Politicians reportedly reaching compromise on haredi service

Parties on all sides up in arms after Plesner Committee’s conclusions leaked on Tuesday • Haredi parties vow to torpedo Tal Law alternative • Coalition and opposition parties form bloc to pass legislation for limiting yeshiva students to 1,500 annually, 20% of draft age men.

Mati Tuchfeld, Dan Lavie, Shlomo Cesana, Yehuda Shlezinger and Gideon Allon, ISRAEL HAY7OM

A possible compromise could be in the works between the ultra-Orthodox parties and the members of the Plesner Committee, tasked with formulating a law that would see all of Israel’s citizens, including the currently exempt ultra-Orthodox, complete mandatory military or civilian service. The Chairman of Shas, the biggest ultra-Orthodox party, was set to meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday on the issue, after having boycotted the Plesner Committee since its inception.

The compromise shaping up between the haredim (ultra-Orthodox) and the committee involves imposing penalties only on yeshivot (religious schools) whose students evade the draft, rather than penalizing individual draft dodgers.

The Plesner Committee is slated to publish its conclusions next week. The Tal Law, which currently exempts the ultra-Orthodox community from mandatory service, will expire on August 1, and the committee has been mandated by the state to draft an alternative in efforts to ensure that the burden of service is shared more equally by Israel’s citizens.

Officials in a number of the haredi parties in Netanyahu’s coalition have already announced that they will torpedo most of the appendices to the new law as it passes through the Knesset legislation process. However, other coalition parties, such as Kadima and Yisrael Beytenu, are determined to ensure that Plesner’s conclusions are fully implemented.

Israel Hayom offered a preview of the committee’s conclusions on Tuesday. The new law will apparently be called “matmidim” (“diligent people”). It will stipulate that there are no automatic exemptions for haredi men. Only around 1,500 “dedicated” students will be allowed to remain at yeshivas to continue their studies. All yeshiva students who request exemptions will be given deferrals until the age of 22. Upon reaching the age of 22, they will have to choose between enlisting in the army or completing national service.

The most dramatic difference between the Tal Law and the new law is that only a small number of yeshiva students, who will no longer be referred to as individuals for whom “Torah is their profession”, but as “dedicated” Torah students, will be permitted to continue their studies and will receive an exemption from army service.

Initially, the committee proposed personally penalizing anyone who absolutely refuses to serve with economic sanctions, in addition to penalizing the yeshiva that teaches each of these individuals. Another proposal was to establish more hesder yeshivas – religious schools that integrate Torah study together with a shortened period of active military duty. For the first time, hesder tracks would also offer the option to serve in the Israel Security Agency [ISA] and the Mossad. The recommendations will be implemented over the course of the next four years, according to the committee.

Meanwhile, Netanyahu has been conducting talks with the haredi parties’ leaders in recent weeks in attempts to find ways together to make an agreeable framework for the Tal Law alternative before the Plesner Committee issues its conclusions.

On Tuesday, Netanyahu held meetings with haredi party leaders, Coalition leader MK Zeev Elkin and other coalition representatives and MK Yohanan Plesner, who chairs the committee. “We will find an agreeable solution,” Netanyahu said. “Nothing is unsolvable. We will find a way to equally share the burden without creating fear in Israeli society.”

Netanyahu is trying to bridge haredi demands and those of Vice Prime Minister Shaul Mofaz and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman. Haredi parties are demanding that service requirements will not directly affect funding for haredi schools and institutions. Mofaz and Lieberman both want to see every Israeli, no matter what sector, drafted for service.

Netanyahu reminded everyone that the Tal Law will only expire at the beginning of August, so there is still time for negotiation and a mutually agreeable solution.

Vice Prime Mininster Moshe (Bogie) Ya’alon spoke on Army Radio on Wednesday saying that, “this is a historic opportunity to achieve compulsory service for all, without breeding hatred for the ultra-Orthodox, like some politicians are trying to do.”

One official at the meetings noted, however, that, “the haredim are not ready for sanctions against anyone who refuses service and they oppose any limitation to the number of men studying Torah.”

Plesner, however, presents an uncompromising position with regard to imposing sanctions on individuals and institutions in the haredi world that do not want to serve, and capping exemption numbers at only 1,500 young men annually.

A high-ranking member of United Torah Judaism said that, “the prime minister will not allow Plesner and Mofaz to be unruly and pass decrees that the public cannot stand behind. We will not leave the government.”

In an interview with Israel Hayom on Tuesday, Shas Chairman Eli Yishai said that “this is a deliberate move by the [Plesner] Committee and the treasury to set quotas that on the one hand, the haredi community cannot achieve and, on the other hand, the army can neither handle nor does it desire. The army will continue with its policy and the treasury will make money.”

On Wednesday, Maj. Gen. Orna Barbivai, Head of the IDF Personnel Directorate, in an interview on Army Radio, insisted that the army was capable of absorbing a large number of haredi recruits. Barbivai added that, “the alternative – not to enlist haredi youth – is a less appealing option for Israeli society.”

The struggle goes beyond just the haredi parties. Recently, the heads of a number of coalition parties, including Kadima, Yisrael Beytenu and Independence, agreed to create a bloc to ensure that the Plesner Committee’s conclusions are implemented in Knesset legislation. Such a move could drive haredi parties out of the government, but opposition parties Labor and Meretz are expected to join the bloc.

As part of efforts to form this bloc, Lieberman and Mofaz visited the “Camp of Suckers” in Tel Aviv on Tuesday, where people who serve in the reserves are protesting the draft dodging among certain sectors of Israeli society.

“Everyone needs to serve,” Lieberman said. “We will only vote for a law that provides a real solution.” Despite insisting on service for all, Lieberman refused to commit to quitting the coalition if the new law was unacceptable.

Mofaz, in contrast, emphasized that, “I oppose the populism that is trying to turn this justified struggle for equality into a civil war. This will not be an opposition law, but rather a supportive law – it supports service and the state of Israel. The law needs to be implemented and, in the end, include additional groups to the circle of people serving and working.”

The “Camp of Suckers” issued a statement in response saying that: “The prime minister of Israel sold out the public that alone carries the military, economic and social burden. Once again he tricked us when he chose to bend the Plesner Committee, making it no more than a decorative committee. We still hope that Mofaz and the members of Kadima, together with the Zionist parties, won’t lend a hand to this going out of business sale. The part of the public that does serve is not launching an uncompromising battle to uphold the character of Israeli society and the State of Israel.”