Leaked Draft Recasts Haredi Conscription as Netanyahu Delays Knesset Debate

Overview

• Billed as a rewrite of earlier plans, MK Boaz Bismuth’s draft backed by Shas and Degel HaTorah recognizes Torah study as a national value and moves away from the stricter Edelstein proposal.
• The draft removes the 35% combat-role quota and permits security-oriented national service, with such service counting only for a limited share of targets reported as 10%, while redefining eligibility to two years of yeshiva study.
• Biometric fingerprint tracking is dropped in favor of audits, institutional penalties would kick in only after a year of missed targets, and draft evaders face personal sanctions including loss of benefits, a driver’s license ban until age 23, and travel limits that end at 26.
• The hearing was postponed at Netanyahu’s request and to avoid overlap with a planned mass rally, and the Knesset legal adviser Miri Frenkel-Shor is preparing objections including a call to raise the first-year enlistment target from 4,800 to 5,760 with rising benchmarks.
• Backlash arrived swiftly as a senior Agudas Yisroel figure dismissed the draft as “nonsense,” Likud MKs Yuli Edelstein and Dan Illouz attacked it, opposition leader Yair Lapid condemned it, and the IDF is expected to form an oversight panel including religious and senior military figures.