Ignoring PM’s extension request, AG tells High Court Haredi draft should start Monday

The Attorney General’s Office tells the High Court that come Monday morning, the state will be legally obligated to begin drafting ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students and there will no longer be a legal basis for the state to pay such students’ monthly stipends.

This would represent a radical and dramatic new legal situation, in which thousands of Haredi yeshiva students would be liable for the draft.

The Attorney General says however that there should be at least a small interim period until the end of the yeshiva academic year when yeshiva stipends could continue to be paid.

This position is essentially the same as a draft response issued late Wednesday night, the adoption of which was delayed over the last day as the government scrambled to come up with some plan for increasing ultra-Orthodox military service enlistment to show the court.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu acknowledged that this effort had failed when he asked for a 30-day extension to the court’s deadline.

The Movement for Quality Government in Israel welcomes the Attorney General’s stance, saying “the days are over in which there are citizens in the State of Israel who have only rights and no obligations.”