From the Liveblog of
Tuesday, June 23, 2026
PM meeting with Haredi leaders canceled amid growing talk of Knesset dissolution
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"
A meeting of the leaders of the coalition parties set to take place in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office is canceled after the leaders of the ultra-Orthodox Shas and United Torah Judaism parties decline to attend. The meeting was called to discussed Haredi-backed legislation to halt the arrests of draft evaders, exempt yeshiva students from military service and restore benefits to draft dodgers.
Speaking with the Emess news site, a senior coalition figure declares that “we are advancing toward dissolving the Knesset next week.”
Yesterday, nearly all bills were removed from the Knesset plenum’s agenda as the Haredi parties’ boycott of coalition legislation entered its second week.
The boycott was initially prompted by the coalition’s refusal to advance to a plenum vote the so-called Daycare Law, which would restore daycare subsidies for the children of draft evaders, but has since grown to encompass other Haredi conscription-related demands.
“The violent arrests of Torah students must stop! We informed the coalition chairman that as long as the law to stop arrests and the Basic Law on Torah study are not advanced, we will not support any coalition legislation,” Shas chairman Aryeh Deri told party lawmakers during their weekly faction meeting on Monday afternoon.
Haredi legislators, who began the process of dissolving the Knesset in May over the coalition’s failure to pass a controversial law restoring yeshiva students’ draft exemptions, have since pushed for the passage of legislation declaring Torah study a foundational value of the State of Israel, restoring daycare subsidies to the children of draft dodgers, and halting the arrests of evaders.
Senior Shas and UTJ officials who spoke with the ultra-Orthodox Behadrei Haredim news site on Saturday evening said that they felt thwarted in their efforts to force the premier to advance their own agenda by holding coalition legislation hostage.
Over the weekend, Hebrew media reported that Netanyahu was considering pushing the coalition’s Knesset dissolution bill through its final two readings in the coming days under pressure from coalition officials, who are concerned about advancing the Haredi legislative initiatives ahead of the election in light of widespread public opposition.
The Behadrei Haredim news site cites sources in the Prime Minister’s Office as saying that Netanyahu met with Deri last week to discuss the bills, during which tempers flared and Deri was harshly critical of the prime minister.
The Times of Israel Community.