On the eve of the Civil War, the problem of escaped slaves who were apprehended after fleeing to the North aggravated the tensions between the free states and the South. While the 1850 Fugitive Slave Act required that free states return escapees to their masters, Deuteronomy states unequivocally, “Thou shalt not deliver unto his master the servant which is escaped from his master unto thee. He shall dwell with thee, even among you, in that place which he shall choose in one of thy gates, where it liketh him best: thou shalt not oppress him.” Yitzhak Melamed examines how Christian and Jewish exegetes explained this law:

Abraham Ibn Ezra (ca. 1089–1164), a polyglot and an astounding poet, grammarian, philosopher, astronomer, and Bible commentator [argued that] abuse of the slave reflects poorly on the nature of God, desecrating the divine name. According to Ibn Ezra’s explanation, the prohibition on returning the slave to his (legal) master is not grounded in the moral norms of the society from which the slave ran away (where the slave is just a criminal fugitive), nor is it clear what Israelite norm requires assisting the fugitive slave (since slavery was legal among the Israelites). It is just “God’s honor” that commends sheltering the slave . . . and providing him an asylum.

Moses Maimonides (1138–1204), [by contrast, believed that] the purpose of the law is to cultivate a moral and psychological trait of standing on the side of the weak and the abused.

In its historical context, Deuteronomy’s law stands in contrast to those of other ancient Near Eastern legal collections, which frequently include prohibitions against harboring fugitive slaves.

As we mentioned in yesterday’s newsletter, Israeli special forces carried out a daring boots-on-the-ground raid on September 8 targeting the Scientific Studies and Research Center (SSRC) in northwestern Syria. The site was used for producing and storing missiles which are then transferred to Hizballah in Lebanon. Jonathan Spyer notes that the raid was accompanied by extensive airstrikes in Syira,and followed a few days later by extensive attacks on Hizballah in Lebanon, one of which killed Mohammad Qassem al-Shaer, a senior officer in the terrorist group’s Radwan force, an elite infantry group. And yesterday, the IDF destroyed a weapons depot, an observation post, and other Hizballah positions. Spyer puts these attacks in context:

The direct purpose of the raid, of course, was the destruction of the facilities and materials targeted. But Israel also appeared to be delivering a message to the Syrian regime that it should not imagine itself to be immune should it choose to continue its involvement with the Iran-led axis’s current campaign against Israel.

Similarly, the killing of al-Shaer indicated that Israel is no longer limiting its response to Hizballah attacks to the border area. Rather, Hizballah operatives in Israel’s crosshairs are now considered fair game wherever they may be located in Lebanon.

The SSRC raid and the killing of al-Shaer are unlikely to have been one-off events. Rather, they represent the systematic broadening of the parameters of the conflict in the north. Hizballah commenced the current round of fighting on October 8, in support of Hamas in Gaza. It has vowed to stop firing only when a ceasefire is reached in the south—a prospect which currently seems distant.