MK Yitzchok Pindrus retraces the battle to bring yeshivah and seminary students to Israel

Photos: Yinon Fuchs, Shuki Lehrer

"The Mir in galus” sounds like a description of the yeshivah’s famous wartime sojourn in Shanghai, complete with grainy photos of bochurim learning in isolation far from home. But under a new framework hammered out last week between Israeli authorities and a broad coalition of 170 Torah institutions catering to overseas students, it will probably describe Elul this year.

After months of uncertainty, the 11th-hour agreement negotiated by Degel HaTorah MK Rabbi Yitzchak Pindrus and Rabbi Nechemiah Malinowitz, director of the Eretz Hakodesh Israel office (the new Orthodox party and big winner in the World Zionist Organization elections earlier this year), gives yeshivah and seminary heads responsibility for their students abiding by the strict “capsule” arrangements that have allowed many Israeli yeshivos to operate even as the country battles a new COVID-19 wave.

Underlying the agreement for the return of foreign students was the formation of a groundbreaking new body representing the full spectrum of Torah institutions, called the Vaad Hayeshivos Libnei Chul, headed by Rabbi Malinowitz and Rabbi Zecharya Greenwald, dean of the Meohr Bais Yaakov seminary.

“On a Zoom call with the roshei yeshivah, we realized that we needed to show the authorities that we were taking responsibility for the bochurim,” says Rabbi Pindrus. “We needed to have a professional plan to adopt the same model that has worked for Israeli yeshivos.”

Creating a common front for the spectrum of institutions, from Modern Orthodox to chareidi, is a notable achievement in itself. But the political backstory shared by Pindrus also reveals the precarious environment in which the Israeli Torah world is currently operating.

Yet together with the relief felt by the nearly 13,000 students who will be allowed to enter Israel for the Elul zeman, the same concerns raised over the Israeli capsule system will apply to the new arrivals.

While the Mir is preparing to house hundreds of bochurim far from its sprawling Beis Yisrael campus, other institutions will be able to implement capsule conditions in their own dormitories. And while there will be plenty of focused, high-quality Torah learning, freely touring the country, spending time in Geula, and even visiting family and friends, will be much more difficult.

For the thousands of talmidim due to arrive in a few short weeks, the new framework means that this will be a yeshivah year like no other.