Former prime minister Naftali Bennett said Monday that should he win this year’s election, he would launch an investigation into “the sabotage of Haredi enlistment,” in a speech lambasting the government for sneaking new allocations to ultra-Orthodox institutions into the 2026 state budget the night before.

“In the new government, I will establish a special commission of inquiry regarding the sabotage of Haredi enlistment, in a time of war, which harmed Israel’s security,” said Bennett, who is seeking to oust Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The promised probe “will look into who, exactly, acted to deprive us of tens of thousands of soldiers needed by the IDF in order to win. Everyone who knowingly took part in violating the Security Service Law during wartime will be investigated,” he said.

Bennett made the pledge in a brief address, broadcast live, the evening after the Knesset passed the 2026 budget in the early hours of Monday.

The legislation went through following a midnight political maneuver, in which dozens of opposition lawmakers mistakenly supported an amendment to earmark NIS 800 million (about $250m) for ultra-Orthodox educational institutions.

The last-minute allocation — which the attorney general later intervened to halt the actual provision of — came after the ultra-Orthodox parties agreed to support the budget despite the coalition’s failure to pass a bill enshrining blanket exemptions of yeshiva students from mandatory military service.

“In the middle of the night, the government of Netanyahu and the Haredim carried out a dark trick,” Bennett charged.

“They took from us, the serving and working public, another NIS 800 million, and transferred it to Haredi institutions that educate people to ‘die rather than enlist,'” he said, referring to a slogan frequently employed at ultra-Orthodox........

© The Times of Israel