Punishment, Purpose or Silence: Israeli Orthodox Rabbinical Responses to the October 7 Massacre

On the morning of Saturday, 7 October 2023, which was also the Jewish Festival of Simchat Torah, Israel was attacked by the Hamas terrorist organization based in the Gaza strip. The attack resulted in the murder of 1200 Israeli citizens and foreign workers, thousands were wounded, and some 250 women, men, elderly, and children were abducted, including babies of less than a year old. Hundreds were raped and all the bodies were mutilated, some beyond recognition. The extent of the attack and the extreme cruelty left Israeli citizens shocked and outraged, resulting in Israel’s involvement in the Gaza War. The current article seeks to characterize the responses of recognized influential rabbinical figures from different sectors of Israeli Orthodoxy in both the ultra-orthodox and religious Zionist sectors to these grave events, and to determine to what extent are they consistent with one of the most widely (especially on the political right) voiced secular arguments, namely that the 2005 Gaza withdrawal was one of the root causes of the October 7 massacre.