Barkat says he and other Likud MKs will oppose Haredi draft bill without major changes

Economy Minister Nir Barkat becomes the second senior member of the ruling Likud party to publicly say he will vote against the ultra-Orthodox enlistment law if it doesn’t undergo “fundamental changes” before it is brought for further votes in the Knesset plenum.

Barkat says he will oppose the current text of the controversial bill, which deals with the military service of Haredi yeshiva students, and that he will do so “together with additional Likud MKs” — without naming them.

He is thus joining Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who unlike the other 63 coalition lawmakers already voted against the bill in last week’s vote, which revived the bill from the previous Knesset, allowing the legislative process to continue from the stage it was abandoned.

The legislation would lower the age at which Haredi yeshiva students are exempted from military service. The bill’s advancement during wartime, and as the military says it needs thousands of more soldiers as soon as possible, has enraged many secular and religious Zionist Israelis.

The High Court has demanded that a new, egalitarian policy be legislated or else the state immediately start recruiting tens of thousands of yeshiva students, a move that the ultra-Orthodox parties are vehemently opposed to.

In his statement, Barkat says his previous vote in favor of the bill was “technical,” and lays out his conditions for supporting it from now on.

Sharing a letter he sent to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other coalition officials, Barkat says the future law must impose mandatory service “for all residents of the state, including the Haredi and Arab communities”; meet the security establishment’s needs; recognize the “importance and value of Torah studies”; have the army adapt service options to the needs of soldiers from the ultra-Orthodox and “other” communities; and introduce a series of incentives — focusing on combat fighters — and differential sanctions for draft evasion.

Likud issues a reponse, quipping that it “expects Nir Barkat to deal with the cost of living and not look for pretexts to topple a right-wing government during wartime.”