Israel’s Supreme Court ruling on the military draft of ultra-Orthodox Jewish seminary students, known as “haredim,” is likely to plunge the country into new legal and political conflicts with implications for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ruling coalition government, which relies on two religious parties to serve as a majority, observers say.
The Israeli Supreme Court ruled unanimously, on Tuesday, that the state “must” recruit Jewish school students into the army, and halt the budgets of religious schools whose students evade military service.
The court’s decision found that there was no legal basis for exempting “haredi” men from military conscription, and explicitly stated that the government must “work to apply the military service law to yeshiva students,” forcing government agencies to take effective steps to recruit these men into the army. Israeli.
What does that step mean?
Military service is mandatory for males in Israel, while religious men are exempted in order to devote themselves to studying in religious institutes and preserving the identity of the people.
Haredi men of military age have been able to avoid conscription into the Israeli army for decades by enrolling in religious institutes and receiving repeated one-year deferrals of service until they reach the military service exemption age of 40.
The exemption for the “Haredim” dates back to the first days after the declaration of the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, when the first Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, exempted about 400 students from military service so that they could devote themselves to religious study.
Through this, Ben-Gurion hoped to protect Jewish knowledge and traditions after they were almost erased during the Holocaust.
Haredi opposition to joining the army is based on their strong sense of religious identity, a feeling that many families fear will be weakened by service in the army.
Some Haredi men perform military service, but most do not, something that many secular Israelis feel exacerbates social divisions.
Political repercussions
The court did not specify details regarding the implementation of the decision, which implies that the government has some freedom in determining the number of Haredi men it needs to recruit on an immediate basis, and also means that the Knesset will be able to influence how the conscription decision is implemented, according to the Times of Israel website. “.
Haredi party lawmakers have long viewed forced conscription of yeshiva students as a red line that threatens their fragile alliance with Netanyahu, who relies on their support to maintain his slim majority in the Knesset.
For Netanyahu, the risks are high. Although public opinion seems to support repealing the exemption, his government includes two religious parties whose withdrawal from the coalition could lead to new elections that opinion polls indicate that Netanyahu will lose.
Previously, the two ultra-Orthodox parties, United Torah Judaism and Shas, vowed to block any attempts to rescind the exemption.
Some within Netanyahu’s Likud party showed discomfort or opposition to the exemption, including Defense Minister Yoav Galant, a former general and a prominent member of the Likud party.
Netanyahu’s government is already trying to draft a law that is consistent with the Supreme Court’s decision without angering his coalition partners.
The draft law is still under discussion in the Knesset, and could provide for the gradual recruitment of an increasing number of Haredim into the army.
The government could promote this law, if approved by the Knesset, as evidence that it is implementing the court ruling while providing legal amendments that would mitigate the impact on Haredi religious institute students.
But if the bill falters and only a judicial ruling remains, it may put additional pressure on Netanyahu’s coalition, which could push Israel toward holding new elections.
Professor of Political Science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Meir Masri, said in an interview with Al-Hurra website, “There are multiple ways that every Israeli knows to evade military service. It is possible, for example, to circumvent the decision by postponing its implementation.”
Masri does not rely “much” on the court’s decision and considers it primarily symbolic. He adds, “The dispute over the issue of Haredi recruitment surfaces before every electoral battle in Israel.”
Masri believes that “it is important that these pressures influence public opinion, especially among the extremists, so that they realize the importance of contributing to defending the homeland and making sacrifices like the rest of the citizens.”
He points out that “studying religious sciences and regularly performing religious rituals does not conflict with service in the army,” pointing out that “equality in rights and duties is one of the pillars of the principle of citizenship.”
Religious Jews make up about 13 percent of Israel’s population of 10 million, according to the Central Bureau of Statistics.
The issue of recruiting religious Jews toppled a previous coalition government led by Netanyahu in 2018, a move that reinforced a state of political stalemate.
The head of the Israel Democracy Institute, Yohanan Plesner, a Jerusalem-based think tank, believes the court’s decision created “a gaping political wound at the heart of the ruling coalition that Netanyahu must urgently address now,” according to the newspaper.The New York Times“.
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