Haredim don’t serve in the IDF. They won’t share the burden of fighting for Israel’s security. Now it’s Israeli government politicians who are going to war for them.

This week’s legislation banning the arrests of Haredi draft dodgers has already left the coalition with battle scars, costing the governing alliance some of its stalwarts, tearing open new rifts, and doing significant damage to the ruling Likud party.

The coalition lawmakers who spent months taking a hard line against efforts by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the Haredi parties to pass a law exempting the ultra-Orthodox from military service are now paying for it: some with their political future, others by simply walking away.

Absorption Minister Ofir Sofer of the Religious Zionism party built a reputation over the past year attacking draft exemptions for Haredim and coalition efforts to protect them from sanctions. When it came time to vote, he skipped the plenum session entirely. Hours later, he announced he would not run in the upcoming election.

Walking out as well, Likud MK Dan Illouz fired a parting shot at his party. “I can’t ask you to vote for a party I can no longer vote for myself,” he wrote, blaming Likud for dodging responsibility for October 7, for greenlighting draft-evasion schemes while reservists burn out, and for caving to interest groups driving up the cost of living. “This isn’t Likud anymore. It’s a party that’s been hijacked.”

Other prominent opponents of Haredi draft evasion made the same move, including former Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee chairman Yuli Edelstein and Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel.

Haskel had fought the exemption laws for months while still serving in government — but as the Knesset broke for the election recess, she fired off a blistering........

© The Times of Israel