The conscription bill being pushed through by Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee chairman Boaz Bismuth gives the ultra-Orthodox everything they wanted.
It would restore various special benefits, including funding for day care and discounts on National Insurance Institute payments. It would even restore half of the government-funded stipends for draft-age yeshiva students that were previously canceled. And on top of that, it sets global conscription quotas for the community, thereby removing the responsibility from individuals.
This is a complete farce, and there's no chance that the Supreme Court will uphold it. The Finance Ministry's budget department analyzed the bill and concluded that it will do nothing to increase the number of ultra-Orthodox conscripts, and therefore won't make it possible to ease the burden of reserve duty on those who do serve. Moreover, it will undermine efforts to integrate ultra-Orthodox men into the labor market.
The department estimated that if this draft-dodging bill becomes law, the economic damage it will cause will run to tens of billions of shekels a year. And on top of the enormous economic damage, it will deal a mortal blow to the values of equality and social solidarity, which is a surefire recipe for worsening societal rifts.
Yet the government is trying to pass this draft-dodging bill, which is wholly bad for the country, and isn't even trying to hide it. And it is doing so after two years of war in which the burden on reservists hit its highest level since the state was established. Not only that, but the government is planning to make existing reservists do two months a year of reserve duty in the coming years as well, and it's working to extend compulsory service for conscript soldiers by six months. Shamefully, that never stopped its members from repeatedly demanding that the war be prolonged without any security justification and even opening new fronts in it.
The Israel Defense Forces urgently needs another 12,000 soldiers to handle its missions. If the ultra-Orthodox aren't drafted, the people who will fill that hole are reservists – people with families who are working or attending college and will therefore be removed from the labor market and higher education. The price of such a step would be astronomical. Since the war began in October 2023, the state has paid reservists 70 billion shekels ($21.5 billion), while their absence from work has caused a loss of economic activity that is estimated at 120 billion shekels. And all that is happening when there are 100,000 ultra-Orthodox men of draft age (18 to 28), and 14,000 ultra-Orthodox boys who turn 18 and join their ranks every year.
The good of the country requires reducing the burden on the people who fought for the last two years, spent hundreds of days away from home and paid heavy prices – personal, familial and financial. Yet the government is doing the polar opposite. Instead of imposing real sanctions, as the Supreme Court demanded, that would push ultra-Orthodox men to enlist, it is pushing legislation that would restore all the benefits stripped from draft-age ultra-Orthodox men who don't enlist.
The government has no mandate to increase the burden on the serving public at a time when it is granting a sweeping exemption to a different segment of society. This is a moral, social and economic injustice, and it will ultimately destroy Israel's future.
The above article is Haaretz's lead editorial, as published in the Hebrew and English newspapers in Israel.