Opposition leaders accuse PM of betraying IDF soldiers over reshuffle aimed at passing Haredi draft law

Opposition leader and Yesh Atid chair Yair Lapid accuses Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of betraying IDF soldiers by appointing United Torah Judaism MK Yisrael Eichler as Deputy Communications Minister in a bid to pass his government’s draft regulation law for yeshiva students.

“Netanyahu is advancing draft evasion together with Knesset members who do not believe in the existence of the State of Israel,” says Lapid in a post on X, adding that the prime minister is “once again betraying IDF soldiers and reservists.”

“The appointment of Eichler as a deputy minister – a man who has called Israel an ‘enemy state,’ a historic national disaster, and said there is a ‘Hebrew ghetto’ here – solely to pass the draft-evasion law is a disgrace that cannot be erased,” he continues.

Yisrael Beytenu chair Avigdor Liberman condemns the appointment as a bribe.

“Government ministries are not a gift or a bribe; there is actually a country here to run,” Liberman writes in a post on X, calling the appointment “disgraceful” and “absurd.”

“Eichler is someone who opposes the very existence of the state and, broadly speaking, is also quite opposed to the very existence of the media,” he continues.

The move is reported to be a quid pro quo in which the prime minister appoints Eichler to the cabinet, and in exchange, he will resign from the Knesset under the Norwegian Law and thus lose his vote against the government’s bill exempting yeshiva students from military service, while allowing former UTJ MK Yitzhak Pindrus to return to the Knesset and vote in favor.

Meanwhile, Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi congratulates Eichler in a post on X, writing that he “welcomes the move.”

“Together we will work resolutely to complete the government’s central tasks – the draft law, the communications reform, the budget, and other issues – for the sake of the people of Israel,” Karhi says.