I don't get it. He quotes [at the 54 minute mark] the Ramban [mitzva dalet] as saying that there is a mitzva to establish a medina. He writes:
This means that we may not leave it in Gentile hands. The country should be inhabited and controlled by Jews. But the Rambam doesn't count this as a mitzva [as the Megilas Esther points out]. Rav Schachter says that the Rambam DID count the mitzva when he says that there are three mitzvos we have to do when we come to Eretz Yisrael - establish a medina, wipe out Amalek and build the Beis Hamikdash.
This is difficult for me to understand [אחרי בקשת מחילה מכבודו]. The Rambam never says that there is a mitzva to have a medina. He says that the mitzva is to establish a KING. THAT is a pasuk. שום תשים עליך מלך. But a secular, "democratic" governement with representatives from Arab parties and whose decisions are not based on the Torah and often are against Torah [they recently "voted Shabbos out of office" and ruled that in Tel Aviv stores may remain open on Shabbos]??
That is a mitzva mi-dioraisa?? Is that what the Rambam meant? The Ramban? Hashem wants us to have a secular rule in the holy land??
Pragmatically - we need a medina. There are many wonderful things about it. We have to have gratitude that they built up the country so beautifully. It is MUCH BETTER than the Gentile alternative. We know what life was like here under different foreign governments. But the עצם המדינה - the very governement itself?? It is hard for me to swallow that it is a mitzva di-oraisa.
As I noted in a recent post - the Chazon Ish and just about every gadol since the birth of the State didn't think so and on the contrary....
Am I wrong??
