Are physical attacks on innocent people by religious Jews - terrorism? by Rabbi Yair Hoffman

Five Towns Jewish Times   How very horrifying it was to see video footage of the Tsarnaev brothers gleefully place down a bomb that murdered four and injured dozens.  It is not just the callous banality of their deeds, it was the smirk on one of their faces.  It was their joy in their involvement that sickens and repels us.

But are we really so different?  As of this writing there are protests going on in Israel concerning the government’s decision to draft Yeshiva students.  The draft and its protest is not the issue.  The issue is how can we not condemn the horrifying actions of religious Jewish men pushing and shoving huge metallic garbage bins into a large crowd of people?

Let us just do a double take here.  Did we really see this?  There is no question that unleashing such a large, massive, metallic object into a crowd of people can cause both serious injury and or death.  How is this so substantially different than the sickening actions of the Tsarnaev brothers?

One difference is that perhaps the victims hit by the massive garbage bin have a greater chance of getting out of the way.  But what if they can’t?  What if they get stuck, or fall and trip?  It is deeply grieving that our brethren could even contemplate this, much less actually do it.    The combination of the mass and velocity here could very easily create deadly force.

One of the fundamental principles of the Mussar movement is that learning the relevant sections of halacha to a particular sin, raises our awareness to that Aveirah.  With this in mind, let us briefly review what the Shulchan Aruch Choshan Mishpat section has to say about such behavior.

The general prohibition of trying to hurt another person is found in Choshain Mishpat 420:1.  There, the Shulchan Aruch writes that the Torah is concerned that additional injury not be caused to someone receiving a punishment – all the more so in regard to innocent people in a crowd. [...]