{"id":114013,"date":"2024-07-11T17:05:21","date_gmt":"2024-07-11T15:05:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/?p=114013"},"modified":"2024-07-08T05:59:08","modified_gmt":"2024-07-08T03:59:08","slug":"08-05-106","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/?p=114013","title":{"rendered":"Israeli soldiers are finding Judaica in Gaza \u2014 and trying to locate the items\u2019 owners"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>Israeli soldiers are finding Judaica in Gaza \u2014 and trying to locate the items\u2019 owners<\/a><\/strong><\/span><\/h5>\n

DEBORAH DANAN\/JTA<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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Similar posts of Judaica have cropped up in the more than eight months since Israel began its ground invasion of Gaza at the end of October.<\/strong><\/h4>\n<\/div>\n

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\nOr, a solider fighting in Gaza, displays a seder plate he found in the territory. \/ (photo credit: OR\/JTA<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

(JTA) \u2014 The commander of a small Israeli military drone unit in Gaza was on a routine reconnaissance mission with his team in an apartment in Rafah when one of his soldiers came across an object that looked strikingly out of place: a wood laminate challah board framed with the biblical injunction to \u201cremember the Shabbat\u201d in gold lettering, in Hebrew and English.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/section>\n

The commander knew that he was allowed to take property only if he needed to use it to fight the war, which didn\u2019t apply here. But he wasn\u2019t sure what to do.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/section>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re definitely not allowed to take them as souvenirs or anything like that,\u201d said the soldier, named Yoya. Military regulations prohibit soldiers from giving their full names to the press. \u201cStealing is forbidden and it\u2019s also immoral. But in this case, when I saw that this was a Jewish item I said, \u2018this can\u2019t be theirs.\u2019\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

So he tried to locate the owner of the challah board by posting a photo of it on Facebook. While the post garnered 1,400 reactions and nearly 250 comments, nobody claimed the ritual object.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/section>\n

Similar posts have cropped up in the more than eight months since Israel began its ground invasion of Gaza at the end of October. Two weeks before Passover, another post made the rounds on social media \u2014 and was published in an Israeli news outlet \u2014 calling for the owners of a Seder plate found in a home in Khan Younis to claim their lost property.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFloor mosaic from the ancient synagogue in Gaza (credit: AVISHAI TEICHER\/WIKIPEDIA)<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

In December, Yoya\u2019s brother, Elisha, also an IDF soldier, found a Hanukkah menorah in the shape of a hamsa, a hand-shaped symbol, in a home in Khan Younis. The post said, without elaborating, that the menorah had \u201cprobably been taken on October 7\u201d amid looting during the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel. <\/span><\/p>\n

<\/section>\n

Other troops who have encountered Judaica in Gaza have made the same assumption. Maj. (res.) Maor Lavi likewise found a menorah in what he described as the home of a terrorist in Gaza City\u2019s Shejaiya neighborhood, alongside weapons, military uniforms and equipment.  Lavi told Israel\u2019s public broadcaster Kan that he had a \u201cgut feeling\u201d it was stolen on October 7<\/a>. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cNext to the bed, we just saw the menorah sticking out on top of one of the dressers. We took it,\u201d Lavi said. \u201cI would really want to return it to its owner and find the person, the family it belongs to.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/section>\n

His unit lit the menorah on the seventh and eighth nights of Hanukkah. Shortly after the incident, Lavi, a father of four, was killed. <\/span><\/p>\n

<\/section>\n

Regulations around seizing property<\/strong><\/h4>\n

In response to inquiries, the Israel Defense Forces detailed its regulations regarding seizing property, though it did not specifically address the issue of Judaica. More broadly, Israeli military looting has been an issue during the war. <\/span><\/p>\n

<\/section>\n

In February, IDF Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi<\/a> called on soldiers \u201cnot to take anything that is not ours \u2014 be it a souvenir or a piece of military equipment.\u201d Three months later, Israel\u2019s Military Advocate General, Maj-Gen Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi, announced that the IDF was investigating 70 incidents of suspected violations of the laws of war by IDF soldiers, including looting. Several soldiers have been indicted for alleged looting from Palestinians in recent years \u2014 including during operations in Gaza.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/section>\n

\u201cAs part of the fighting and subject to the military protocols, it is possible to use enemy property for military necessity, as well as take property that belongs to the terrorist organizations subject to the protocols regarding booty of war,\u201d the spokesperson said. \u201cTaking property in ways that are not in accordance with army protocols is prohibited by law. Incidents in which forces did not behave in accordance with protocols and the law will be examined.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/section>\n

Lt. Col. (res) Maurice Hirsch, former director of the IDF\u2019s Military Prosecution in the West Bank, noted that while there is no way to fully ascertain whether the menorah and objects like it were stolen, nor whether they were taken on Oct. 7 or beforehand, there is evidence of looting of Israeli homes and businesses by Palestinians on October 7. Prior to the attack, more than 18,000 Gaza Palestinians worked legally in Israel, so it\u2019s possible they acquired the items then.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/section>\n

According to its author, Asa Kasher, violations like looting fly in the face of the IDF\u2019s Code of Ethics, which stresses the \u201cpurity of arms.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/section>\n

\u201cIt means that you use your military force only for certain purposes, for the purposes of fighting a war which is justified,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd looting is using your force in a wrong way, and therefore it is absolutely forbidden.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

But Kasher said that given the sheer scale of the current war \u2013 in which 300,000 reservists were called up in addition to regular soldiers \u2014 isolated incidents of looting, even if they number in the dozens, are statistically negligible and not indicative of the military\u2019s broader conduct.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/section>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not the IDF. It\u2019s the criminal margins that are expected if you have that quantity of people participating,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/section>\n

In the case of Jewish ritual artifacts, there is \u201ccause to believe that they have been stolen and so soldiers would be entitled to seize those items and attempt to return them to their lawful owners,\u201d Hirsch said. He added that as they attempt to return the items, the soldiers need to provide detailed documentation of where the objects were discovered, so that if the original owners were not identified, the artifacts could potentially be returned to the place from which they were taken.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/section>\n

He added however, that the IDF may harbor concerns over making exceptions for Judaica and ritual items, which \u201ccould give rise to a lapse of judgment by the soldiers where they would be taking property which is not even reasonably thought to be stolen \u2014 and that\u2019s looting.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/section>\n

Kasher asserts that a formal procedure should be in place for handling such items, where soldiers report them up the chain of command rather than taking them to their homes. \u201cIf taking the item is justified, it must be done by the state, not by the soldier,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/section>\n

To date, the seder plate and menorahs all lay unclaimed. Still, that hasn\u2019t dampened Yoya\u2019s hope to find the owner of the challah board. <\/span><\/p>\n

<\/section>\n

\u201cI really wish we\u2019ll find who it belongs to, because it definitely doesn\u2019t belong in Rafah<\/a>,\u201d he said. <\/span><\/p>\n

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Israeli soldiers are finding Judaica in Gaza \u2014 and trying to locate the items\u2019 owners DEBORAH DANAN\/JTA Similar posts of Judaica have cropped up in the more than eight months since Israel began its ground invasion of Gaza at the end of October. . Or, a solider fighting in Gaza, displays a seder plate he […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[26,24],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114013"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=114013"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114013\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":114101,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114013\/revisions\/114101"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=114013"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=114013"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=114013"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}