October 7 changed Israel forever. But the ultra-Orthodox? Not so much, report suggests

In the days and weeks that followed the unprecedented Hamas attacks against Israel on October 7, 2023, a wind of change seemed to sweep through Israeli society. Amid shock and grief, people from all walks of life, including from the country’s ultra-Orthodox sector, took it upon themselves to help those in need and bring positive change.

However, 16 months later, the Haredi community’s efforts to act in solidarity with the general Israeli population appear to have been a transient phenomenon that did not usher in permanent change, according to Dr. Gilad Malach from the Israel Democracy Institute. Malach is the author of the IDI Annual Statistical Report on the ultra-Orthodox (Haredi) Society in Israel for 2024, which was released on Wednesday.

“When we think about those images of Haredim volunteering or showing up at the army recruitment centers, there are a few things we need to keep in mind,” Malach told The Times of Israel over a phone interview. “First of all, these episodes happened specifically in the first few months after October 7. Secondly, those who sought to enlist in the army were mostly men over 28, rather than the 18-year-olds able to serve in combat units that the army really needs.”

Malach was referring to contentious efforts to pass a law that would enable the draft of ultra-Orthodox youths amid an urgent need from the IDF for more manpower and an adamant refusal of the Haredi parties to agree to such a move.

In June, the High Court of Justice ruled that the government must draft ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students into the military since there was no longer any legal framework to continue the decades-long practice of granting them blanket exemptions from army service.

But the efforts have largely stalled amid an unwillingness of the ultra-Orthodox to compromise and a lack of political will to force the issue through the Knesset.

According to Malach, about 1,500 Haredi men were drafted during the enlistment year 2023 (which concluded in July 2024 and whose data were not included in the report as the army had not officially released them).

In the previous enlistment year, the figure stood at 1,266. Regarding the national civil service, whose data for 2023 has been released, 814 ultra-Orthodox entered the service, compared to 492 during the previous year.

“We see a slight increase, but the numbers remain negligible if we think that around 14,000 Haredi boys turned 18 over the year,” Malach said.

According to the report, in 2013, 2,925 Haredi men were drafted into the army, and 953 entered national civil service.

At the same time, the number of yeshiva students in January 2024, relative to January 2023, increased by 8.5%, marking the most significant growth since 2015. Overall, the number of yeshiva and Kollel students stood at 46,200 and 111,000 in 2024. The figure rose by 83% in the past decade, while that of Haredim enlisting in the IDF fell by 36%.

Beyond conscription, the IDI report shows that the gap between the ultra-Orthodox and the rest of Israeli society has widened or, at best, remained stable in many areas investigated, which include education, employment and lifestyle.

In the year 2021-2022 (last available data), some 3,608 Haredi students attained a matriculation certificate, or just 16%, compared to 86% of the rest of Jewish students in Israel.

Albeit not final, data for 2024 also indicate a slowdown in the rise of the employment rate among ultra-Orthodox men, which stood at 54%, compared to 55.5% in 2023 and 87% for other Jewish men in the country. On the contrary, some 80% of Haredi women worked in 2024, a percentage very similar to the rest of Jewish Israeli women (83%), showing a 21% increase from 2009.

In addition, the average monthly income of Haredi employees was 55% of that of other Jewish workers, or NIS 9,929 compared to NIS 20,464 for the men and NIS 8,617 compared to NIS 13,057 for the women. The report noted that while for the latter, a significant reason for the gap lies in the choice of working part-time instead of full-time, for the former, the gap is a result of limited vocational training and concentration of these workers in lower-paying jobs.

As a consequence of the high unemployment rate, lower wages, and high number of children (an average of 6.4 per woman compared to 2.5 for the rest of Israeli Jewish women), 34% of Haredi families lived in poverty in 2022, compared to 15% of other Jewish households and 21% of the general population.

“As we reflect on what is needed to close the gap between the Haredi sector and the rest of Israeli society, there is an important element to consider, which is that the Haredi sector largely does not aim to close this gap,” Malach said.

“If we consider, for example, the Arab society, we can see how they have the goal to narrow the disparity with Israeli Jews in terms of employment, education, and so on. The ultra-Orthodox might want to make a decent living, but they are not interested in receiving more secular education or becoming wealthy.”

“This is the main challenge for the Israeli authorities,” he added.

According to Malach, it is important to acknowledge that some things have evolved in recent years.

In addition to the jump in women’s employment rate, the number of Haredi students in higher education frameworks has grown by 274% between 2010 and 2024, standing at around 17,400 in the 2023-2024 academic year, as highlighted by the IDI report.

The poverty rate among Haredi families has fallen by five points compared to 2015, when it stood at 39%.

In many cases, however, such as IDF enlistment, employment among men, or high school graduation rate, change has not come at all or has materialized at a less significant extent than needed from the perspective of Israeli general society.

“For the last 20 years, the main effort of the state has been to open special tracks and programs reserved for the ultra-Orthodox society to integrate them,” Malach said. “Examples of this approach include dedicated army units and college campuses meant to cater just to the Haredim.”

While these initiatives have yielded some results, like in the case of higher education participation, according to the researcher, at this point, economic disincentives are the only tool that can have a more profound impact on issues such as the enlistment rate and employment figures.

“We have seen that special programs are not enough,” Malach said.

The researcher argued that the current Haredi way of living largely depends on the government’s financial support, such as support for the yeshivas, child subsidies and lower taxes.

According to the IDI report, the expenditure of ultra-Orthodox households on income taxes, social security, and health insurance is, on average, only 33% of the expenditure of non-Orthodox households.

“If this situation were to end, more people would have no choice but to integrate into the labor market, as it happens with the Haredi population outside of the state of Israel,” Malach said.

Malach believes that, for example, the slight decrease in the number of children per woman in the Haredi sector over the past 20 years (6.4 compared to 7.5) is at least partially due to lower child subsidies than in the previous period.

“It is worth noting that we do not see a significant difference between women who work and women who do not,” he said.

Asked about the risk of alienating the Haredi population and its leadership, whose support many argue is essential to positive change in the community, Malach responded that he understands the argument, but the more accommodating approach has shown its limitation.

“After twenty years of carrots, which brought some successes but not enough, we need to try the stick,” he said.