Outrage as students at state-funded Haredi yeshiva sing anti-Zionist, anti-enlistment anthem
‘We don’t believe in the government of infidels and we won’t show up at their [army] recruitment offices,’ sing thousands of Ateret Shlomo young men at mass wedding
Thousands of ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students from a seminary network that receives tens of millions of shekels annually in state funds were filmed Tuesday night gleefully singing their refusal to enlist in the Israeli army of “infidels,” in a clip that drew angry reactions from across the political spectrum.
The Ateret Shlomo students from branches around the country had gathered for the wedding of the son of the yeshiva chain’s head, Rabbi Sholom Ber Sorotzkin, at an event hall in the Mishor Adumim area of the West Bank, east of Jerusalem, and had filled bleachers outside the hall afterward to sing and dance.
Singer Arale Samet led the crowd in a raucous rendition of a famous anthem of the staunchly anti-Zionist Neturei Karta Haredi sect, which is translatable as: “We don’t believe in the government of infidels and we do not recognize their laws.”
However, the version sung at the wedding tweaked the words to say: “We don’t believe in the government of infidels and we won’t show up at their [army] recruitment offices.”
Many in the crowd could be seen joining Samet in belting out the adapted line in a clip that quickly went viral, sparking an uproar online and among politicians.
The background is a High Court of Justice ruling last year that there is no legal basis for the decades-long blanket exemption from military service for Haredi yeshiva students, as well as a decision by Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara that there can be no daycare subsidies for the children of ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students who refuse to obey military draft orders.
רבבות תלמידי ישיבות עטרת שלמה בראשות ראש הישיבה הגרש"ב סורוצקין שרים בהתלהבות: "בשלטון הכופרים אין אנו מאמינים ובלשכותיהם אין אנו מתייצבים" pic.twitter.com/8d44FHeKVp
— משה ויסברג (@moshe_nayes) March 11, 2025
Unlike members of Neturei Karta, who reject any financial support from the Israeli state, Ateret Shlomo, a large non-Hasidic chain of yeshivas, schools and kindergartens, received a total of over NIS 51 million ($14 million) annually in government funds as of 2023.
The Walla news site quoted an unnamed yeshiva official as saying the song was sung as part of a “Purim atmosphere,” a Jewish festival marked by masquerade and revelry.
But the clip drew condemnation from right-wing, centrist and left-wing politicians, including from the coalition’s far-right Religious Zionism party, which shared the video on social media and wrote: “Shame on you.”
Avigdor Liberman, head of the secularist right-wing opposition party Yisrael Beytenu, reacted with his new slogan, “Don’t enlist? You cannot vote,” promoting his new longshot legislation seeking to deny voting rights to those who are drafted but don’t join the army.
MK Elazar Stern, from Opposition Leader Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid party, said: “They don’t believe in the government of infidels, but they do believe in their money and blood,” referring to the blood of many hundreds of soldiers who have died in the war and in Hamas’s October 7, 2023, onslaught.
Stern also urged Religious Zionism — headed by Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich — and the ruling Likud party to not approve a new round of substantial funding to elements within the Haredi community that encourage mass draft evasion.
Lapid himself echoed that sentiment, claiming that the government is giving the ultra-Orthodox “exemptions at the expense of our children.”
Yesh Atid MK Vladimir Beliak said he had contacted the welfare and education ministries, asking them to halt funding for Ateret Shlomo, and also asked the Tax Authority to deny the yeshiva network tax benefits.
And MK Gilad Kariv from the left-wing Labor commented during a Knesset committee meeting that the yeshiva head “should have opened the celebration of his draft-dodger son’s wedding with a moment of silence for the fallen, but instead he mocks the bereaved families. You insolent people, you have no shame.”
