Ofer Winter: Torah Study Must Be Protected

Ofer Winter, a retired IDF brigadier general and former commander of the Givati Brigade, said Torah study must remain protected at the center of Jewish life.

Winter, who also held senior IDF roles including commander of the 98th Division, addressed the debate over Torah study, Haredi enlistment, and national service.

However, he also warned that Israel must tell the truth about who is truly studying Torah.

Ofer Winter On Torah Study

“Torah study and our Torah of Israel are a clear foundation of the Jewish people,” Winter declared. “The people of Israel fought in exile for Torah study. The Torah guards and protects the people of Israel.”

That message reaches directly into the Tanakh. Deuteronomy says of the Torah, “For it is not an empty thing for you, for it is your life.” For Israel, Torah is covenant, identity, memory, and mission.

Winter said that truth must protect that mission. “Not everyone who wears black and white is studying Torah,” he said. “That is a lie, and I am saying this to Goldknopf and Gafni.”

He added that this harms serious Torah students first. Winter said anyone chosen to study Torah should be valued “at least as much as someone who serves in national service.”

Trust And Haredi Enlistment

Winter also addressed Haredi enlistment and pointed to his own experience in the IDF.

“I have been working on integrating Haredim into the IDF for 10 years inside the army,” he said.

As a brigade commander, Winter established Tomer Company, a Haredi company in Givati. Later, he said, he helped establish Hetz, a Haredi company in the Paratroopers.

“Hundreds of Haredim came to the army,” Winter said. However, he argued that the army failed because it violated agreed rules. “Trust was broken,” he said, “and then you cannot move forward.”

Winter said large numbers of Haredim will still come to the IDF, but only “with love and trust.”

Covenant, Torah And Defense

That same bond appears in “Fallen Soldier’s Family Raises Funds for Torah: ‘The Closest We Will Come to Walking Him to the Chuppah.’” The family of fallen Netzah Yehuda soldier Moshe Shmuel Noll is raising funds to write a Sefer Torah in his memory, carrying his name forward through Torah.

The United States and Israel also share a covenantal understanding before God. Both nations, at their best, see liberty as a moral calling, not only a political system.

That shared belief includes faith in divine promise, the dignity of human life, and the duty to stand with those who refuse to disappear.

For Israel, that duty includes Torah, land, return, and the defense of Jewish life. That is why the scroll and the soldier are not enemies in this story. They are two expressions of the same covenantal responsibility.

Winter’s message was ultimately about truth. A serious nation must honor real Torah study, respect those who serve, and rebuild trust where it has been broken.

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