Plates Delivered to IDF Wrapped in Pages From Chumashim

The Defense Ministry immediately suspended the entire shipment, apologized and ordered that all the plates and the pages be collected until the matter was clarified with the contractor. Soldiers on the bases where the delivery was received were horrified to discover that instead of being wrapped in newspaper or other types of paper, large numbers of pages torn from Chumashim were used.

Many of the kitchen staff on the base are Torah-observant; they, and many secular soldiers as well, informed their commanders that they would not use plates from a company that desecrates sifrei Kodesh.

A senior defense ministry official clarified to Hamodia’s reporter that “the Defense Ministry considers this a very serious incident. As soon as the complaint was received the ministry questioned the Clear company, which won a tender to provide serving dishes for the IDF units. Clear replied that they used a subcontractor for the plates, and informed us that it will immediately collect all the plates from around the country and will stop working with the subcontractor from which the plates were purchased.”

While the Defense Ministry welcomes Clear’s move to discontinue ties with the subcontractor, the official said, it will still continue its investigation to ensure that such incidents do not happen again.

Clear said that it had filed a police complaint against Green Glass, the subcontractor that was hired to package the plates. The packers seem to have torn dozens, if not hundreds, of Chumashim for the pages.

Clear said in a statement that “we purchase utensils from Green Glass in closed cartons and ship them directly to the IDF bases without opening them. We were also shocked at the paper the plates were wrapped in. We are immediately collecting the plates. The entire process will be overseen by a representative of the Rabbinate in Be’er Sheva. In the meantime, the contract with Green Glass has been suspended. Our company has nothing to do with this serious incident, and we condemn all violation of religious sensitivities.”

This article appeared in print on page 1 of the January 16th, 2014 edition of Hamodia.