Peri Committee plan calls for criminal prosecution of ultra-Orthodox who don’t register for draft, extends length of Hesder track
By GAVRIEL FISKE, GOI May 23, 2013, 4:39 pm 1
The Peri Committee on Thursday submitted for Knesset review the government’s plan for universal conscription, which, if passed, promises to significantly change the army’s relationship with Israel’s ultra-Orthodox citizens.
The bill would require ultra-Orthodox 18-year-old men and women to register for service, but if they are engaged in full-time Torah study allow them to defer it until age 21, at which time they will be forced to choose whether to enlist in the IDF or register for national or civil service.
Those who defer their service will have to be registered at yeshivot whose student bodies are subject to regular government auditing. Yeshivas that receive state funding and register their students for service deferment will also be required to introduce vocational training into their curriculum.
Individuals who do not register for the draft will be subject to criminal prosecution, as will yeshiva heads whose institutions do not comply with the new law. The bill also promises financial incentives and penalties for yeshivas according to their compliance with the registration rules.
The bill still allows for 1,800 top Torah scholars to be totally exempted from service per annum, far below the estimated 7,000-8,000 ultra-Orthodox 18-year-olds who do not currently register each year.
The committee’s recommendations also contain some general changes for the IDF, including a shortening of service for males from 36 to 32 months, and an extension of service for females to 28 months from 24. The plan also gradually extends and expands the Hesder yeshiva program, which combines Torah study with military training and will be an available option for ultra-Orthodox recruits.
Most of the changes would roll out in 2016, including the criminal prosecution of individuals who do not register for the draft, allowing for a transitional period to built up the bureaucratic and physical infrastructure needed to implement the changes.
The bill sets clear recruitment numbers for the ultra-Orthodox, to be gradually increased, beginning this year with the goal of 2,000 registrations for the IDF and another 1,300 for national and civil service. The bill also implements a 6,000-per-year recruitment goal for Israeli Arabs into civil service.
The bill is to be debated on Sunday at the weekly cabinet meeting, then passed to the Ministerial Legislative Committee, which will in turn pass it on for a preliminary reading in the Knesset plenum.
MK Uri Ariel, a member of the Ministerial Legislative Committee, said that a clause in the bill that seeks to lengthen the military service portion of the Hesder yeshiva track to two years (up from 16 months) was “completely opposite” to the coalition agreement upon which the the current government was founded. He said that his Jewish Home party would oppose the bill until it is modified to conform with previous agreements.
MK Yaakov Litzman of the ultra-Orthodox United Torah Judaism party said on Thursday that the bill was out of touch with reality and its recommendations would not be implemented. “Anyone who talks about limiting the number of Torah scholars, targeting outstanding young scholars, and quotas is ignorant,” he told Channel 10, calling the committee recommendations “condescending.”
“The value of Torah study doesn’t need to be proven to anyone,” he added. “In every generation, we safeguarded the Torah scholars, and today we won’t have a situation where a person who wants to study Torah in Israel will find himself in jail.”
Litzman said it was striking that there were no ultra-Orthodox members on the Peri Commission, named for its chairman, MK Yaakov Peri.
MK Meir Porush, also of the UTJ, called on the rabbis of the modern Orthodox Jewish Home party to oppose the bill. “It’s not too late,” he said. “Don’t let your hands damage the Torah and the holy yeshivas.”
Right-leaning Zionist NGO Im Tirtzu expressed support for the bill, calling it a “significant first step” in a long-term process to ensure equal service for all Israeli citizens, “regardless of religion, race, gender or sector.” By imposing mandatory service, the bill presented a formula allowing for ultra-Orthodox and Arab Israelis to enjoy increased social integration and presence in the labor market, the group said.
In February 2012, the Supreme Court ruled that the Tal Law, which had granted sweeping de-facto exemptions from military or national service to ultra-Orthodox Israelis, was unconstitutional.
Following the ruling, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that the Knesset would draft a revised, more equitable law, which ultimately was not approved by the Knesset. Following the January 2013 elections, Netanyahu formed the Peri Committee to draw up another universal service recommendation.
Aaron Kalman contributed to this report.
They should definitely NOT be supported by taxpayer funds.
@ Laura:
Information distributed must be based on reality.
Did anyone bother to check the new budget allocations?
The Haredi schools and institutions as well as other religious and Jewish secular schools are severely cut from income generated by taxes.
How about the Moslem schools and Medrasahs, Mosques etc?
Their budgets are to remain the same or increased… I concluded that since the “leadership” has refused to respond to my requests for information.
The idf does not need recruits, there more than enough of them to attack Jews and run from the Arabs. That is the only activities they have proven to be persistent at.
The other being their charlatans blabbering about menaces and super duper make believe abilities.
I am a former decorated idf soldier, OT LEBANON. Also former Senior Fellow Engineer, Miltary Avionics. The idf today is unworthy to be kept up at command level.
Anyone trusting that garbage is suicidal.
@ NormanF:
The last time America won a significant war it was with draftees.
The draft here and in America (when there was a draft) gives the military a much larger grop of pooled talent to choose from. The so called professional army is one made up of mostly those at the bottom or near bottom of the socio… economic strata in America and I don’t want it here where the poorest are accepted and used as fodder for the well to do.
Our strength is when everyone or nearly everyone has skin in the game. I think that during Nam years if America had had a 100% so called professional army, there would have been little to no social unrest and protest.
Today except for family and friends of those serving in the US Military nobody cares except maybe for the expense but two wars fought simultaneously or over 12 years would be unheard of if there was still the draft.
Professional soldiers in America are virtually perceived as mercenaries. Yes many on the conservative right pay patriotic lip service to our boys in uniform but that’s mostly nostalgia not translating into political and grass-root opposition to 2 stupid wasteful wars that few understand the reasons why they are fighting them.
In Israel the military is the consensus around social, cultural, ethnic and religious differences and fosters national cohesion. Nobody comes out worse than when the went in. It bonds people like nothing else in our society has or in my view can. Even if it’s wasteful it’s worth it.
Yamit,
If people have to be forced to serve, its not going to unify native Israelis, immigrants and Arabs.
The key is to make it attractive for people to enlist of their own will. They do so in the US at a higher rate than when America had a draft.
And people are more motivated to defend their country and not just because they receive material benefits. A professional IDF is one that is going to get the job done.
I don’t believe a military is meant to be a social institution. There are other ways to better integrate the Jewish people in Israel apart from the draft.
@ NormanF:
@ Laura:
Keep the draft and find a better way within the IDF to utilize redundancy.
The United States Military was far more dynamic and had a much higher level of personnel when there was a draft.
Consider that the ratio of combat soldier, sailor and airmen to those in support and admin roles is close to 10 to 1.
The more technology dependent the military the more they are dependent on the best of the best in all capacities. A professional military cannot fill those requirements. Especially when the social status of the military is low in our societies.
Why give those who do not serve the advantage of a 2-3 year educational and earning head start. It would mean that those serving are suckers.
There is no reason today that our system allows active duty military personnel to retire at near full retirement pay and be allowed without penalty to attain after military service second career even in Government.. Today half our defense budget goes to benefits and pensions of military retirees for life.
While all militarizes are by nature wasteful the IDF funded by American aid is excessively wasteful.
The IDF has an irreplaceable societal function in it’s ability to assimilate a myriad of cross cultures and individual beliefs. Most Israelis because we all have skin in the game revere the IDF. Commonly hear in Israel is the slogan: “We are the IDF and the IDF is us” It’s the only unifying agency of government that seems to work and is mostly respected by most israelis.
Making the IDF professional and eliminating the draft will remove the one institution that seems to have worked positively in social integration and that includes the Heredi.
I submit that any Israel citizen not serving in some IDF capacity should be mobilized into work battalions—-filling according to their abilities all functions of foreign workers from 2-3 years with the stigma and penalty of being barred from any social service provided by the state and being barred from any civil service position or political office if they for any reason opt out or gain somehow a legal deferment.
In Israel almost 50% of our work force is employed in some form of government employment.
@ NormanF:
Don’t you think its unfair for Haredi to be exempt from military service while being given state benefits, all the while the rest of the Jewish population is subjected to the draft? I can certainly understand the resentment against Haredi. The Heredi are arrogant and view themselves as entitled.
Perhaps an all volunteer service would be preferable.
I’m in favor of abolishing the IDF draft. Why should the IDF be forced to induct recruits it says it doesn’t need?
Any Jew who wants to serve can volunteer! Israel would be better off with a professional all-volunteer army than to exacerbate existing social divisions.
If the aim of those who seek to draft haredi Jews is to assimilate them into secular Israeli culture, their aim is doomed.
This bill has nothing to do with strengthening national unity among the Jewish people. There are other ways to achieve it but they are not being considered.