For modern Western readers, it seems natural to see a gaping divide between the Torah’s ritual laws (like the prohibitions against eating certain foods) and its civil laws (like those governing torts). The biblical text, by contrast, slips easily from one category to the other, while the Talmud recognizes a distinction but tends to portray both categories as part of a unified and unchanging divine law. Drawing on the work of the early-20th-century Russian talmudist Shimon Shkop, Chaim Saiman argues that the Jewish tradition does recognize a qualitative difference between these two areas of halakhah:

[I]f one confronts a piece of meat of unknown status, halakhah requires abstaining from it to avoid even the possibility of transgression. This principle [of caution] applies to any biblical [as opposed to rabbinic] prohibition. . . . Shkop notes, however, that theft is also a biblical prohibition. The principle of stringency in the case of doubt would therefore counsel that when there is factual or legal doubt as to who owns an asset, whoever has it in his possession should refrain from using the asset for fear of violating the biblical prohibition against theft.

Shkop notes that this is emphatically not the halakhic rule. . . . [H]alakhic civil law, like its secular counterparts, assumes that the plaintiff bears the burden of proof. . . . Unless and until the plaintiff meets his burden, the defendant is permitted to retain and use the disputed asset. But why, asks Shkop, is this instance any different from the meat of uncertain kosher status? . . .

Shkop answers this question by proposing a novel understanding of halakhic civil law. These rules, he argues, are not primarily established by divine mandate. Instead, human rationality and institutions create the system of property, ownership, contract, and tort. . . . While some elements of civil law are indeed determined by biblical exegesis, the bulk are generated by human reason. . . . In Shkop’s account, [therefore], the civil law allows for human intuition and reason to establish legal entitlements and liabilities. But it is the transcendent divine call, a call still heard echoing from Sinai, that calls upon us to live up to these obligations.

For some time, opponents of U.S support for Israel have been urging the White House to end the war in Gaza, or simply calling for a ceasefire. Douglas Feith and Lewis Libby consider what such a result would actually entail:

Ending the war immediately would allow Hamas to survive and retain military and governing power. Leaving it in the area containing the Sinai-Gaza smuggling routes would ensure that Hamas can rearm. This is why Hamas leaders now plead for a ceasefire. A ceasefire will provide some relief for Gazans today, but a prolonged ceasefire will preserve Hamas’s bloody oppression of Gaza and make future wars with Israel inevitable.

For most Gazans, even when there is no hot war, Hamas’s dictatorship is a nightmarish tyranny. Hamas rule features the torture and murder of regime opponents, official corruption, extremist indoctrination of children, and misery for the population in general. Hamas diverts foreign aid and other resources from proper uses; instead of improving life for the mass of the people, it uses the funds to fight against Palestinians and Israelis.

Moreover, a Hamas-affiliated website warned Gazans last month against cooperating with Israel in securing and delivering the truckloads of aid flowing into the Strip. It promised to deal with those who do with “an iron fist.” In other words, if Hamas remains in power, it will begin torturing, imprisoning, or murdering those it deems collaborators the moment the war ends. Thereafter, Hamas will begin planning its next attack on Israel:

Hamas’s goals are to overshadow the Palestinian Authority, win control of the West Bank, and establish Hamas leadership over the Palestinian revolution. Hamas’s ultimate aim is to spark a regional war to obliterate Israel and, as Hamas leaders steadfastly maintain, fulfill a Quranic vision of killing all Jews.

Hamas planned for corpses of Palestinian babies and mothers to serve as the mainspring of its October 7 war plan. Hamas calculated it could survive a war against a superior Israeli force and energize enemies of Israel around the world. The key to both aims was arranging for grievous Palestinian civilian losses. . . . That element of Hamas’s war plan is working impressively.