IDF manpower chief: Arrests of Haredi draft dodgers ineffective, sanctions needed

Ultra-Orthodox draft evaders arrested by the military police are still managing to get out of enlisting thanks to significant loopholes, making efforts to detain them a waste of resources, the head of the IDF’s Personnel Directorate told lawmakers on Wednesday.

Addressing the Knesset State Control Committee, Maj. Gen. Dado Bar Kalifa said that “these arrests bring people to detention centers, [but] they do not enlist because we have loopholes the size of gates in a fence: There are psychiatrists and an army of lawyers who arrange what is called ‘the exemption.’”

He added that arrests are expected to ramp up as more Haredi men attempt to fly to Uman, Ukraine, for an annual Rosh Hashanah pilgrimage to the grave of Rabbi Nachman of Breslov. Dozens of suspected draft dodgers were reportedly arrested in recent days at Ben Gurion Airport while trying to make the journey.

Some 80,000 ultra-Orthodox men between the ages of 18 and 24 are currently believed to be eligible for military service, but have not enlisted. The IDF has repeatedly said it urgently needs 12,000 recruits, citing strain on standing and reserve forces from the ongoing war against Hamas in Gaza and other military challenges. Those evading conscription are prohibited from leaving the country.

Military Police units are being sent to handle arrests of draft dodgers instead of carrying out security-related tasks like blocking roads leading to the Gaza Strip, Bar Kalifa continued. He said, “You’ve invested all your resources but delivered nothing.”

The arrests of Haredi draft dodgers also create issues for the police who must deal with protests and attempts to block roads, he noted, adding: “We have no desire to have arrests. We want soldiers.”

“I need more soldiers, and at the same time, many career officers are currently asking to leave the IDF, and we should be very troubled by this reality,” he said.

Since the IDF began its recent crackdown on draft evaders, ultra-Orthodox leaders have declared war against conscription efforts and have held numerous protests, including outside the Beit Lid military prison, where many evaders are being held.

Limited absorption capacity

According to Bar Kalifa, the IDF will make sure it is capable of integrating as many Haredi soldiers as determined by a bill regulating Haredi enlistment that is currently under debate in the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, but does not have the capacity to absorb all 80,000 currently eligible for conscription were they to join up.

At the same time, steps are being taken to ensure that Haredi soldiers are provided with suitable conditions, with the establishment of “a variety of tracks” suitable for Haredim — such as units oriented toward Haredi observance like the Netzach Yehuda Battalion and the Hasmonean Brigade. The military “will open more in the future,” he said.

Despite this, “You don’t want us to invest massive resources in building bases and brigades for the Haredim when we don’t know how they will arrive,” he noted, adding that the military was “committed to creating a General Staff order and an advisor on Haredi affairs — and the chief of staff has already approved it.”

Such an order would address concerns expressed by some Haredi leaders, such as Rabbi Moshe Maya, a member of the Shas party’s ruling Council of Torah Sages, who told Radio Kol Hai last month that any arrangements facilitating Haredi enlistment must be anchored in such an order or they would be “worthless.”

A call for sanctions

Addressing the State Control Committee, Bar Kalifa insisted that “enforcement alone is not enough” and that a full toolbox is required, including “sanctions” against evaders.

“Why can a person who is legally defined as a criminal because he evades the draft represent lawbreakers and be a lawyer? Why can a draft dodger drive on the road?” he asked, echoing similar calls from officials from the Finance Ministry to the Attorney General’s Office.

Bar Kalifa said that while the army is doing what it can, it needs better coordination from other public bodies, singling out the Education Ministry and demanding that it provide information, presumably on graduating students eligible for enlistment, “so we can accurately determine the numbers for each year.”

A kerfuffle with a reservist

While Bar Kalifa was speaking with lawmakers in the State Control Committee, things were growing heated at the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, whose members are currently debating a controversial government-backed bill to regulate Haredi enlistment and exemptions.

During the discussion, reservists slammed the bill, with one insisting that the committee’s deliberations were “a complete waste of time.”

Chairman Boaz Bismuth, a Likud lawmaker and ally of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, ordered reservist Omri Ronen, one of the leaders of the Brothers in Arms anti-government protest group, removed from the committee after he repeatedly interrupted the proceedings.

“Why shouldn’t I interrupt? You’re not letting me speak,” Ronen declared before being dragged out of the room by Knesset security.

“Whoever called for refusal and slandered the State of Israel will not be here, Brothers in Arms will not speak here,” Bismuth declared, referring to the group’s calls, prior to October 7, for reservists to halt their service to protest the government’s judicial overhaul agenda.

“The Jerusalem Faction gets the right to speak here but Brothers in Arms does not?” protested Yesh Atid MK Moshe Tur-Paz, referring to a hardline ultra-Orthodox group known for its staunch opposition to military service.

Bismuth and Brothers in Arms have clashed before, with the lawmaker refusing to meet with its leadership until it repudiated its previous rhetoric. In response, activists last month accused him of seeking to advance an “evasion law” and protested outside his Tel Aviv home.

Following Ronen’s ejection, the group tweeted that the incident represented “a new low” from a “government of refusers and draft dodgers.”

Edelstein’s appeal

In a Facebook post after the debate, former Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee chairman Yuli Edelstein (Likud) insisted that the reservists “who have been deployed time and time again have no time to waste.”

“Once again, they talked about the sections of the draft law that I have already held discussions on, and I couldn’t stop thinking about the inquiries that I have been receiving from reservists and their families,” he said, noting that many would be absent from their families over the upcoming Rosh Hashanah holiday.

“We must expand the draft base for the IDF. There are ways to do it. We just need the will and the understanding that there is simply no choice.”

Edelstein was pushed out of the committee chairmanship earlier this year after a conflict with Haredi leaders over the bill. After rolling back changes made to the legislation by Edelstein, lawmakers on the committee are currently debating a version of the bill first proposed in 2022 and revived by the Knesset in 2024.