A gathering crisis over enlisting ultra-Orthodox Jews into the Israeli army is posing a risk to Israel's government and splitting the country.
The public mood on the matter has shifted dramatically in Israel in the wake of two years of hostilities, and this is now perhaps the most divisive political challenge facing the Prime Minister.
The Judicial Conflict
Politicians are currently considering a piece of legislation to terminate the deferment given to Haredi students engaged in full-time religious study, instituted when the modern Israel was founded in 1948.
That exemption was ruled illegal by the nation's top court two decades ago. Stopgap solutions to extend it were formally ended by the judiciary last year, pressuring the government to start enlisting the community.
Some 24,000 draft notices were issued last year, but just approximately 1,200 ultra-Orthodox - or Haredi - draftees reported for duty, according to army data shared with lawmakers.
Tensions Boil Over Into Violence
Tensions are erupting onto the city centers, with lawmakers now discussing a new conscription law to compel yeshiva students into military service alongside other Jewish citizens.
A pair of ultra-Orthodox lawmakers were targeted this month by hardline activists, who are enraged with parliament's discussion of the proposed law.
And last week, a elite police squad had to extract Military Police officers who were targeted by a big group of community members as they attempted to detain a alleged conscription dodger.
These arrests have sparked the creation of a new communication network dubbed "Dark Alert" to spread word quickly through Haredi neighborhoods and summon demonstrators to prevent arrests from occurring.
"We're a Jewish country," said Shmuel Orbach. "One cannot oppose religious practice in a nation founded on Jewish identity. It is a contradiction."
A World Separate
Yet the transformations sweeping across Israel have failed to penetrate the confines of the Kisse Rahamim yeshiva in a Haredi stronghold, an ultra-Orthodox city on the edge of Tel Aviv.
In the learning space, scholars study together to discuss Jewish law, their brightly coloured writing books popping against the rows of white shirts and small black kippahs.
"Arrive late at night, and you will see many of the students are studying Torah," the dean of the academy, Rabbi Tzemach Mazuz, said. "Via dedicated learning, we safeguard the troops on the front lines. This is our army."
The community holds that constant study and religious study defend Israel's military, and are as vital to its defense as its tanks and air force. This conviction was accepted by Israel's politicians in the earlier decades, Rabbi Mazuz said, but he conceded that Israel was changing.
Growing Societal Anger
The ultra-Orthodox population has grown substantially its share of the nation's citizens over the past seven decades, and now represents around one in seven. What began as an exemption for a few hundred religious students turned into, by the beginning of the 2023 war, a group of some 60,000 men not subject to the draft.
Surveys indicate support for ultra-Orthodox conscription is rising. A poll in July revealed that an overwhelming percentage of the broader Jewish public - including a large segment in Netanyahu's own right-wing Likud party - backed penalties for those who declined a enlistment summons, with a clear majority in favor of withdrawing benefits, passports, or the electoral participation.
"I feel there are people who are part of this country without contributing," one off-duty soldier in Tel Aviv explained.
"It is my belief, no matter how devout, [it] should be an reason not to perform service your state," added a Tel Aviv resident. "Being a native, I find it rather absurd that you want to exempt yourself just to learn in a yeshiva all day."
Voices from Inside Bnei Brak
Advocacy of broadening conscription is also found among traditional Jews not part of the Haredi community, like one local resident, who is a neighbor of the academy and notes non-Haredi religious Jews who do enlist in the army while also maintaining their faith.
"I'm very angry that the Haredim don't perform military service," she said. "It's unfair. I also believe in the Torah, but there's a teaching in Hebrew - 'The Book and the Sword' – it represents the Torah and the guns together. That's the way forward, until the days of peace."
The resident manages a small memorial in Bnei Brak to soldiers from the area, both observant and non-observant, who were killed in battle. Lines of images {
