A Crisis Looms in Israel Regarding Ultra-Orthodox Military Draft Bill

A looming political storm over drafting Haredi men into the military is jeopardizing Israel's government and fracturing the state.

The public mood on the question has changed profoundly in Israel following two years of hostilities, and this is now possibly the most volatile political issue facing Benjamin Netanyahu.

The Constitutional Battle

Lawmakers are now debating a draft bill to abolish the deferment given to yeshiva scholars enrolled in yeshiva learning, instituted when the modern Israel was founded in 1948.

That exemption was declared unconstitutional by Israel's High Court of Justice in the early 2000s. Stopgap solutions to maintain it were officially terminated by the court last year, forcing the government to begin drafting the community.

Some 24,000 call-up papers were issued last year, but merely about 1,200 Haredi conscripts showed up, according to army data shared with lawmakers.

Friction Spill Into Violence

Tensions are erupting onto the public squares, with parliamentarians now deliberating a new legislative proposal to require yeshiva students into national service alongside other Jewish citizens.

Two representatives were confronted this month by radical elements, who are furious with parliament's discussion of the bill.

In a recent incident, a special Border Police unit had to extract enforcement personnel who were surrounded by a sizeable mob of ultra-Orthodox protesters as they attempted to detain a man avoiding service.

These enforcement actions have prompted the establishment of a new alert system named "Dark Alert" to spread word quickly through ultra-Orthodox communities and mobilize protesters to block enforcement from happening.

"Israel is a Jewish nation," remarked an activist. "One cannot oppose the Jewish faith in a nation founded on Jewish identity. That is untenable."

A Realm Separate

But the transformations affecting Israel have not reached the environment of the Torah academy in an ultra-Orthodox city, an Haredi enclave on the outskirts of Tel Aviv.

In the learning space, young students sit in pairs to debate Judaism's religious laws, their brightly coloured writing books standing out against the seats of formal attire and small black kippahs.

"Arrive late at night, and you will see half the guys are studying Torah," the leader of the seminary, Rabbi Tzemach Mazuz, said. "By studying Torah, we protect the soldiers wherever they are. This is how we contribute."

Haredi Jews maintain that unceasing devotion and spiritual pursuit guard Israel's soldiers, and are as vital to its defense as its tanks and air force. This tenet was endorsed by previous governments in the previous eras, the rabbi said, but he acknowledged that public attitudes are shifting.

Growing Popular Demand

The Haredi community has significantly increased its proportion of the country's people over the past seven decades, and now represents 14%. A policy that originated as an exemption for several hundred Torah scholars became, by the start of the Gaza war, a cohort of some 60,000 men exempt from the national service.

Opinion polls show backing for ending the exemption is growing. Research in July showed that 85% of non-Haredi Jews - encompassing a large segment in Netanyahu's own right-wing Likud party - supported penalties for those who declined a enlistment summons, with a solid consensus in approving withdrawing benefits, the right to travel, or the electoral participation.

"I feel there are citizens who live in this country without giving anything back," one off-duty soldier in Tel Aviv explained.

"In my view, regardless of piety, [it] should be an reason not to perform service your state," added a Tel Aviv resident. "If you're born here, I find it rather absurd that you want to opt out just to engage in religious study all day."

Views from the Heart of Bnei Brak

Advocacy of broadening conscription is also found among traditional Jews beyond the ultra-Orthodox sector, like a Bnei Brak inhabitant, who lives near the seminary and notes religious Zionists who do serve in the military while also engaging in religious study.

"I'm very angry that this community don't perform military service," she said. "It's unfair. I too follow the Torah, but there's a teaching in Jewish tradition - 'Safra and Saifa' – it means the scripture and the guns together. This is the correct approach, until the messianic era."

The resident runs a local tribute in Bnei Brak to fallen servicemen, both from all backgrounds, who were lost in conflict. Rows of photographs {