UTJ leaders refuse Netanyahu request to delay haredi draft bill

While preparation of the haredi draft bill sped up in the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee in recent weeks, it is still unlikely to pass into law by March 3.

By ELIAV BREUER FEBRUARY 23, 2025 19:51

Police officers in Bnei Brak, Israel use water cannons as haredi Orthodox Jewish men block a main highway to protest efforts to allow the state to draft Haredi yeshiva students into military service, June 2, 2024. (photo credit: Amir Levy/Getty Images)

United Torah Judaism (UTJ) chairman Housing Minister Yizhak Goldknopf and Deputy Transportation Minister Uri Makleb rejected in a meeting of coalition party leaders on Sunday a request by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to drop their demand that a bill to regulate the haredi IDF draft pass prior to the 2025 budget, according to a source.

The annual state budget must pass by March 31, or the government falls. While preparation of the haredi draft bill sped up in the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee in recent weeks, it is still unlikely to pass into law by March 3.

Both Goldknopf, who leads the Hassidic Agudat Yisrael faction of UTJ, and MK Moshe Gafni, chairman of the Lithuanian Degel Hatorah faction of UTJ, have conditioned their support for the national budget on an acceptable draft bill passing first.

Makleb, who represented Gafni at Sunday’s meeting, further said that he did not want to go to Degel Hatorah’s rabbinical leadership for a consultation since the government has yet to put forward a full version of the bill, and therefore, he had nothing to show them, the source said.

Notably, according to the source Shas chairman MK Aryeh Deri took Netanyahu’s side at the meeting, and joined the request that the others suspend their ultimatum. Deri had previously also threatened to leave the government if a draft bill did not pass ahead of the budget, but his comments at Sunday’s meeting seemed to indicate a softening of his position.

HAREDI JEWS walk in the streets of the ultra-Orthodox neighborhood of Mea Shearim, in Jerusalem, earlier this month. (credit: Chaim Goldberg/Flash90)

Discussions on sanctions against haredi individuals

Meanwhile, the FADC convened on Sunday to begin discussions on sanctions against haredi individuals who ignore draft orders (as opposed to institutional sanctions on yeshivot that do not meet draft quotas). At the start of the meeting, FADC chairman MK Yuli Edelstein (Likud) denied a report that the prime minister had requested that he put forward a version of the bill by the end of the week.

In order to map out the current benefits awarded to yeshiva students, the committee’s legal team requested in advance that representatives of a series of government organs, including the finance and labor ministries and the National Insurance institution provide data regarding the extent and mechanisms of the benefits in question. These included haredi acceptance into government jobs via affirmative action, city tax discounts, and more.

Most importantly, however, was subsidized daycare for children aged 0-3, a benefit that is expected to expire at the end of February and could significantly impact haredi household income.

The FADC is scheduled to continue discussing the issue on Monday and Tuesday.