Attorney general says government funding for draft-dodging yeshivas is illegal

Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara tells the High Court of Justice that the government is legally barred from funding daycare subsidies for the children of ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students who are obligated to perform military service but are not doing so, as a result of the court’s own decision in June that such students were legally obliged to enlist in the army.

Her position is submitted to the court in response to a petition by ultra-Orthodox groups asking for an increase to the length of the transition period between the cut to daycare subsidies and their implementation, and comes after the attorney general told the government it was legally obligated to halt these payments back in August.

But it also answers petitions by groups advocating for ultra-Orthodox enlistment who have demanded that Labor and Welfare Minister Yoav Ben Tzur publish the criteria for subsidies for all those eligible. The minister has refused to publish the criteria ever since the attorney general barred funding for children of yeshiva students who have not performed military service.

“The labor minister is not allowing the families who are eligible for the subsidy to receive the annual subsidy which they are entitled to, in order to coerce a solution which allows the families of yeshiva students who are obligated to perform military service to receive the subsidy [as well]” Baharav-Miara tells the court.

“This behavior is unlawful.”