From the Liveblog of
Thursday, December 11, 2025
Netanyahu meets with ultra-Orthodox party to discuss 2026 budget and Haredi draft bill
Add ToI as a Preferred Source on GoogleSam Sokol is a former political correspondent at The Times of Israel. He was previously a reporter for the Jerusalem Post, Jewish Telegraphic Agency and Haaretz. He is the author of "Putin’s Hybrid War and the Jews"
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met this evening with members of the ultra-Orthodox United Torah Judaism party “as part of a series of meetings [he] is holding with all coalition factions,” a spokesman for the ruling Likud party announces.
In a statement, the spokesperson says that the meeting centered on “the issues currently on the agenda,” a likely reference to both the coalition’s draft exemption bill and the 2026 state budget. The Haredi UTJ and Shas parties have both said they will fight to ensure that the budget includes funding for yeshivas, which was cut in 2024 following the High Court ruling that military exemptions for yeshiva students were illegal.
While UTJ’s Degel HaTorah faction stating that it supports the latest draft of the bill, which would continue to grant military service exemptions to full-time yeshiva students, the party’s Hasidic Agudat Yisrael faction opposes any legislation containing sanctions on Haredim who don’t serve.
The Times of Israel Community.