Gantz: I respect Haredi community but we can’t accept ‘anarchy’

Defense Minister Benny Gantz, speaking at a Blue and White faction meeting, says the ultra-Orthodox must heed the government’s pandemic rules, after many Haredi schools openly defied the guidelines and reopened.

“Learning Torah and its studies are things that are important to the people of Israel, I don’t belittle this at all, but there cannot be one law for some and another law for others,” says Gantz. “I am in favor of dialogue, in favor of listening. We must be attuned to their needs but we cannot accept anarchy.”

Ultra-Orthodox kids make their way back home from a Talmud Torah in Jerusalem, October 18, 2020. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

Gantz also addresses the coalition crisis around the 2021 budget, saying: “If there is no budget, we’ll go to elections.”

Netanyahu is widely believed to be using the budget crisis to call early elections, thus avoiding the transfer of power to Gantz next year under their coalition agreement.