Haredi minister says replacing defense minister with Sa’ar won’t guarantee draft exemptions

Addressing reports that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may replace Defense Minister Yoav Gallant with New Hope chairman Gideon Sa’ar if the latter enters the coalition, Jerusalem and Heritage Minister Meir Porush says that there is no guarantee that such a change would benefit Haredim fighting to preserve their longstanding exemptions from military service.

“It’s no secret that I’ve known Gideon Sa’ar for many years, since our days together at the Education Ministry, and I’ve also recently been in conversation with him about matters on the agenda,” the senior United Torah Judaism politician says, only a day after New Hope denied media reports that Sa’ar has been negotiating with the Knesset’s Haredi parties in order to reach a compromise on the conscription issue.

“I don’t know exactly where he stands on the fateful question of regulating the status of yeshiva students, but I can say that I heard clear statements from him regarding the need to settle the matter via a proper and respectful discourse and that there is no place in this period for the inciting voices that are unfortunately once again being heard against Torah students,” he says.

Porush notes that even though Gallant had not been marked out as an opponent on the issue previously, he has since opposed efforts to pass legislation without broad agreement, angering the ultra-Orthodox. Porush says that “even if Gallant is replaced by Sa’ar, and I am not giving advice here as to whether it is the right thing to do or not, we have no guarantee how Sa’ar will behave and it has already been proven in the past that he is also sometimes unpredictable.”

The Haredim’s “real problem” is with the attorney general, he continues, accusing her of “working systematically to thwart any possibility of regulating the status of yeshiva students.”

“I am afraid that salvation will not come from coalition changes,” Porush continues.