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ISRAEL’S ARMY EXEMPTIONS FOR THE ULTRA-ORTHODOX  
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Michael Brenner
March 15, 2024
The Conversation
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_ The Jewish state is divided over the Jewish religion _

Israeli police scuffle with ultra-Orthodox Jews as they block a main
road in Jerusalem during an October 2017 protest against Israeli army
conscription., AP Photo/Ariel Schalit

 

 
Just when you think nothing can surprise you anymore in Israeli
politics, someone always comes along with a new twist.

This time it was Yitzhak Yosef, one of Israel’s two chief rabbis. In
response to debates over whether ultra-Orthodox Jews should be
required to serve in the military, or continue to be excused to study
religious texts full time, he had a simple answer:

“If they force us to go to the army, we’ll all go abroad,” he
declared
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on March 9, 2024.

Ultra-Orthodox resistance to conscription is nothing new.

But the forcefulness of this declaration is new, especially coming in
the midst of a war. And Yosef is not any random rabbi. He is the son
of Ovadia Yosef
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who was the spiritual leader of the Shas Party: an important partner
in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing and religious
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governing coalition.

Ever since the state of Israel’s founding in 1948, ultra-Orthodox
Jews – those who take the strictest approach toward following Jewish
law, and are now around 14%
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of the population – have been exempt from military service. Among
all other Jewish citizens, from the secular to the modern Orthodox,
men are required to serve 32 months, and women 24, plus reserve duty.

In 2017, the country’s Supreme Court ruled against the exemptions
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but they have continued through a series of legislative workarounds.
The latest is due to expire at the end of March 2024
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however – and other Israelis’ resentment toward the ultra-Orthodox
exemption
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is at a high.

As a historian [[link removed]], I
see the conscription debate as more than a political crisis for
Israel’s government. The question is so sensitive because it opens
up fundamental questions about the cohesion of Israeli society in
general, and of the ultra-Orthodox, or “Haredi,” population’s
attitude toward the Jewish state in particular.

It also illustrates the complexity of a country that is not as easily
explained as many of its supporters and critics alike believe.

[A crowd of men wearing head coverings, with one man seated in front
wearing an ornate gold and black robe.]
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Yitzhak Yosef, center, the Sephardi chief rabbi of Israel, attends a
protest against religious reforms in Jerusalem in 2022. AP
Photo/Mahmoud Illean
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Initial compromise

Historically, Orthodox Jews struggled to justify the idea of a Jewish
state. They prayed for centuries to return to Jerusalem and rebuild
the temple, but had a specific return in mind: a Jewish state
established by the Messiah
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Any other kind of Jewish sovereignty, they believed, would be
blasphemy.

Theodor Herzl, who founded modern political Zionism in the late 1800s,
had a long beard and looked like a Biblical prophet. Yet he was
thoroughly secular and assimilated – he even lit a Christmas tree
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with his family. Herzl’s movement to encourage more European Jews to
migrate to the Holy Land had little appeal for the Orthodox.

There was, however, always a minority among the Orthodox who
identified with Zionism, the belief that Jewish people should have a
sovereign political state in the land of Israel. According to the
Talmud, the central source of Jewish law, saving lives is more
important than other commandments
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– and Zionism saved Jews from pogroms and other anti-Jewish violence
in Europe.

During the Holocaust, the vast majority of observant Jews in Eastern
Europe were murdered [[link removed]].
Afterward, many survivors who had previously opposed Zionism sought
refuge in the new state of Israel.

On the eve of Israel’s independence, David Ben-Gurion, the prime
minister of the state-to-be, entered an agreement
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the leaders of the two camps of Orthodox Jews.

The Haredim, or ultra-Orthodox, still refused to recognize the
legitimacy of a secular Jewish state. The so-called national religious
camp, on the other hand, embraced it.

Among other concessions, the new state granted exemption
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young Haredi Jews who wanted to study religious texts full time
instead of joining the army. That hardly seemed consequential, as the
young men in question numbered only a few hundred.

Shifting views

During the Six-Day War of 1967, Israel captured the Jewish holy sites
in Jerusalem as well as the Gaza Strip, West Bank, Golan Heights and
Sinai Peninsula [[link removed]].
Since then, the national religious camp, once a moderate force, has
developed into the spearhead of the right-wing settler movement
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[Young men sit at tables in a dimly lit temporary structure.]
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Jewish settlers study the Torah in a tent at the West Bank outpost of
Homesh, near the Palestinian village of Burqa, Jan. 17, 2022. AP
Photo/Ariel Schalit
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Unlike the first generations of Orthodox Zionists, national religious
Israelis today are Zionists not despite but because of messianism.
Israel, they believe, will help bring about the messianic age.
Therefore, right-wing religious Zionists – like Netanyahu’s
cabinet ministers Itamar Ben-Gvir
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and Bezalel Smotrich
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– are enthusiastic proponents of army service.

Not so the Haredim, the ultra-Orthodox.

To be clear, Haredi Jews are very diverse
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demographic includes families with roots everywhere from Poland and
Romania to Morocco and Iraq. It includes people who support Israel’s
existence, and opponents who burn the flag
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on Independence Day. It includes men who join the workforce and men
who dedicate their life to religious study.

The majority of Haredim living in Israel are not Zionists, yet live
there because it is the Holy Land and the state subsidizes their study
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Anything else – secular education, army service, and often paid work
– is seen as a distraction.

A minority of Haredi Jews serve in the armed forces voluntarily, and
more have enlisted
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since the beginning of the latest Israel-Hamas war. But they have no
legal obligation to do so; nor do Israel’s Arab citizens.

[Four men in black hats and jackets, as well as a child, stand near a
blue fence on a street, as they men look down at books in their
hands.]
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Jewish men pray in Jerusalem for the success of the Israeli army and
for the return of the Israeli hostages, on Nov. 9, 2023. AP Photo/Ohad
Zwigenberg
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Growing Haredi sector

Israel’s governments have continued to tolerate this situation
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ultra-Orthodox political parties became much-needed partners.

Yet legal and popular opposition has increased.

In 1998, the Supreme Court ruled that the defense minister has no
right to exempt Haredi Jews from military service
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and asked the government to find ways to draft them. In 2014, a
center-right government under Netanyahu passed a law
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aiming to have 60% of Haredi men serving within three years. But the
2015 elections brought Haredi parties back in power, and
implementation was effectively abandoned.

Since then, Haredi parties have become more powerful as their
population grows. Yet the Supreme Court has made clear that by the end
of March 2024, the government either needs to draft Haredim
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or the legislature has to come up with a new law to excuse them.

Seven in 10 Israeli Jews oppose the blanket exemption
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meaning another exemption might jeopardize Netanyahu’s government.
Frustration is also rising over plans to raise the military service of
men to three years and to double the duty of reservists to 42 days a
year
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during emergencies.

None of this would matter if the Haredim were still the same tiny
segment of society they were in 1948. Today, however, ultra-Orthodox
women have 6.5 children on average
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among other Jewish Israeli women, and 1 in 4 young children are
ultra-Orthodox [[link removed]].

The resulting transformation of Israeli society
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is easy to see. If the trend continues, Israel will become a very
different, very religious society – one that can hardly survive
economically.

On average, a non-Haredi household pays nine times more income tax
than a Haredi one, while the latter receives over 50% more state
support
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Even if they were ready to work, most Haredim would have a hard time
finding well-paid jobs, as their state-subsidized private schools
teach hardly any secular topics.

For Israeli society, this portends further fragmentation and a
weakening of the economy – to say nothing of the army.

But, Chief Rabbi Yitzhak says, this will never happen. In his and
other Haredim’s eyes, Israel’s soldiers succeed only because
religious Jews study and pray for them
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“They need to understand that without the Torah, without the
yeshivas, there’d be nothing, no success for the army,” he said.

_This article has been updated to correct the date that the military
exemption is due to expire._

Michael Brenner
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Professor of Jewish History and Culture at Ludwig Maximilian
University and Abensohn Chair in Israel Studies, American University

How The Conversation is different

Every article you read here is written by university scholars and
researchers with deep expertise in their subjects, sharing their
knowledge in their own words. We don’t oversimplify complicated
issues, but we do explain and clarify. We believe bringing the voices
of experts into the public discourse is good for democracy.

* Israel
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* Palestine
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* Haredi parties
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