From the Liveblog of
Sunday, December 7, 2025
Deputy FM vows to march to Jerusalem to stop Haredi draft exemption bill
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Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel says she will march from her hometown of Kfar Saba to Jerusalem carrying an Israeli flag as an act of protest against the proposed bill regulating ultra-Orthodox draft exemptions.
Haskel calls on reservists to join her on the march.
“We can’t allow this law to pass,” Haskel says in a statement. “We can’t have a political solution to a security problem.”
Haskel is one of several coalition members who have expressed opposition to the bill that is currently being debated in a Knesset committee.
For the past year, the Haredi leadership has been pushing for the passage of a law that would largely keep its constituency out of the IDF, after the High Court ruled that decades-long blanket exemptions from army duty informally afforded to full-time Haredi yeshiva students were illegal.
Some 80,000 ultra-Orthodox men aged between 18 and 24 are currently believed to be eligible for military service, but have not enlisted. The IDF has said it urgently needs 12,000 recruits due to the strain on standing and reserve forces caused by the war against Hamas in Gaza and other military challenges.
The Times of Israel Community.