The text of a law to regulate haredi (ultra-Orthodox) service in the IDF is expected to be published within days, and the legislative process will likely resume in the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee at some point next week, a spokesperson for committee chairman Yuli Edelstein said Thursday.
The text is expected to reflect agreements reached between Edelstein and representatives of the Knesset’s haredi parties on June 12, the eve of the Israeli strike against Iran, with some adaptations, the spokesperson said.
The committee’s legal team is nearing completion of the full text of the bill. Despite the text being unknown as of yet, the bill is already at an advanced stage in the legislative process. It requires voting in the committee on every clause and then two final votes in the Knesset plenum.
The text is still unknown because the dozens of discussions in the Knesset panel over the past year were based on a bill by the previous government in 2022 that had already passed its first reading. Last year, the coalition “recycled” the 2022 bill, despite the attorney-general deeming this “not legally viable” since the 2022 bill was irrelevant to the IDF’s post-October 7 massacre needs.
Once the new version of the bill is presented in the committee, the coalition said it would attempt to push it through as quickly as possible so it can pass into law prior to the end of the Knesset’s summer term on July 27.
Thousands of draft orders to be sent out
Meanwhile, IDF sources said 54,000 draft orders to eligible haredi men who have yet to receive them would start going out as soon as July 8.
As of June 2024, there is no legal exemption from IDF service for the more than 80,000 eligible haredi men. Government representatives pledged to the High Court of Justice that the IDF would draft a maximum capacity of 4,800 haredim in the 2024-025 draft year, which ended on June 30. However, the IDF only reached about half this number.
Meanwhile, haredi yeshivot are no longer eligible for state funds for students who are of military age, and students no longer qualify for state-subsidized daycare for their children. Haredi MKs hope the bill’s passage will enable these funds to resume flowing.
The June 12 agreement was not published officially, and according to Edelstein’s spokesperson, the details still require fine-tuning. Edelstein was willing to make concessions on the eve of the airstrikes against Iran to avoid the passing of a preliminary vote to disperse the Knesset, but he may walk back some of these concessions, the spokesperson said.
These changes could include an increase in the annual quotas or demanding that some of the sanctions come into effect sooner, the spokesperson said.
Draft agreements' main points
The following are the agreement’s main points as of June 12, confirmed by two sources with knowledge of the matter:
No. 1: A gradual increase in draft quotas, beginning with 4,800 haredi draftees in the 2025-2026 draft year that begins on July 1; 5,700 draftees in the following year; and 50% of the haredi graduating class within five years (about 9,000 recruits out of an estimated 18,000 graduates). Reaching 95% of the quota will be considered sufficient.
No. 2: Sanctions for draft dodgers will apply gradually, some immediately, and others following six months, a year, and two years. Immediate sanctions on individuals upon the law’s enactment include: suspension of driver’s license and prohibition from obtaining one; travel restrictions on leaving the country (with an exceptions committee); cancellation of affirmative action in public service employment; cancellation of subsidies for academic studies; and loss of tax credit points until age 26 (for those working).
No. 3: Following six months, if draft quotas are not met, draft dodgers will no longer receive subsidies on public transportation or on daycare for the following six months.
No. 4: Following a year, draft dodgers will lose, for the following year, National Insurance Institute benefits, access to discounted housing programs, and subsidies on second-hand real-estate purchases.
No. 5: Following two years, draft dodgers will lose access to subsidized afternoon daycare and subsidies on new real-estate purchases.
No. 6: Sanctions on yeshivot that do not meet quotas: If 75% or more of the quota is met, the remaining portion will be doubled and deducted from yeshiva funding. For example, if 80% of the target is achieved, the remaining 20% is doubled (40%) and cut from the yeshiva budget. If less than 75% of the target is met, 100% of yeshiva funding is revoked.
Criticism against the draft bill
Haredi MKs have said the agreement constituted serious concessions, but several officials and opposition MKs said there were significant flaws that would ultimately not lead to increased service.
Critics said the quotas themselves might be a nonstarter since the IDF has already announced it has the capacity to recruit the entire haredi pool of eligible men by 2026. The legal basis of only requiring about 10,000 recruits out of an estimated 80,000 eligible one was unclear.
Additional criticism was that the so-called personal sanctions, which would apply immediately, are not so damaging. They block access to leaving the country, getting a driver’s license, and subsidies for academic tuition costs and tax credit points.
For the most part, these would not significantly affect many young haredi yeshiva students. In the meantime, the law would free up funds to yeshivot and parents that are currently frozen because of students’ draft evasion.
The head of the Finance Ministry Budget Department, Yoav Gardos, wrote in a letter to Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee legal adviser Miri Frenkel-Shor on Wednesday that the agreement would actually serve as an incentive not to enlist and not to work, thereby perpetuating the issues that it set out to solve.