Israel may be heading to snap elections over the enlistment of a few hundred more ultra-Orthodox recruits, which would do little to address the army’s manpower woes
That Israel may be heading toward a second general election within months — if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fails to form a majority coalition — actually has relatively little to do with the military or its very real manpower concerns, even though this failure stems from irreconcilable differences between the secular Yisrael Beytenu party and the ultra-Orthodox factions over the conscription of yeshiva students.
Yisrael Beytenu chief Avigdor Liberman is demanding an increase in the level of ultra-Orthodox, or Haredi, enlistment in the Israel Defense Forces, with the threat of economic sanctions on ultra-Orthodox institutions if they do not meet these goals. The Haredi parties, United Torah Judaism and Shas, are demanding precisely the opposite: more exemptions for their communities’ yeshiva students. And Netanyahu needs both Liberman and the ultra-Orthodox parties for a majority coalition.
The IDF is indeed grappling with the potential threat of significant troop shortages following a 2015 amendment to the country’s draft law that cut the mandatory service for men from three years to two years and eight months, and plans to further reduce males’ service to 30 months beginning in 2020.
Yet while ostensibly stemming from the manpower needs of the military, the direct impetus for this partisan fight between Yisrael Beytenu and the Haredi parties comes not from IDF requests, but from legal necessity.
In 2012, the High Court of Justice struck down the 2002 “Tal Law,” which had dictated ultra-Orthodox enlistment levels but was found to do so unfairly and thus illegally. A more demanding replacement law was proposed in 2013 by the Yesh Atid party, but it was soon amended and moderated once the Haredi parties were brought back into the government. In 2017, the High Court struck down that law as well, declaring it similarly unjust.
Even during the years when this weakened 2013 replacement law was in effect, the IDF never reached the prescribed Haredi enlistment numbers, sometimes falling short by hundreds of recruits.
While Netanyahu now needs to find another formulation, one that simultaneously satisfies the demands of Liberman, the ultra-Orthodox parties, and the High Court of Justice, ensuring the IDF has its manpower requirements met is not one of these demands. And nor would even the most dramatic of proposals that are seriously being considered come close to meeting the IDF’s needs.
Liberman’s plan, while seen as entirely too extreme by the Haredi factions, would see only a comparatively modest increase in the number of ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students. The proposal put forward by Liberman’s Defense Ministry last year would initially require 3,348 ultra-Orthodox men to enlist in the IDF each year and another 648 take part in some kind of national service, a small increase on the current quotas. These numbers would increase, first by eight percent each year for three years, then 6.5 percent for another three years and finally by five percent for four more years, reaching 5,737 ultra-Orthodox military recruits and 1,107 national servicemen after a decade.
If the draft falls short of 95% of these targets, sanctions in the form of cuts to state funds allocated to ultra-Orthodox yeshivas would be put in place. The fines would increase each year the targets are missed.
On Monday, Liberman confirmed that this was a symbolic battle over the nature of the country, not one about the IDF’s readiness for war.
“It’s not just the draft law. The draft law became a symbol. And we certainly won’t give up on our symbols… but look at what is happening here,” he said, referring to demands by the Haredi parties in recent months to halt all government work on Saturday.
“I want to emphasize another time: We are in favor of a Jewish state, we are against a halachic state,” Liberman added, using the Hebrew term for Jewish law.
Since the 2015 cutback, the military has adopted a host of new measures and programs to make up for its manpower losses, and the prospect of the additional reduction in 2020 is still being protested by the IDF in the halls of the Kirya — the Defense Ministry and military headquarters — and the Knesset.
The enlistment of these few hundred more Haredi recruits each year is not likely to have a significant effect on the military’s manpower shortages, nor is it trumpeted by IDF officials as a potential game-changer on this front, especially as ultra-Orthodox servicemen require on average more investment per soldier by the IDF due to their community’s relatively low socioeconomic position.
There are, of course, other reasons for encouraging greater Haredi enlistment in the military beyond simple manpower numbers.
Israel remains one of the few countries around the world with near universal conscription, and the IDF is described as a “people’s army,” one that is supposed to reflect the diverse nature of Israeli society.
This is a “supreme value that will continue to serve as the basis for the IDF’s activities and to direct it,” the Defense Ministry wrote in its recommendations last year.
The military can also serve as an important economic and social springboard, offering people skills, qualifications and experiences that would be otherwise difficult or expensive to obtain — especially for a comparatively poor and economically underperforming community like Israel’s ultra-Orthodox.
For the relatively insular Haredi community, however, the prospect of the military’s diverse landscape is precisely its concern.
This is also the impediment to ultra-Orthodox participation in national service, as a substitute for military enlistment. For many Haredi Israelis, participation in any secular or, at least, non-religious framework is inherently problematic, even if this in practice means remaining inside their communities — helping the elderly, working in schools or serving as emergency medical personnel.
For the military, an end to the proposed two-month service reduction in 2020 and a larger budget — both to offer soldiers with much-needed skill sets career positions and to outsource basic services on IDF bases to civilian companies instead of relying on troops to perform them — are far more pressing concerns than a few hundred more troops.
I believe that people should be open, all the time, hide nothing, and I am Marxist, and FOR the Russian Workers Revolution of 1917. Not only to be open, but also to refute the snarky attacks on Marx, which never go away it seems. So at least this little voice is raised there too.
I do not have to know every last detail of this case. I do know that the Jews were repressed for 2000 plus years. And being Irish I have immediate sympathy.
I also have long argued, must be 40 years now, that the Jewish national self determination is expressed still through Judaism, and was in the past totally so. All they had.
I hate Liberman. Do not like him. Hate his crassness. How can he not have empathy for this past.
Russia is a particular case. Do not attack unless you have some knowledge of history. Russia emerged from the depths of backwardness and lack of human culture in 1917, then flowered like a wild rose held down for millenia, but was crushed once again. Liberman comes out of that. This man has nothing going for him at all.
I respect the religious Jews and will stay with them.
The Knesset has just voted to dissolve itself and hold new elections on Sept. 17. Lieberman refused to compromise with Bibi and the haredi parties until the very end. See my analysis is the comments section of “Poll: Right-wing bloc would win again if new elections held ” on this web site.
@ Hugo Schmidt-Fischer:
It’s O.K>Hugo, I can take bit of “pin-pricking\”…I DO have a sense of humour,and “take it”. . Often gets me into “trouble”… But, allowing all else you disclosed as being “Torah”, you are wrong in referring to the Haredi as “a certain aristocratic caste”…..They re anything but that. the very opposite in fact. They are abysmally poor (except , it seems Deri), and it is they and their Torah devoted ssaociates who have carried for many centuries the burden of the 613 precepts. Wthout them , as I’ve pointed out before, we’d ll be chazar eaters, praying to statues or ikons somewhere, ans NOT in Israel.
Lieberman can go around in gatkes for all I care. Or even bare tucchas.
I believe that the haredi leaders forbidding their people from serving in the IDF, and insisting that the Parliament grant them immunity from service, is outrageous and moral-intellectual treason. And I write this as someone who believes in the holiness of Torah and the Jews should obseve halachah.The haedim lives are protected by the IDF in which they refuse to serve. They receive extensive financial support from the state and are represented in the Israeli government. They have an absolute moral obligation to serve, and their is no exemption for them in either the written or oral Torah.
Their refusal to do their share in Israel’s defense has contributed to a serious manpower shortage in the IDF, which places the state and all its citizens in jeopardy of their lives.
However, the leftwing moral-intellectual traitors, and their operatives on the Supreme Court and its allies-appointees in the Israeli government, are a far greater threat to Israel’s security and survival. If the Leftists who now illegally control the Israeli government are ever removed from office, I would consider a crackdown on the haredi leadership (not ordinary haredim) and a compulsory draft for all Israelis, including haredim, and the next step in protecting Israel from armed attack.
@ Hugo Schmidt-Fischer:You said
Actually the writing of a new law came about because of the Supreme Court as the court threw out the previous law as unjust because it no equal application to all sectors of the population. They ruled the government must write a draft law that includes the Haredi being drafted.
Edgar G. Said:
He used to wear shirts one size too small, so he was not able to close the top button which looked bizarre when he was donned a suit and tie. That was enough to raise a dissonant note for me. But then again what can you expect from someone born and bred in the Soviet union. And he has improved his sartorial comportment since.
Then the way he spells Liberman, instead of Lieberman. I do get it that living for centuries in the Russian Pale of Settlement, German names got bastardized. But it is strange to my eyes. So is his first name ‘Yvette’, a bit unusual for a male. Then again maybe my views are antiquated.
More to the point, Liberman deserves big credit for bringing up the injustice of the recruitment racket in Israel, where large parts of the public get off without justification.
Unfortunately, Liberman’s are just political antics. As described earlier, the quotas Liberman is fighting to introduce, are ridiculously light, and even then, they are manipulated and bogus anyhow.
The truth is very simple. One law equal for everybody must apply. No excuses, no exceptions.
Especially, the National Service which is also a fraud. It is a fig leaf to pacify objectors, and to facilitate the orthodox receiving a free pass. Tasks at the national service are invented, they are not monitored, savvy volunteers find ways not to show up aided by corrupt overseers.
A modern society can well afford to pay for needed services. If services are not funded, they are typically not worthwhile. And when they are created for ‘free’ they typically are endemic of squandering.
There is also no justification for allowing a certain aristocratic caste to opt out for civilian service instead of military duty.
You absolutely should never be able to buy off the obligation of laying your life on the line, or the threat of being maimed for life, with ‘volunteering’ work.
Now here would be a cause worthy of Israeli supreme court intervention. A simple interpretation of the law which is already on the books, laws that were passed in the Knesset and apply to the public at large, a requirement these laws be applied equally and fairly on each and every citizen. Unlike other cases the supreme court wouldn’t have to interpret and invent legislation out of thin air. But surprisingly, these supposed stalwarts of democracy are lax and negligent.
Let the top 10% of Haredi Yeshiva’s Students who wish to continue to their studies continue to do so. The rest shall be eligible to be drafted to the IDF or if not needed serve in National Service.
This is good for the country and good for the students. This would be fair plus provide enough Yeshiva students plus more eligible soldiers.
Kohen should be exempt and an equal number of the brightest and no more in my opinion.
@ Hugo Schmidt-Fischer:
Oh Boy Oh Boy…!! It seems that the whole process is twisted, as much else in Israel.. Revealed, the way you’ve just detailed it, it becomes a very major scandal of collusion and illegality in several important faculties.
Assuming your assertions are correct, and I’ve always found them very believable, the IDF is conniving to smooth the (ruffled) sand in the arena. They could just complain about the matter, and the whole pack of cards would collapse.
The facts are there, because you found them.
Like just about everything else, the “Start-up Nation”..wonderful as it actually is, needs to be “re-vamped” from the TOP down. (not the bottom up as is usual-
everything is upside down in Israel)
Anyay thank you for clearing it up for me…..I still DON’T like LIeberman.(for other reasons.)
It’s all a big fraud.
2016 the number of fresh orthodox recruits into the Israeli army amounted to 850, according to the research unit of the Israeli Knesset. In addition in that same year 571 orthodox ‘volunteers’ opted to serve in the ‘National Service’ channel performing chores nobody would every pay for if they had to.
For summer 2018, the Knesset found 1’371 orthodox in the civil National Service and 7’250 in the regular army. As the army service takes almost 3 years, it is safe to assume that a paltry figure of about 2’500 orthodox soldiers were enlisted annually – only.
It gets worse. Everyone agrees that the army does not properly record orthodox soldiers.
Instead, the so-called orthodox recruits are actually regular national religious soldiers, the ones going with colour Kippahs.
The army actually wrongly draws up its reports. Every year, a few hundred non orthodox though religious soldiers, such as hilltop youth or other members of the nationalist movements who would enlist into the army anyhow, are misclassified in order to fill up the orthodox lists and pacifiy the political process. The army thus reports that from 2013 to 2016 the numbers increased by 47% and everyone is happy.
Furthermore, the army claims it has enough on its hands to ‘absorb’ and ‘assimilate‘ this difficult segment of soldiers and please do not send anymore so quickly.
Meanwhile Israel is encircled with millions of viscious enemies, and its ‘normal’ citizen suckers are burdened with years of service in the military and even more years of active reserve duty.
There ought to be one law for everybody. Period.
The Israeli supreme court, always quick to intervene and invent new laws not specified and always micromanaging government processes is part of of the charade. Here is a case where clearly, there is one law for regular citizens and another law for orthodox. But the court agreed to the fraud of a thousand orthodox annually, as an fair implementation of the military recruitment law.
The problem is the pernicious electoral system of ‘Proportional Representation’. which in an attempt at fairness actually means the fringe parties must be courted to form a coalition government, thus giving them a voice unjustified by their paucity of votes.
A ‘First Past the Post’ system would unify the government and (especially in this case) allow the normal Israeli the chance of stopping these insular medievals from disrupting the function of a modern state.
@ Edgar G.:
Huge- I posted above, based on reading your comments, before just now reading the article, which arrived to my inbox late, just a few moments ago.. I see that it seems to say the IDF is SHORT of inductees because of the 4 month shorter service stint. On the other hand it also says that it has taken other measures to make up the shortage.
So………????
@ Hugo Schmidt-Fischer:
Hugo,
My understanding , is that some years ago when this problem came up…as it did often, there was agreement via a law which allowed the best,brightest and most dedicated Yeshiva Talmudists to get 18 mth. or 2 year exemption. Also, to qualify, the student would be required to spend a heavy minimum time in serious study. . and that the Haredi Community would supply whatever numbers that the IDF called for. I can be corrected on this. I paid little attention to it anyway. It was always going on, and I was living in Israel then,
The Haredim announced the other day that they have kept that agreement properly, that whatever recruits the IDF ask for are inducted. It seems there are far more Haredim available than the IDF actually can absorb. And it’s the same for the average Israeli so.
Please correct me as it was a long time ago and I’ve paid no attention since, and it may have changed. In politics the biggest liars seem to take the forefront.
Israel developed a caste system condemning inferior people of one sort into years of unpaid servitude in the military, where they put their life at risk or may end up physically handicapped for life.
In addition, these serfs are expected to feed an entire class who refuses to take up a trade or profession, much like indentured peasants were forced to toil for their feudal masters.
The Israel office for statistics provides the numbers.
In 2018 there were about 185’000 ‘live births’ in Israel of which 74.4% were Jewish. That works out for about 68’500 boys that could be called to serve in 18 years time.
Quite a few males of other persuasions, such as Druze, Circassians and even some Muslim Bedouin will also take up the call to arms. Not to forget the 300’000 or so Christian Russian emigrants that tagged along with the Russian inflow during the last generation, a loyal core of Liberman’s voters. These non-Jewish happen to generate a lot of well motivated fighting men. Not to mention a handful of new immigrants who also enlist.
In addition, many of the secular female population actually go and serve in the Army. I have no figures, but let us make an estimation. Assuming 70% of the class born 2018 is secular, and say, 50% of the female cohort joins the military ranks, that potentially suggests another 24’000 troops.
All in then, the year 2018 may yield 92’500 soldiers if all arrive in good health and enlist.
Liberman is ostracized for insisting the orthodox provide 3’384 men next year! That is about 3.5% of the entire crop. The audacity of Liberman’s detractors is beyond belief.