Ultra-Orthodox faction said pushing to dissolve Knesset over Haredi draft law

The ultra-Orthodox Degel HaTorah party has threatened to dissolve the Knesset over the coalition’s failure to pass a law exempting yeshiva students from military service, potentially moving up the 2026 parliamentary elections by months, Hebrew media reports.

Degel HaTorah, which represents members of the non-Hasidic “Lithuanian” Haredi community, is one of two factions comprising the larger United Torah Judaism party.

The threat comes in response to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu telling Haredi MKs last week that the coalition doesn’t have enough votes to pass the controversial legislation.

According to the Kan public broadcaster as well as Haredi media outlets, Degel HaTorah chairman Moshe Gafni is now refusing to take the premier’s calls.

A spokesman for Gafni tells the Times of Israel they are “waiting for the rabbi’s decision.”

The Behadrei Haredim news site quotes senior Degel HaTorah officials as stating that they “intend to disrupt the legislative procedures in the Knesset in order to immediately dissolve the Knesset and go to elections.”

Degel HaTorah’s support would not be enough to ensure the success of a vote to dissolve the Knesset, which would also require the backing the Shas party, which has not made such threats.

Elections must be held by October, regardless.

The site further reports that Gafni refused to meet with Netanyahu yesterday. During a subsequent meeting with MK Uri Maklev, the prime minister was said to have reiterated that, in his view, the bill should be postponed.

The bill was taken off the table in March with the outbreak of the US-Israeli war with Iran.

According to Israel Hayom, internal polling conducted within the Haredi community indicates that passage of the legislation as currently written could lower support for UTJ at the polls.