Watchdog group demands criminal probe of Haredi party behind anti-enlistment hotline
Movement for Quality Government says Agudat Yisrael promoting draft dodging, assisting Haredim to circumvent order on daycare subsidies for kids of yeshiva students who fail to enlist
Sam Sokol is the Times of Israel's political correspondent. 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"
The Movement for Quality Government in Israel watchdog group called on Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara and the Israel Police to open a criminal investigation into the Hasidic Agudat Yisrael party on Sunday, citing reports that it had encouraged draft evasion and instructed its constituents on how to circumvent a High Court ruling restricting daycare subsidies for children of yeshiva students who fail to enlist.
The conduct of Agudat Yisrael officials “raises serious suspicion of committing serious offenses of fraud and breach of trust,” the organization, which has long advocated for ultra-Orthodox enlistment, said in a statement.
The Movement for Quality Government’s appeal cited reporting by The Times of Israel, which last Thursday published an investigation into a hotline established by Jerusalem Affairs Minister Meir Porush. It also cited reporting by the Ynet news site on a separate hotline dealing with the issue of daycare subsidies.
Worried Haredi yeshiva students and parents who called the hotline set up by Porush have repeatedly been advised to ignore draft orders and lie to the Israel Defense Forces, The Times of Israel found.
Zalman, a member of the ultra-Orthodox community who spoke on condition of anonymity and asked to be identified by a pseudonym, said that he was told to disregard any draft orders sent to his son.
“What they are suggesting at this stage is to ignore it, not deal with it,” he said, claiming that he was told: “If you received an initial call-up order, you are like thousands of others. You don’t have to do anything, just ignore them.”
The Agudat Yisrael faction represents the Hasidic community’s interests within the coalition’s United Torah Judaism party (the other faction in UTJ is the non-Hasidic Degel Hatorah).
“Let us recall that the penal code stipulates severe prison sentences for anyone who incites or solicits a person liable for military service not to serve, and that the things described… may amount to committing a criminal offense, especially at a time when the State of Israel is at war,” Movement for Quality Government attorney Tomer Naor told The Times of Israel last week.
The Ynet news website, meanwhile, reported that another Agudat Yisrael hotline had given callers advice on how to circumvent a High Court of Justice ruling cutting off ultra-Orthodox families from daycare subsidies, which form an important part of their income streams.
Last summer, the court ruled that ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students were obligated to perform military service after the law for blanket military exemptions expired. In the same ruling, the court determined that the state cannot fund such students if they do not enlist.
The Attorney General’s Office last week informed the Labor and Welfare Ministry that it must halt these payments by the end of the month, in line with a subsequent ruling on the matter.
Ynet published a recording in which the hotline could be heard advising a caller on how to register a business to “recite psalms in memory of the souls of the fallen.” Even if it is not profitable, the caller was told, he would still be eligible to receive the daycare subsidy for the first six months.
“The use of resources and political power to circumvent the law and instruct citizens on how to deceive state authorities constitutes a serious violation of the public interest, moral purity, and the rule of law,” the Movement for Quality Government wrote to Baharav-Miara — demanding that she “open a criminal investigation” into Porush and “all those involved in the affair.”
“This is not spontaneous conduct, but a well-planned system designed to circumvent the rule of law and harm the public purse,” The Movement for Quality Government’s Naor said on Sunday.
In a separate letter, Yesh Atid MK Vladimir Beliak also appealed to the Attorney General to open a probe into Agudat Yisrael, whose hotline, he said, is encouraging callers to open “a fictitious business, with no intention of conducting any business activity.”
“This is a blatant and illegal attempt by the Agudat Yisrael party… to deceive government ministries and law enforcement agencies, as well as to disparage the Supreme Court ruling, in order to continue the illegal subsidy to young men who evade conscription into the IDF,” he tweeted.
Agudat Yisrael chairman and Housing Minister Yitzhak Goldknopf has denied any connection with Porush’s hotline. A spokesman for the minister told The Times of Israel last week that “this is related to Porush, the institutions of Agudat Yisrael Jerusalem belong to [him].”
Since last summer’s High Court of Justice ruling that the government must draft ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students, the IDF has sent out thousands of draft orders and subsequently issued 1,212 arrest warrants. Last week, an ultra-Orthodox yeshiva student was arrested at Ben Gurion Airport for trying to evade an IDF draft order by leaving the country.
Spokespeople for Porush and Goldknopf did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the calls to investigate their party.
