Rabbi David Leybel: The haredi rabbi pushing for IDF, workplace integration

At first glance, Rabbi David Leybel’s history is emblematic of haredi society in Israel.

Born in Strasbourg, France, Leybel came to Israel at a young age to study at the storied Ponevezh Yeshiva. He excelled and became a talmid muvhak (“outstanding student”) of Rabbi Elazar Menachem Man Shach, one of Israel’s leading haredi rabbis from the 1970s until his death in 2001.

Leybel eventually began teaching and would do so for the next four decades, publishing numerous books and founding a chain of exclusive kollelim (study centers for married men) for standout students.

At age 40, Leybel entered the diamond business. He continued teaching save for three hours a day, during which he would do business at the Ramat Gan Diamond Exchange.

In 2012, approaching age 60, Rabbi Leybel pivoted. He learned from a chance encounter that haredi men who had jobs did not have appropriate frameworks for Torah study.

Leybel set out to fix this and founded a series of kollelim called Achvat Torah, which catered to working students. Achvat Torah grew exponentially and developed into a series of communities of working haredi families.

The Magazine met Rabbi Leybel in his office in the Holyland Towers in Jerusalem for an illuminating interview.

Workforce integration

In addition to his activity in the communities, Leybel has produced a number of relatively small institutions that are quickly growing.

These include JBH (Jewish Brains in Hi-tech), a college for haredi men that has been teaching hi-tech professions since 2012; Ravtech, a hi-tech outsourcing company employing only haredim, operating since 2013; HaMetivta, a haredi yeshiva combining Torah study and academic degrees in collaboration with the Open University, established in 2023; and Rosh Hakahal, a leadership program for working haredim, active since 2023.

He has also founded LeOvda (2023), which trains haredim for general professions such as construction management, electronics, safety, and transportation, and integrates them into workplaces with good salaries; Kodcode (2023), a program for training and recruiting haredim to elite military units such as the 8200 Intelligence Unit, which is now recruiting its third cohort, having enlisted about 500 haredi soldiers to date; Mishmar HaTorah (2024), a hesder yeshiva combining Torah studies and military service; and, most recently, Achva, a youth movement founded in 2024 promoting the values of a pragmatic haredi lifestyle.

Leybel realized that haredi society’s situation was neither beneficial to those who had the ability and desire to study Torah full time nor for those who wanted to work. The masses, many of whom were yeshiva students in name only, weighed on the institutions and encouraged mediocrity. 

The structure did not allow for a system of small, exclusive groups of students, a system that existed in Lithuania prior to World War II and produced many great Torah sages. Rather, the truly outstanding students were not given the investment and means to take their skills to even higher levels.

On the flip side, haredi men were required to remain in yeshivot until age 26 and were not equipped to succeed in the workplace once they graduated. It was also not socially acceptable for men to work. They remained trapped in unemployment, and those who dared buck the norms still settled for low-paying jobs.

From Leybel’s perspective, therefore, the integration of haredi men into the workforce was of interest not just to the men themselves but also to the Torah world as a whole. More integration would free up funds and resources for the truly elite students while enabling the rest to fulfill their duty to provide for their families.

In addition to the inner haredi advantages, Leybel contended that integration was important for relations between haredim and the rest of society. If haredim chose not to take part in government and not to accept government benefits, then a segregated life could be acceptable. 

However, the reality was the opposite. Haredi politicians have been an integral part of government, and haredi society benefits from state funding. Therefore, haredim should be required to fulfill the duties of normative citizens – and in Israel, this included military service.

IDF service

Leybel distinguished between military service in theory and in practice. 

In theory, Leybel first pointed to a statement by Rabbi Shach, calling one who did not study and did not join the army a rodef – someone who threatens the lives of others. Leybel added that not joining the military, especially during a war, was immoral. He cited a law from the Mishna that even a “groom from his room and a bride from her huppah [wedding canopy]” were required to take arms in times of emergency.

This wasn’t a matter of Zionism, either, Leybel stressed. It didn’t matter if the Jewish state was or was not the “beginning of redemption,” as some Religious Zionists believe, and it certainly was not an attempt to join the melting pot of secular Israeli Zionists. Even if haredim did not identify with Zionism, those who did not study Torah could not enjoy the benefits of citizenship without fulfilling the moral duty to share the burden of service.

In practice, however, the issue is more complicated for a number of reasons. The first is the refusal of top haredi leadership and politicians to even consider integration, let alone military service.

Due to the highly hierarchical culture in haredi society, military service remains socially unacceptable. Some family members of haredi men who worked, let alone served, would not be accepted to yeshivot (boys) or seminaries (girls), and the prospects for a shidduch (matchmaking) suffered as well.

Leybel suffered for his positions. He was condemned on a number of occasions by leading haredi rabbis and faced aggressive protests outside his home. He explained that his stable financial condition enabled him to withstand possible financial implications, but above all, he said he believed deeply in what he was doing and was willing to pay the price.

Leybel said he did not maintain contact with the top haredi rabbis or with haredi politicians and did not want to consider the reasons behind their refusal. These involved money, power, and politics.

He was, however, in touch with many important rabbis, and nearly all of them shared most of his worldview. Thirty-eight out of 40 leading rabbis supported the formation of a haredi combat brigade, Leybel said. The problem was that none were willing to speak their mind in public and face the potential ostracism and social sanctions.

The second reason for the impracticality of haredi IDF service had to do with the army’s approach, Leybel explained. Behind the scenes, the IDF has been frantically preparing and opening new options for haredim in the army.

These include technical and logistic roles in the Israel Air Force; a specialized track within the Logistics Command; a unit serving in the Israel Prison Service at Ofer Prison; the aforementioned Kodcode, Leybel’s brainchild, in which haredim served in Unit 8200, where they do not have to wear IDF uniforms but continue wearing traditional haredi garb; and a new haredi combat brigade, called the Hashmonaim Brigade, which was supposed to launch in late December but will likely be delayed.

But the IDF has found it very difficult to recruit haredim for these units, Leybel said. It was not enough just to open the units with a bottom-up approach; there needed to be a top-down guarantee that these units would respect haredi needs. 

One such guarantee could come in the form of a General Staff order outlining requisite conditions for haredi units.

There is a General Staff order that regulates the service of men and women together, and issuing one for the haredi units would signal that the IDF at its highest levels intends to ensure basic haredi needs, such as prayer, levels of kashrut, and gender segregation. The IDF has been hesitant to issue such an order, which has turned off potential haredi recruits, Leybel explained.

Haredi privilege

The IDF’s approach brought to the forefront the prevalent counterargument to Leybel’s views on haredi IDF service: Normative Jewish Israelis do not have the privilege of choosing whether or not to immerse themselves in study or serve in the IDF. So why should haredi 18-year-olds have that privilege?

In other words, why shouldn’t the default be that all haredim join the IDF, except perhaps for a select few?

Leybel said that he has no good answer and that the question needed to be asked on a more systematic level of haredi integration in general.

According to Leybel, many haredim still have a Diaspora mentality and feel that Israel’s state institutions are foreign to them. For haredim to join the IDF, there needed to be a broad effort to begin integrating haredim into the national ethos and discuss values such as mutual responsibility.

This was already happening in Achva, the youth movement Leybel founded, and there was a “very strong gravitation” in the haredi public in that direction. Still, like all social changes, this was a process, and in this case a delicate one. It was enough for one haredi who avoids service to end up in jail for the process to regress significantly, Leybel said.

“Gravitation” is an accurate description of what seems to be occurring on the haredi street. Leybel recognized a growing need for new institutions for so-called “modern haredim,” who want to maintain their lifestyle and incorporate Torah study while also functioning as productive citizens.

To date, Leybel has been the leading, and one of the only, haredi voices arguing that this movement should be encouraged, not criticized. 

The movement could get an enormous boost if even one leading haredi rabbi endorsed it.

Either way, according to Leybel, the train has left the station, and if the current haredi leadership did not get on board, new political leadership might eventually emerge that will buck the haredi establishment and head in a new direction.  