Monday, December 11, 2006

Boycott El Al??

We have a flight to England before Pesach (coming back before Pesach too) with El Al. Why El Al? Because in today's day and age of possible suicide bombers, hijackers, rockets aimed at aircraft etc, it is the most secure airline in the world. With which other airline do I know there are undercover officers on the plane in case there is a nutter suicide hijacker flying with us? With which other airline do they Xray your checked luggage (not just your hand luggage)?

Do I fly because they're Israel's national airline? No, not really. I'm willing to pay a bit extra for peace of mind.

So should I boycott El Al? Why shouldn't they fly on Shabbat?! I mean, most of the country doesn't keep Shabbos, Moshiach is NOT here yet and therefore there is no reason that they will start keeping Shabbos tomorrow.

Rabbi Nathan Cardozo talks about Abrahamaic vs Mosaic (i.e. from Moses) law in reference to 'enforced Judaism' in Eretz Yisrael. He says there is no way you can enforce Mosaic law on a people who don't understand and haven't accepted Torah themselves. Abrahamaic law, however, you can. This means common morals and basic absolutes like 'do not murder'. It does not mean Kashrus and Shabbos.

To enforce Shabbos observance in the non-observant will cause resentment and not bring Jews back to Torah.

We're asking a shaila (as all Torah-observant Jews should do). However they already have our money and therefore we can't actually boycott them anyway (non-refundable tickets).