Elections may loom as senior rabbis tell Haredi UTJ party to bolt coalition

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government was teetering Wednesday after the spiritual leaders of Degel Hatorah, one of the two factions that make up the ultra-Orthodox United Torah Judaism party, instructed their MKs to introduce a bill to dissolve the Knesset due to the coalition’s failure to pass a law exempting yeshiva students from conscription — a longstanding UTJ goal.

On Wednesday morning, Degel Hatorah chair MK Moshe Gafni received the instructions from rabbis Moshe Hirsch, the dean of Bnei Brak’s Slabodka yeshiva, and Dov Lando, the senior leader of the so-called Lithuanian stream of non-Hasidic ultra-Orthodoxy and the chairman of the faction’s ruling Council of Torah Sages.

In a message to The Times of Israel, UTJ lawmaker Yitzhak Pindrus confirmed Lando’s directive, saying that his party’s MKs had received a telephone call from the senior rabbi.

The other faction that make up the United Torah Judaism party, UTJ chair Yitzchak Goldknopf’s Agudat Yisrael, was reportedly already pushing to advance a bill to dissolve the Knesset and force new elections.

In response, opposition parties Yesh Atid, Yisrael Beytenu and The Democrats announced that they would submit a bill for the Knesset’s dissolution next Wednesday. That means Netanyahu has a week to try to resolve the issue, in addition to the period it would take for the bill to be voted on in parliament.

Asked why the opposition had not submitted a bill to dissolve the Knesset earlier, Yesh Atid MK Moshe Tur-Paz said that “we didn’t want to submit before the Haredim’s meetings with [Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu] so as not to make them close ranks. In any case, there was no majority because Shas is not there yet. And of course, if the Haredim keep threatening [to do so], they are welcome to resign from the government.”

Both Shas and UTJ, the two Haredi parties in the Knesset, had demanded the passage of the controversial exemption bill by the Shavuot holiday, which this year ended on June 2, warning that any delay would endanger the government’s continued existence.

While the ultra-Orthodox have repeatedly backed down from previous ultimatums, recent developments — including IDF plans to increase the number of draft orders sent to young ultra-Orthodox men — have seen their relationship with Netanyahu approaching a breaking point.

With only seven Knesset seats, however, UTJ on its own does not have the ability to bring down the government, as Netanyahu’s coalition currently holds 68 out of 120 seats. Thus, any effort to do so on UTJ’s part would require the cooperation of the Sephardic Shas party.

Elections are formally scheduled for October 2026.

Frustrated with Edelstein

Rabbis Hirsch and Lando’s instructions came after a last-ditch meeting between Haredi representatives and Likud MK Yuli Edelstein on Tuesday evening apparently failed to find common ground. Under Edelstein’s chairmanship, the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee is revising a government-backed bill to regulate Haredi enlistment.

“After Knesset members last night briefed Hirsch on the details of the meeting with Edelstein, it is clear that there is no progress at all on the draft issue. Accordingly, the yeshiva head will order withdrawal from the coalition in the near future,” a statement on behalf of Hirsch reportedly read.

Edelstein has pledged that any law coming out of his committee would levy sanctions on draft dodgers, a position he apparently maintained on Tuesday evening.

Edelstein’s refusal to compromise on what he sees as core issues relating to conscription legislation has generated harsh criticism from both the Haredim and senior members of his own party.

Speaking with the ultra-Orthodox Behadrei Haredim news site, one senior UTJ official accused Edelstein of placing “Torah scholars in a worse position than Eritrean infiltrators,” while Channel 12 journalist Amit Segal quoted an anonymous senior Likud official who accused the veteran lawmaker of bringing down the government during a war “due to narrow political considerations and a personal vendetta.”

In response, Maayan Samun, a spokesman for Edelstein, derided the idea, tweeted on his personal account that if recruiting Haredim when “families are collapsing and when couples are getting divorced because they can’t handle the burden of reserve duty” constitutes revenge, “then I’m in favor of revenge.”

“The heads of the Haredi factions are frustrated with Prime Minister Netanyahu’s conduct,” Kikar Hashabbat, another Haredi news site, reported, citing senior Haredi political figures.

“The feeling is that Netanyahu believes this is a personal crisis between the Haredim and Edelstein and not an event that threatens his rule. Our hope is that by next week he will come to his senses and exert his weight to resolve the points of disagreement — otherwise we will indeed go to elections.”

According to the site, Netanyahu, in an effort to prevent UTJ’s withdrawal from the coalition, attempted to call rabbis Lando and Hirsch but was rebuffed. A spokesman for Netanyahu’s Likud party told The Times of Israel that he was unaware of such efforts.

Netanyahu held a similar round of calls to prevent a coalition rift over enlistment in March.

According to media reports, Netanyahu has been considering replacing Edelstein as chairman of the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, although this move has been rejected by the Haredim, who believe it would deepen opposition to the bill.

While UTJ chairman Goldknopf’s Hasidic Agudat Yisrael faction has already been pushing to dissolve the coalition, no final decision has been made, with its own separate Council of Torah Sages currently “in the advanced stages” of coordinating a meeting, Behadrei Haredim reported.

Waiting for Shas

There has been no public comment from Shas on the developments, although it has been coordinating its efforts with UTJ in recent weeks, with both parties engaging in a partial legislative boycott of the coalition in an effort to exert pressure on Netanyahu.

Shas’s top leadership was also expected to convene to discuss whether they would stay in the coalition.

Last Thursday, unnamed senior Shas officials cited in a front-page report in HaDerech, the party’s official newspaper, stated that “immediately after Shavuot, the question of deciding on Shas’s continuation in the government and coalition will be placed on the table of the rabbis of the Council of Torah Sages.”

A spokesman for Shas did not respond to a request for comment.

Following a meeting of the Knesset Finance Committee on Wednesday morning, UTJ’s Gafni was seen conferring with MKs Yinon Azoulay (Shas) and Naor Shiri (Yesh Atid). Asked by Shiri during the meeting if it would be the last of the current legislative session, Gafni replied that “it could be, that’s not unrealistic.”

‘A terrible lack of national responsibility’

Likud lawmakers had harsh words for both UTJ and the opposition, which appeared to be in active contact with Haredi MKs regarding efforts to disperse the Knesset.

“Anyone who supports going to the polls at this time is showing a terrible lack of national responsibility and will not bring any benefit to Torah study or to expanding the ranks of the IDF,” warned MK Amit Halevi.

Freshman lawmaker Dan Illouz argued that by advancing legislation to dissolve the Knesset, the opposition had shown that its use of the conscription issue was “nothing more than a campaign to overthrow the government.”

“If they really cared, they would declare that they would vote together with Likud for a good conscription law,” he tweeted.

Both Halevi and Illouz had been removed from the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee for opposing coalition-backed measures.

“The government will not fall and the Knesset will not dissolve,” MK Tally Gotliv, an alternate member of the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, declared in a video post on X.

While she was “ashamed of the Haredim who dare to undermine the stability of the government during a time of war,” Gotliv insisted that the government would not fall because Shas would not defect, noting that the coalition could “manage with 61 seats.”

Speaking with the pro-government Channel 14, MK Boaz Bismuth, who is also a member of the committee, argued that while the conscription law is “essential,” it must be advanced “wisely, without going off the rails.”

Calling efforts to bring down the government “madness,” Bismuth appealed to the Haredim “to think carefully about the war.”

Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.