Winning – The Jewish Way 

To fight an army of murderers who punished Israel with more carnage in a single day than we suffered since the Holocaust, we must wage war on three fronts.  

• The first and foremost front is the Divine front. Every Jew is called into action.  
• The second front in this war is the military front. The IDF is confronting Hamas, Hezbollah, Syria, and Iran. 
• The third front is the media war, the war of perception. While everyone is doing their bit on social media, a handful of big influencers will be charging the front lines.  

The first front is where we win or lose. It’s the Divine front. This is where we petition our Father in heaven to defend us from our enemies. In this front, everybody serves. In this front, everybody makes a powerful impact. This is the front where we command the entire battlefield: The war of prayer. The war of Torah. The war of mitzvot.  

God gives us an arsenal of ways to serve Him so intimately, so profoundly, that none of the nations can match. Here are the words of our greatest war tactician, David HaMelech:  

He tells His words to Jacob, His statutes and His judgments to Israel. He did not do so to any nation, and they did not know the judgments. Hallelujah! (Psalms 147:19-20) 

Identify the Terrain 

Sun Tzu, the second-best war tactician, tells us that a battle is won or lost before it’s waged. The side that knows the terrain and how to utilize it best has a significant advantage.  

We must remember that the main front is the Divine front. This is a war of emunah and a war of mitzvot. The side Hashem chooses will emerge victorious.  

As thousands of tanks pass through our streets and highways in Israel, and our pride and joy – the Israeli Air Force – sweeps through the skies, it’s easy to forget Who guarantees their safety and success.  

Those rely on horses and chariots, but in the Name of God – our God – we call out. They slumped and fell but we rose and gained strength. (Psalms 20:8-9) 

We will not win this war by the strength of our right hand. Just as in 1948, 1967, and 1973 – the IDF will win by the will of God.  

Our job is to ask Him for victory.  

When we fight on the Divine front with determination, our soldiers fight on the military front, and the influencers fight on the media front, then Hashem can grant us another miraculous victory in His compassion. A victory that will send shock waves to the four corners of the earth.  

A History of Hashem’s Redemption 

The first war we ever fought was on both the Divine and military fronts.  

When we left Egypt, Amalek attacked us. Our warriors fought valiantly, but it was prayer that was the deciding factor. When Moshe raised his arms in prayer, we were on the offensive. When he was too tired to keep his arms up, Amalek was on the offensive.  

Moshe kept praying and we won. To this day, God commands us to remember the first war we fought in our history – and how to win every one that follows.  Remember what Amalek did to you on the way, as you departed from Egypt. (Devarim 25:17)

The first war of conquest in Eretz Yisrael was on the Divine front. God split the Jordan River just like He split the Sea of Reeds so that we could enter and take the Land He gave us.  

At the battle of Jericho, God commanded we blow our shofars rather than rely on instruments of war, horses, or chariots. Hashem caused the walls surrounding Jericho to crash down, and we took the city.  

The City of David is not in the Old City of Jerusalem. It sits to the south, about 100 feet lower than the Old City. It was from the lowest, most vulnerable point that King David captured Jerusalem from the Jebusites. He became the first military leader to take Jerusalem by marching uphill toward Mount Moriah.  

Jerusalem would be conquered countless times after that, but only once more from the bottom of the valley. That battle was in the Six Day War when the Jewish People, once again, took the city of God with the help of God.  

The Six Day War itself was also a miracle. We didn’t take out the Egyptian Air Force because of superior intelligence, but only with Hashem’s help.  

The Path to Victory

The Lubavitcher Rebbe states that Jews praying, learning, and doing acts of kindness increase their merit before God, and this merit wins wars. He was the only person to announce that we would win the Six Day War, and he did it a week before the fighting started! 

Our mitzvot is what powers the IDF. It’s what launches our air force. It’s the secret to our intelligence services.  

Every Jew that does a mitzvah is serving the war effort. The more mitzvot, the stronger Hashem will make us.  Every added service of God adds to the fight. On the Divine front, we are far stronger than our enemies, and we have much more powerful combat tools.  

We are immensely stronger against the combined spiritual forces of the 8 billion people on Earth. Hashem commands His children 613 ways to give Him happiness. No other nation has been given instructions on how to gain favor in His eyes.  

But we must act. We have to man these battle stations. In this war, everybody must fight.  

The Jewish Arsenal 

Here are the major weapons in the Jewish arsenal:

Recite the Shema Yisrael Daily 

We declare the Oneness of God in this prayer and proclaim Him our King. You can recite it every day. If you want to hear the melody first, listen here.  

Recite Birkat HaMazon 

When you eat a piece of bread, you can recite a prayer directly commanded by God in His Torah. TIP: Read it in English first. It’s a powerful and beautiful prayer. You can listen to it here.  

Recite Psalms 

 “…if we only knew the power of verses of Psalms and their effect in the spiritual realms, we would recite them constantly.” (The Tzemach Tzedek) 
 

You can recite any of the 150 Psalms of King David. You can find them online (Artscroll Tehillim, pocket-sized) or buy a Book of Psalms at your local Judaica store. Any synagogue will have them. In an Artscroll Siddur, the entire Book of Psalms is in the back of the siddur.  

 

Reciting any Psalm is powerful. For asking God for His help in war, Psalms 20, 22, 69, 83, 121, 122, 124, and 150 are recommended.  

Light Candles for Shabbat 

We can usher in the Shabbat at nightfall on Friday with two candles. It’s that simple. This is a great way to start if you have never guarded Shabbat.  

 
For thousands of years, our Sages have taught us that more than the Jews guard Shabbat, Shabbat guards the Jews.  
 
Here are some examples: 
 
Example 1  

Two girls decided to start guarding Shabbat a few weeks before the music festival on Simchat Torah. They had planned to go to the music festival, but started to rethink what they would do. The party started on Thursday and continued to Sunday. They decided to stay the first two days, and then leave on Shabbat.  
 

As people who were just beginning Shabbat observance, they left Saturday morning. A lot of Jews taking on this mitzvah do it gradually, in steps. They left the Kibbutz minutes before the Hamas terrorists attacked.  

 

Shabbat saved their lives.  

Example 2 
 
Two kibbutzim along the Gaza Strip were Shabbat observant: Kibbutzim Sa’ad and Mefalim. They keep their gates closed throughout the holiday. Upon attacking these kibbutzim, terrorists converged on the gates with automatic guns, motorcycles, and vehicles. They couldn’t penetrate the front gates.  

 

Then, the readiness teams on the kibbutzim started firing back at them. The terrorists fled and nobody on the kibbutzim was wounded or abducted.  

Learn the Laws of Modesty 

For men, start wearing tzitzit. This is a mitzvah that you are performing every moment that you are wearing them. It’s a commandment that God gives us inside the Shema Yisrael (third paragraph, Bamidbar 15:37-41).  

 

There was a Jewish man who lived 20 kilometers north of Gaza, and he heard about the attack. Observing the mitzvah of saving human life, he jumped into his car and raced the battlefield to save as many civilians as possible. After making several heroic trips and rescuing people, he got into a firefight with some terrorists.  

 

He killed many terrorists, but then he got shot. He and the terrorists were lying face down. When the IDF arrived, they saw a group of people in civilian clothes holding guns and lying in their own blood.  

 

The IDF thought that all of them were terrorists and got ready to kill anyone who moved. As our hero started to move, the soldiers aimed their weapons. In a second, one of the religious soldiers ran in front of this man and ordered the soldiers to stand down. He said this man was Jewish.  

 

How did he know? Our hero was wearing tzitzit. This mitzvah saved his life.  

 
The greatest strength of the Jewish People is in the modesty of the women. Any Jewish woman who dresses modestly is a true warrior – especially today. Her deeds will shake the heavens. Her willpower will subdue the savages.  

Read Rabbi Arush’s The Garden of Emunah 

Is it possible to fight on the Divine front at every moment? Yes! We can attack nonstop, pulverizing the enemy relentlessly.  

 

The first mitzvah in the Ten Commandments is to have faith in God. I am the Lord your G‑d, Who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. (Shemot 20:2-3)

It’s the most beautiful commandment in the Torah, and it will change your life. You don’t have to have any experience with Judaism to learn this powerful transformation to happiness and strength. 

 

The Garden of Emuna is Rabbi Shalom Arush’s timeless work.  

Read Rabbi Arush’s The Garden of Peace 

Is there another way to constantly advance and gain ground? Yes.  

 

Like emunah, this is another key to unlocking a massive wealth of happiness. At every moment, you can give the most precious gifts of love and kindness to the people who mean the most in your life.  

 

Rabbi Arush’s epic The Garden of Peace teaches you how to light up your home with boundless joy by fighting for the people you love the most. The result is a never-ending love story between you and your wife, you and your children, God and your family, and the God of Israel and His children – the People of Israel.  

Put on Tefillin 

Go to your local Chabad House and ask to put on tefillin.  
 
There are Chabad Houses in every city in Israel, America, and Europe. Their mission is to enable any Jew to perform the mitzvot of God. On the Divine front, they arm the troops.  

 

Find the center closest to you and give them a call. They will be happy to help. Ask them every question you can think of.  This is their job. On the eve of the Six Day War, the head of the movement, the Lubavitcher Rebbe, commanded all of Chabad to teach everything they could to any Jew with the courage to ask.  

Learn Torah 

Learn about how to speak with a refined voice (email alessonaday@chofetzchaimusa.org). Learn about the laws of Jewish Purity. Listen to a Torah lecture on your phone. There are limitless ways to learn Torah.  

With every letter of the Torah, you are beseeching God’s protection over His children. You are advancing your nation on the Divine front.  

Our National Duty  

From the first war ever fought to our current confrontation with evil, generals have always looked for a hole in the enemy’s defenses.  

In 1973, Ariel Sharon saw that the Egyptians weren’t guarding the Sinai border, so he bypassed their army and went straight to Cairo. Fifty years later, Hamas saw that we weren’t manning the Gaza border, so they plowed right through and did the unthinkable.  

On the Divine front, the enemy is nowhere to be seen because we command the entire battlefield with prayer, Torah learning, and mitzvot. In the name of their god, Hamas committed rape, torture, and murder. If we invoke the Name of our King to do His Will, He will do our will.  

But to win, we have to advance at this point. We have to charge the Divine front. Run to God!  

Beseech Him to protect us as He did in the battle of Jericho, the victory of Gidon at Givat Ha’More, and the victories of 1948, 1967, and 1973. Call out to Him with a nonstop barrage of prayer, kindness, and mitzvot, and He will grant us a victory more miraculous than anything humanity has ever witnessed.  

Hashem will save! The King will answer us on the day we call. (Psalms 20:10) 

Then they will say among the nations, “The Lord has done great things with these. (Psalms 126:2) 

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David Ben Horin lives in Afula with his family, millions of sunflowers, and Matilda, our local camel. David‘s Israeli startup, Center Stage Marketing, is a lean marketing agency for startups and small businesses that creates and promotes SEO optimized ROI-driven to the right audience on LinkedIn to make your business the star of the show.