Q&A: 'Netanyahu Quote.' But the Halakhic Question …
'Netanyahu Quote.' But the Halakhic Question …
Question
Once again Netanyahu is lying. He said that his father begged President Roosevelt to bomb the extermination camps, and Roosevelt replied, 'Over my dead body'—they will not be bombed.
I understood that leading historians were asked about this, and all of them were adamant that it never happened at all—not even remotely.
Fine, so he's fantasizing again…
But it raised a question I've thought about many times. (A request to bomb did reach Churchill; he ordered it, but the order was not carried out. In the U.S., the highest-ranking official who received such a request was the Deputy Secretary of War… and he answered that the needs of the war did not allow diverting pilots there. There was, however, a Jewish boy who managed to escape the killing valley, advanced until he reached the air force of one of the Western countries, connected with the pilots, touched their hearts, and tried to persuade a pilot to bomb the place. That wasn't practical, so at least to drop leaflets saying, 'We are coming to save you, hold on'—if only to save the numbers of Jews who were committing suicide in the camps out of hopelessness. He couldn't persuade them. Seeing that this was the situation, he pleaded with and made clear to his pilot friend that this was his final request… He deliberately committed suicide by throwing himself into a military truck. The pilot broke down because his friend had killed himself because they were not being saved, and he did indeed manage to persuade them to make a detour in order to drop such leaflets. They reached the prisoners in the camps, and many understood that their salvation was near, did not commit suicide from despair, lived to be liberated, and some of them came up to Zion.)
Is it permissible according to Jewish law to bomb the camps and the gas chambers when that would certainly kill those who were there, but on the other hand would save the Jews next in line?
As for those inside the chambers or on the way there, the intuition says that in any case they have already been taken to death and are considered as already doomed.
But those in the camps? (Under the conditions of that time it probably wasn't possible to be precise.) Some of them would in fact be saved if the camps were not bombed.
Is it permissible to kill them in order to save those who come after them in line?
Answer
Why did we need the whole encyclopedia you put in front of the question just to ask the question at the end?
It's hard to give a clear answer. If the people in the camps agree or want it, it seems simple to me that it is permissible. If we don't know, then one has to assess the view of the reasonable person. It seems to me that a reasonable person would agree. In short, this is not a question of the prohibition of murder but a question of consent. It is somewhat reminiscent of the Hannibal procedure.
Discussion on Answer
Yes, if he is in that kind of situation. Like the discussion of Rabbi Moshe Feinstein and Rabbi Chaim Ozer about a dangerous operation for a dangerously ill patient. The operation can kill him, but in his condition he is allowed to undergo such an operation. And in the Warsaw Ghetto there was an even more far-reaching discussion: whether to fight with no chance of winning. Rabbi Menachem Ziemba supported it.
Why is this not a question of murder?
What difference does it make whether the people in the camp agree—are you allowed to kill a person who is willing for us to kill him?