From Israel HaYom (http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=4362) comes an article headed Religious soldiers refuse to enter church on IDF tour.
According to the article, "The (IDF's) Education and Youth Corps conducts a wide range of activities for soldiers, in an attempt to familiarize them with the different populations within Israeli society. Among these activities there are also tours of holy sites. A soldier who cannot visit a church due to his religious beliefs, is not obligated to do so."
The flap is about a few "Orthodox" members of a crack commando unit who object to entering into a church during "an educational tour of Jerusalem and its surrounding area, scheduled for Jerusalem Day." The soldiers, ten officers and soldiers called the scheduled event "idol worship" or the worship of foreign gods.
I might - in fact I would - agree with the soldiers if there was a religious service going on. But there is no suggestion that this would be the case.
A monk from the church is to give a talk; I would dangerously assume it would be about the facility's history. I would not expect an attempt to proselytize the soldiers.
The IDF's purpose in the tour is to make the soldiers aware of the different cultures in Israel, of the different people it is called upon to defend.
Granted, an observant Jew is prohibited from praying in a church, but not because a church is a place of worship to "a foreign god" but because of symbols of the non-Jewish religion. Jews may - if they dare - pray in a mosque since the Moslems, like most observant Jews, prohibit images in the sanctuary.
The really interesting thing about the protest is that the IDF already allows "Orthodox" soldiers to beg out of most "all-hands" events, including entering a church. These soldiers are complaining about the mere fact that the church is even on the list of places to visit; it's not enough that they are exempt from entering the building; they want it removed from the tour itinerary.
On the one hand, the soldiers deserve a כל הכבוד for serving in the IDF; too many "Orthodox" Jews hide in yeshivot and duck all responsibilities attendant to citizenship - e.g., serving in the IDF or performing national service.
On the other hand, I think these folks are taking an unnecessarily extreme position.
Let them consider the church a cultural diversion; they are learning something about the people who they must protect. Since non-Jews may join the IDF, they may be learning something about the soldier who might be fighting next to the reluctant "Orthodox" soldier.
These ten officers and soldiers seem to me to the type Jew that blindly follows his rabbi, no matter what fiat the rabbi issues, even if it goes against halacha (e.g., those rabbis that deny halachic conversions). These are the type Jew who, I believe, give us - all Jews - a bad image which, by extension is a חלול השם.
But then I am not a rabbi and I don't play one on tv.
Sometimes it is difficult, but
הריני מקבל עלי מצוה עשה של ואהבת לרעך כמוך, והריני אוהב כל אחד מבני ישראל כנפשי ומאודי
