3 police injured, 27 arrested in ultra-Orthodox draft protests

Three police officers were wounded and 27 protesters arrested overnight during violent ultra-Orthodox anti-draft protests, police said Friday.

The demonstrators blocked roads and threw rocks and other objects at police in protests centered in ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods of Jerusalem and the nearby city of Beit Shemesh.

Police are expected to request on Friday an extension of the remand of those arrested, Israel Radio reported.

Ultra-Orthodox Thursday night, in a continuation of the anti-draft protests taking place since the start of the year.

Pictures of the demonstrations in Jerusalem showed police forcibly dragging away protesters and using water cannons on those blocking the roads.

The latest round of protests follow the arrest of an ultra-Orthodox yeshiva student, Yisrael Meir Toledano, who was arrested earlier this month for failing to report to the IDF recruitment office.

Military prosecutors have recommended a three-and-half-month jail term for Toledano.

His spiritual leader, Rabbi Shmuel Auerbach, who is encouraging the protests, leads a splinter faction opposed to the authority of the Lithuanian community’s principal leader, Rabbi Aharon Leib Shteinman, known as the Jerusalem Faction.

A statement from the Committee to Save the World of Torah earlier this month said that all attempts to use “brutality” against Torah students by detaining them for lengthy periods or giving them jail terms would be met with courage by other Torah students who were “ready to give their lives.”

The protests would continue until all those under arrest were released from prison and returned to their “natural place” in the study hall, the statement added.

Ultra-Orthodox Jews represent about 10 percent of the Israeli population and live in compliance with a strict interpretation of Jewish laws.

Some of them view military service as a source of temptation for young people who then leave the closed world of prayer and religious study.

The ultra-Orthodox are generally exempt from serving in the army if they are studying in religious schools known as yeshivas, although the issue is controversial for secular Israelis, and attempts have been made to roll back the longstanding exemption.

Either way, ultra-Orthodox students called to the draft must register at the recruitment office before seeking an exemption.

Some extremist rabbis, among them Auerbach, prohibit their followers from even registering.

Earlier this month, a number of effigies of ultra-Orthodox soldiers were found hanging in the ultra-Orthodox neighborhood of Mea Shearim, in an incident that police said would be investigated as incitement.

One of them had a sign attached to it that read “hardak out,” a derogatory term for ultra-Orthodox Jews who join the army and which sounds similar to the Hebrew word for insect.