Protesters seeking housing they can afford are doomed to failure – unless they repent for standing by silently as Jews were expelled from their homes in Gush Katif. So says Rav Daniel Stavsky, in a brief segment of his weekly Torah lecture that has been making the rounds online. “Those who ask for homes, for housing, and six years ago did not protest the expulsion of 10,000 Jews from their homes, and the demolition of their homes – it didn't pain you then? You did not take to the streets? You have no right. You have no right,” the rabbi declared. “You didn't care, it didn't pain you, you didn't go out to the streets. Now you want 'a home, a home, a home.' You have no right.” Protesting high housing prices “will not help,” Rav Stavsky stated. However, he said, there is one possible solution. “Repentance is possible. You can repent; certainly you had been misled,” he said, adding that many felt unable to admit their pain over the expulsion from Gush Katif even to themselves, due to heavy social pressure. Today is the time to make change, and in doing so to solve not only the housing crisis, but the most pressing crises facing the Jewish world, he continued. “So you need to repent. Now, when you're starting to suffer, when you're in a bit of pain, when you want a house... think about the homes of the ten thousand Jews who were expelled, degraded, humiliated... Maybe you can repent and make reparations. And then not only will you have a home, but so will our Father in Heaven – the holy Temple.”
