and singing and embracing them and basically doing what we can to ease their unbelievable suffering, or hard to imagine suffering. A lot of people in the community feel that the hostages should, that the war has to be won before the hostages will be released. But Hamas is playing with us and all these quote negotiations aren't going to go anywhere. And this is a problem because if you approach Joe Biden and say, do something to release the hostages, then maybe really nothing that he can do. Now, in the paper this morning, there was a report that both Hamas and the Israeli spelled that we were closer to a release of some hostages. I don't know what the sticking points are. They've been sticking points for weeks. But my question to you is that Hamas is terrorists. Hamas is playing the hostages. They took the hostages for some strategic reasons and psychological reasons. Can we ever get them out without conceding way too much in the past when this has happened? Israel has conceded things and I'm not sure that they're going to be able to cut a deal. What do you think? I don't know, to be honest with you, this is a very, very, very complicated situation if Israel didn't care for each individual person that's hosted. It's almost like natural and it's within the teachings of Judaism and it's part of our DNA to care for each other. Therefore, Israel has no choice but has to figure out ways to save the hostages. That has to be balanced against the, like you mentioned, the absolute imperative need to wipe out the terrorists, to wipe out Hamas once and for all as the West did to the Nazis during World War II. It's almost like an impossible, to how to strike a balance. Israel is trying its best. With God's help, they will be able to bring the hostages back home and finish the job, which they absolutely must. I don't envy the leaders in Israel in figuring out how to maneuver. It is very, it gets my blood boiling as if to, you know, when like you say they're playing with us, the Hamas and they're like almost like dictating, like they're like an equal member at the table dictating, you know, how it's going to come down and what they are willing to agree to and whatnot. That must be very, very difficult as well. But like I say, Israel is, you know, it's absolute commitment to every single hostage is, I guess, overrides, overrides, you know, what they would normally know what to do. Yeah. Well, let's talk about the orthodox and the ultra orthodox in Israel, the Haredi. You know, how has their view changed? Because before they were not interested in serving in the army, they were not necessarily in agreement, you know, with the war. How are they feeling now? How has it changed for them and for Qabad for that matter? Okay. Good question. So first of all, just for your audience to know that Qabad, even though we are quote unquote orthodox, we're referred to as orthodox within the streams and Judaism orthodox conservative reform because we embrace the Torah and the commandments. Nevertheless, Qabad is not seen as Haredi in the Israeli society because we are are much more maybe open minded as a right word, I'm not sure, but we are more integrated with the whole of Israeli society, religious and non-religious right and left. That was one of the revolutionary approaches and philosophy of Robert Schneersen is to reach out to all Jews and not segregate ourselves from the larger Jewish community. So from the beginning of state of Israel, which was founded as a secular state, Ben-Gurion, who was the first prime minister in Israel, recognized the need to preserve, you know, the classical servant's stream of Judaism. So he made accommodations for them. And one of them was that they were exempt from serving in the army as long as they were studying in the, you know, in the academies in the Yeshivas. And that's been going on for since the statehood. However, over the years, it became a contentious political issue. A lot of the non-Haredi community felt that the Haredim were taking a pass and not doing their share in protecting a nation like everyone else. So there was a lot of tension and schism within the community. In the last many years or in the last several years, there's been a push on the part of the Israeli government and within also the Israeli society to somehow come closer together the Haredi community and the general community. And in reference to what we're talking about is for them to begin to serve in the army. So while there isn't the draft and the quotas, there's in the draft, there's still the exemption that applies to Haredim. But today, most ultra-religious Jews do join the army. Chabad forever has joined the army. The young Chabad Hasidim who was living in Israel, they joined the army. But now it's been more and more of the Haredim. And something amazing has been happening in Israel since the war started. And that is that Israel, unfortunately, maybe just the way we are wired, we mean the Jewish people, there's been a great divisions within the society. You don't need to look beyond the fact that in America, we're a population of several hundred million people, we basically have two political parties, primarily two political parties. In Israel, with eight million citizens, you have 20 political parties or more. That's make up the government, the Knesset. So there's been a lot of tension between the secular and the religious, the left and the right. And in Israel, where it's not abstract, the ideas and the policies are not abstract, but they actually affect the people in a very real way. You know, whether to negotiate with the Palestinians, whether to create a Palestinian state, these impact the lives of the people. Everybody in Israel is involved in politics. Everyone has an opinion. And very often, it was a divisive situation. But now, everyone is coming together in unbelievable ways. We have to hope and pray that it continues. But today, there's no right and left in Israel. There's no division. Everyone is united together and feels like one big family. The first goal is to bring the hostages back. The second goal is to annihilate Hamas, who are still today. They're not backing down from their mission just to destroy the Jewish people. What's interesting is, we, the Jewish people, sadly, unfortunately, have a long history of people trying to annihilate us. Going all the way back to Egypt, when we first were born as a nation, that they enslaved the Jewish people. And we all know the story, the biblical story, where God brought the 10 plagues on the Egyptians. And eventually, they surrendered. And they said, go, let my people go. And they let the Jewish people go because they saw that they couldn't stand up against God Almighty and they were being destroyed. But these terrorists know they're being destroyed. They don't care. They don't mind that they bring destruction also on the Palestinian people who are not Hamas. But they're just sworn to destroy the Jewish people. So it's a much more difficult enemy to fight because they don't fear death. And they don't care about inflicting death not only on the Jewish people, but even on the Palestinians. So it's a very difficult situation. Yeah. So the Chabad and the Haredi are together on the notion that they must be destroyed. There's no difference of opinion on that. I don't believe so. And I don't think it's just Chabad and the Haredi. I think even the right and the left today all agree and acknowledge that Israel has to destroy Hamas because every time in the past when Israel was close to total victory, always politically something cropped up that brought about a ceasefire and this and that. And it never was able to ultimately totally destroy the enemy like the allies destroyed the Nazis. They didn't make a ceasefire until they destroyed them and they surrendered. Yeah. I'm troubled by all this talk about ceasefire and cause and bigger ceasefire and little ceasefire, a ceasefire part of a release of a hostages deal because I think it allows Hamas to regroup. But I think it's also a message. It's like capitulation. And we'll have more of that kind of play going forward with the other hostages. I'm troubled that even though Biden is under such political pressure that he has the pressure of Israel to do ceasefires and causes and all like, how do you feel? How do people in Israel feel about that? I can tell you how I feel on how many, many Jewish people feel probably in Israel as well. But it's really, it's part of how Jews are treated differently than anyone else. When former president Bush went after ISIS or an Iraq, no one said after two weeks that we need to have a ceasefire and we have to give them a pause so they can catch their breath and regroup. The president at the time pushed the war effort until we destroyed ISIS that we brought down Saddam Hussein. So why when it comes to Israel, all of a sudden the talk of a ceasefire and humanitarian pause, yeah, it's really, I mean, unfortunately there's a double standard when it comes to the Jewish people. And that's something that's been around for a long time, probably from the beginning of time. But when you see it in real time, it's very, very disheartening and even very, very frightening, especially the call and the pressure on Israel to stop because of the casualties of war, a war that Israel didn't initiate, didn't ask for, but a war that Israel has to fight to protect its citizens. And yes, that's why war is a terrible thing. No civilized nation wants war. But at the same time, it has a sacred obligation to protect itself and its citizens. One of the interesting things this has revealed is that the liberal press has followed this kind of ultra liberalism to support the Palestinians even at the expense of Israel. So if you look at cable news that has previously been dedicated to liberal causes in the country, in this country, now you find when they report on Israel that the first thing they do is they talk about the plight of the Palestinians and they seem to forget to cover the plight of the hostages and the people who were killed on October 7th, murdered on October 7th. And I find it very interesting that when Hamas comes up with a number, and I was just watching last night, Hamas comes up with a number and they say, oh, 11,000 Palestinians have been killed. And some of them condition it, but others do not condition it. They take it as fact. And then when the Israelis go into the tunnels under that hospital, they say we have no way of actually verifying what the Israelis are saying. And the implication is that we don't necessarily believe them. And I find that extraordinary because to me, the Israelis are trying hard to tell the truth on everything and Hamas is trying to lie on everything. And yet these news shows and channels and broadcasts seem to give the edge to anything reported by Hamas. And that's what's inflamed the Middle East. That's what's inflamed the college campuses. How do you feel about the way the media has been handling this, the Western media, if you will? Well, I agree with everything you say. And it's very, very, it's very upsetting. To me, it's just like good old antisemitism. When it doesn't even when it reports, it reports as if there's a battle between two legitimate, two legitimate peoples. And then talking about the casualties, and like you say, most of the time the focus is on the casualties happening in Gaza, not the murder of the innocent people in Israel, not about the hostages. It's really, really shocking, shocking, as if Israel just decided to go in and to bomb Gaza unprovoked. Even if they do mention it, it's like a chryslery mention, and then they just go on to talk about the casualties. And they don't even talk about the fact that Israel goes to such great lengths to try to avoid innocent or quote unquote reporting them, the civilian population, killing the civilian population. But the terrorists, they embed themselves in the residential communities and where they live, and the hospitals, and kindergartens, and all of these, as we all know. And it's as if nobody says boo, and Israel's to blame. Yeah, this is a real problem. I mean, some of my favorite radio and television stations have been doing that, one-sided reporting. And it's very troubling, and I will never forget that they did this. Now I question everything they say, not just about Israel. The other thing is funny that Fox News, which I used to say was a right-wing Trump-type organization, at least on the subject of Israel is doing a better job. It's really 180 different. And finally, YouTube. YouTube has increasingly a number of YouTube videos up there about what happens on the battlefield, about the hostages, the families, about the motivations of the Israelis. And it's better reporting. And you can go on YouTube and you can say that you're going to see that and you can be better informed on YouTube. So that's how I get my news these days because I have learned not to trust the news organizations I use to trust. And I wonder if people are getting that. And it takes me to my next question to you. We have seen this extraordinary and blatantly ignorant phenomenon in the United States where people, including college kids and university students and what have you, are protesting against Israel for Hamas. And they are kind of supporting what Hamas did. And this is happening on many, an increasing number of campuses by an increasing number of students. And the administrators and officers of these universities seem to go along with it or allow it to happen. In my view, as Ben Shapiro's view, a spokesman for the Israeli point of view American, if a teacher, I've said this before, if a teacher or administrator of one of these colleges supports Hamas or doesn't stop groups that do support Hamas, he should lose his job, it's that simple goodbye. But that's not happening. So Rev, I'd like to know your view and the view of Kabad and the Jewish community, including the Orthodox community about what is happening on these college campuses and where it is all going in terms of public opinion in this country. Yeah, again, I agree with everything you're saying. It's very, very, very frightening was happening on the campuses. Just this past Sunday, there was a rally in Waikiki, pro-Palestinian rally. And some members of the Jewish community showed up to counter it. I was there as well, and we were outnumbered, maybe five to one by the people who came out, pro Hamas. A lot of them are Americans, a lot of young people. And the tone and the anger and the shouting was very, very, very frightening. I don't think a lot of them really know what Hamas is all about. And their atrocities, or they don't want to believe it, or they just don't care. But as Jews, unfortunately, we have a long history of antisemitism. The fact that it's rearing its head in America today, to the extent that it is, is very, very frightening. And like you say, the administrators and the professors and even anyone that could support Hamas today, they're like enablers. Because by not denouncing this kind of evil, this kind of barbarism, it gives them support, gives them moral support. And moral support translates into more beheadings and more rapes and more killings. Yeah. So it's really extraordinary that anybody in the world considers themselves civilized, could support Hamas and what Hamas has done and has said it will do. From the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea. It's outrageous. The United Nations is not doing anything. And the U.S. is helpful in its own way. But frankly, war is getting worse. As Ben Shapiro said, he doesn't sleep well at night worrying about it. And I can tell you that a lot of people don't sleep well at night worrying about, worrying about the existence of the state of Israel, worrying about a war that seems to be growing in its scope and its participants against Israel. And so I guess my question to you is how do you cope with that? How do you cope with it? And how should Jews everywhere cope with it with this emergence of a new and virulent kind of anti-Semitism, a violent anti-Semitism and anti-Semitism that doesn't go away while the Israelis are trying to save the hostages. Hamas is still shooting at them, still firing rockets into Israel. And it's not only Hamas now. It's the West Bank and it's Lebanon and it's Yemen. It's a multi-front war. It's enough to lose a little sleep over, maybe a lot of sleep. Your thoughts, your advice. Well, first of all, unfortunately, and I don't know the exact maybe that requires another show to try to understand why the left is so anti-Semitic. The people who are on the right politically for the most part are not anti-Semitic. They're supporting their support, the supportive of Israel, the support of what Israel is trying to do. It is the left that's egging on this fight and supporting the Hamas. So why is that? As a rabbi, I just want to say that throughout our history, really how Jews cope with this and how Jews cope with anti-Semitism is through intensifying our faith in God, our connection to God, and our strengthening ourselves spiritually. The spiritual dimension has a very, very strong impact on everything and all the other dimensions of life. There's something very, very interesting and that is in the very beginning of the Bible, talks about Abraham, 1st Jude. He traveled through ancient Israel, the land of Canaan, and his wife was hijacked, taken as the captive by the king. Then later on, when Abraham speaks to the king and the king returns Sarah back to him, his wife, the king says, why did you say she was your sister and therefore we took her, that she was a pretty woman? Why didn't you tell us that she was your wife? So Abraham said to the king, it's because I saw there was no fear of God in this place and I was afraid that you were going to kill me. I was to tell you that she's my wife, who would kill me so she would no longer be a wife of a person. So Abraham was able to connect the dots between lack of faith and murder. It's not so apparent that just because there's a breakdown in our faith and a higher power, a breakdown in our faith and right and wrong and the absolute morals that the Bible teaches us, that there's a direct link with that breakdown to the actual violence that could ensue. But we're seeing it today. We're seeing it today. And unfortunately, I think that if we are able to strengthen ourselves first and ourselves within every single person individually and collectively as a society and go back to the values of the Torah of the Bible where there is right and there is wrong, it's not relative. There's absolute right and wrong and there's a higher authority, a higher power. Remember many, many years ago when in the public schools they banned prayer in public schools, the Rebbe came out, the Rebbe said that that would have a direct effect on the behavior of these students later on in their lives because if you're not reared and raised with an awareness of a higher power that's looking over you and right and wrong, then the consequences are inevitable to follow. And this was at a time when there was no shooting in schools. It was unheard of in the 1970s. We could only go back to that time. I don't mean going back to the 73 war but going back to that time. So what about action points? For example, it seems to me that Israel has 3,400,000 of its reservists on the battle and they have jobs, a lot of them. And that's got to affect the economy that they're out of work all this time. And those communities near the border, especially near the border of Lebanon, they've been abandoned. The IDF has asked people to move south to avoid the violence. And so what you have is things that will affect the Israeli economy. And so do you think American Jews have a duty to financially support Israel? And if so, how? And furthermore, let me add another thing is you know there are a lot of Americans, not only Jews, but Americans who have gone to Israel over the past few weeks and joined the IDF. Good for them. Just as a lot of Americans went to Ukraine and joined the Ukraine army, people with conscience and who are willing to put their life on the line, what about that as an action point? Those two things, could you comment? Yeah. So I think it's wonderful. These people are doing unbelievable things. And actually that's the flip side of this horror of the war that we see so many people are coming forward and like you say, are putting their lives on the line and going above and beyond to do everything that they can to help Israel in this war. And I mean, so many examples, so many examples of big and small and big and small ways where people are at the very beginning of the war. So I saw a clip where a big shopping, a big store and a shopping center, a big kosher store was empty. All the shelves were empty because people were coming in with duffel bags and buying everything that they can and sending it to Israel so they'll have. And even from our community here, some people actually flew to Israel. Some Israelis who were living here flew to join the front lines and the front lines. So I'm just here to be there. There's a fellow who comes here. He lives here and he lives part-time in Israel. He has an apartment in Natanya in Israel. And he got in touch with an organization in Israel that helps the people from the south to find places to live because they, they, you know, they, they're, they're, he puts him where burnt down and shut up, et cetera, et cetera. So he gave up, so he opened up the doors of his house, of his apartment, this family from the south. He was telling me, you know, he spoke to them. It's, it's, it's a, it's a mother and three children. Her husband was killed on October 7. So her son, one of her sons were shot and killed on October 7. And then the terrorists pulled out a grenade and was going to throw it in the apartment. So the husband jumped on the grenade and got killed, but he saved the rest of his family. But one of her sons, you know, there's shrapnel in him and he lost one of his eyes. So that's the family that's living in his apartment. And, and this is happening again and again and again and again. So that's, like I said, that's very, very amazing, the good that's coming, that's coming out of this from good, good, good people. We need to actually, we need to actually build on it and, and make it grow because this is a classical war between good and evil, darkness and light. And ultimately, what we know from what Judaism teaches us that, that, that good will vanquish evil. We believe that and light dispels darkness. And everyone in their own personal lives has to think how they can become more of a light in, in, in one's own small footprint. And collectively, this is how we're going to win this war. Yeah. And also the media and also talking on the media and, you know, covering these issues and these events. And that's why I greatly appreciate you coming on our shows to discuss it. And I, I would like to circle back with you in the near term so we can continue to follow it, what's going on and, and the changes and what it means, what it means to the, the Israelis, what it means to the Jews, what it means to the United States, what it means to the world. It has global impact and we need to, you know, we need to watch that and cover that and discuss and analyze that. So I'll be, I'll be, I'll be, I'll be back to you, Rabbi. We'll talk some more. Thank you very, very much. Thank you, Jay. Thank you for inviting me. Be well.