Knesset defense panel’s legal adviser calls for review of clause in Haredi draft bill

Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee legal adviser Miri Frenkel Shor calls on lawmakers to weigh amending a clause in the coalition’s bill to regulate ultra-Orthodox enlistment, ahead of tomorrow’s discussion of the controversial legislation.

The clause in question stipulates that the defense minister may remove a specific institution from the list of yeshivas whose students receive draft deferrals should 20 percent or more of those enrolled fail to report for registration and medical examination at an IDF recruitment office as required by law.

Frenkel Mor writes to committee members that such an arrangement should not be put in the law “as all are required to do under the provisions of the Security Service Law, since all students must comply with the provisions of the law and the yeshiva must ensure this.”

Responding to the letter, committee member Moshe Tur-Paz (Yesh Atid) tells The Times of Israel that the level of evasion required to remove a yeshiva from the list is one that is “discriminatory by definition, because most Israeli citizens do not have the opportunity to study in a yeshivah.”

Frenkel Shor has previously indicated that the bill, which stipulates that full-time yeshiva students who do not engage in any other vocation can be granted yearly deferments from enlistment, violates principles of equality.

The bill has also been panned by Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara, who last week stated in a position paper that it would actually disincentivize recruitment, and provide for the needs of yeshivas and their draft-shunning students rather than for the manpower needs of the military.