Shmarya Green is a Canadian from Toronto. In 2015, The Hamilton Jewish News (HJN) published an article titled, “A Tale Of Three Soldiers: Why The Grandchildren Of Three Iconic Hamilton Rabbis Joined The IDF,” which featured Green and two other individuals included in this database: Rebecca Baskin and Josh Goldberg.
The article stated, “The common thread in the aliyah stories of Goldberg, Green and Baskin is twofold — each of them grew up in families with deeply Zionistic roots.” It noted that Green’s parents are Moishe Green and Faigy Green, and that there was “never any doubt” that Shmarya would eventually live in Israel.
The article states, “Green made aliyah in 2006 directly after he graduated high school, enrolling in Yeshivat Har Etzion, a Hesder yeshiva located in the south Judean hills outside of Jerusalem. Green opted to register in the yeshiva’s Israeli stream, rather than its American program, ‘because I knew I was staying and that I wanted to go into the army so I spent a lot of time getting to know the Israelis because in the end you end up going to the army with them.’ It was a strategy that served him well when Green was later accepted into the paratroopers brigade along with 10 of his classmates. The support they were able to offer each other was very helpful to him, especially during the difficult adjustment period.
‘It was pretty hard in the beginning because you don’t know what to expect. The Israelis, I guess, are born growing up knowing that they’re going into the army … and even though I had a lot of friends that went in before me, and I spoke to a lot of people, still nothing was really able to prepare you for (going from) being in charge of your life to being told every single second what to do.’ Within a month, Green understood the basic truth about army service, that ‘if you do what they tell you to do, things are going to be a lot easier.’ […]
Asked to comment upon the extent to which he experienced [the IDF] code being put into practice, Green reflected on a several month period in the territories, where his unit was assigned on anti-terrorism patrols. ‘There were times when they were throwing rocks or Molotov cocktails at us, where we were not allowed to use deadly force,’ he said. ‘You shoot in the air, you shoot at the ground, only last case scenario you’re allowed to shoot at their feet, because they don’t want to risk any possible civilian casualties, even if it means putting us more in harm’s way. So yes, I one hundred percent agree that the IDF is a moral army.’”
The article added, “Green is back in school pursuing a law degree at the Academic College of Israel in Ramat -Gan.” And it ended by stating, “The life choices made by these three young people serve as the greatest possible affirmation of the values in which they were raised. They do their parents, their grandparents and all of us proud.”
Green currently works at a law firm in Israel, according to his LinkedIn.
