The Samaria Regional Council announced Wednesday that three new yeshivas will open this coming Elul in the communities of Emek Dotan, Ganim and Eival, as part of 18 new settlements planned in northern Samaria. The Eival branch will be led by Rabbi Aviad Shinwol and will open officially on 1 Elul as a branch of Yeshivat Alon Moreh, headed by Rabbi Elikim Levanon.
This morning, Levanon, Shinwol, Samaria Regional Council head Yossi Dagan, Elon Moreh institutions director Elissaf Parsan, and yeshiva students held a first planning visit and study day at the site on Mount Eival. They reviewed preparations for the first school year there and the continued development of the community.
The Eival yeshiva will be built in a site of special historical and national significance near the altar of Joshua bin Nun. It is intended to bolster the broader effort to strengthen settlement in northern Samaria and will be a central part of establishing the renewed Eival community, where families are also expected to move in later.
Two other yeshivas are also set to open in Elul. In Ganim, a higher yeshiva will be headed by Rabbi Neria Bulak as a branch of Yeshivat Bnei David in Eli, led by Rabbis Eli Sadan and Yigal Levinstein. In Emek Dotan, a yeshiva will open as a branch of Rabbi Chaim Baruch’s yeshiva and pre-army institutions, which currently operate in Lod, Bruchin and Tiberias.
Levanon called the Eival branch “a significant expression” of the path linking Torah and the Land of Israel. Shinwol said he was taking on the mission “with a deep sense of purpose and great humility.” Dagan said the openings mark “a tremendous value-based announcement for the State of Israel,” while Parsan described the project as proof that when Torah and the Land of Israel meet, “a new and irreversible reality” is created.
