Lapid slams enlistment bill as a ‘fraud,’ calls for elections

Yesh Atid leader Yair Lapid calls for fresh elections after ministers approve a bill allowing ultra-Orthodox students to avoid military service in a bid to stave off the government’s collapse.

“What they are calling a compromise on the ‘evasion law’ is proof — if anyone needed it — how cynical, rotten and shameless our politics are,” says Lapid at the start of the party’s weekly faction meeting.

He calls the bill a “fraud” and an “insult to the IDF.”

“First they tell us what is permitted and what is forbidden for us to do at home on Shabbat. Afterwards they transfer billions in indecent political deals. Now they inform us that the army — the IDF, the shield of Israel — is only for suckers prepared to endanger their lives and sacrifice their best years for the state,” he says.

“Netanyahu always says a prime minister is replaced at the ballot box. For the sake of change I agree with him. The time has come to go to the ballot box and replace the prime minister,” Lapid adds.