Committee aiming to draft national service law faces first challenges

Kadima joined the coalition with the goal of finding an alternative to the Tal Law relating to conscription to the IDF, but on Monday the first obstacles emerged, both from within the coalition and from the opposition.

Shas leader and Internal Affairs Minister Eli Yishai said his party would not take part in a Knesset committee meant to increase the number of ultra-Orthodox men drafted into the IDF or national service.

Yishai said he had spoken to Shas’s spiritual leader, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, who was very clear on the topic. “Shas will formulate its own solution to the problem,” Yishai said. The right of yeshiva students to learn Torah will not be compromised, he stated, as “their contribution to Israel is obvious to everyone.”

Earlier on Monday, MK Isaac Herzog (Labor) asked for the Knesset’s legal adviser’s opinion on Kadima MK Yohanan Plesner heading the special committee in charge of formulating the new law. Herzog claimed Plesner, being a coalition MK, suffered from a conflict of interests — though Herzog was quick to note that he respected Plesner.

Members of the Knesset should not serve the government, but rather act as its critics and supervisors, Herzog said. “If Plesner wishes to be in a job meant to serve the interests of the government, he should be appointed as a minister or deputy minister.”

Last week, Kadima chairman Shaul Mofaz led his party into a surprise unity government, only moments before the Knesset was to be disbanded and while the country was preparing for elections. One of the goals Mofaz claimed was going to lead him was the need to find an alternative to the Tal Law which, following a court ruling, will no longer be in effect starting August 1.