The Israeli Supreme Court on Thursday ordered the government to\u00a0stop funding religious schools whose students defy the country\u2019s mandatory military service, posing one of the most serious threats to date for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu\u2019s governing coalition. <\/p>\n
Netanyahu relies on two Ultra-Orthodox parties \u2013 Shas and United Torah Judaism \u2013 to maintain a governing coalition. His wartime cabinet partners \u2013 Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Benny Gantz, of the National Unity Party \u2013 have been heavily critical of Netanyahu\u2019s approach to the issue of Ultra-Orthodox conscription. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe judges of the High Court of Justice want to saw off the branch of existence of the Jewish people,\u201d Ariyeh Deri, leader of the Shas party, said in a\u00a0statement on X. \u201cThe people of Israel are engaged in a war of existence on several fronts and the High Court of Justice judges did everything tonight to create a fratricidal war as well.\u201d <\/p>\n
Young men studying in yeshivas have since the country\u2019s founding been exempt from mandatory military service \u2013 in practice, exempting all Ultra-Orthodox Israelis. But the exemption has never been enshrined in a law that the Supreme Court views as equitable, and for years has been carried out by patch-work government mandates. Netanyahu this week attempted to delay the Supreme Court\u2019s deadline to pass a law that would make official the exemption. <\/p>\n
After decades of rulings on the subject, the Supreme Court told the government that it was illegal for the government to both fund yeshivas and exempt their students from conscription. In a ruling late Thursday, the Supreme Court said that starting on April 1, the government could no longer transfer funds to yeshivas whose students did not receive legitimate deferments. <\/p>\n
Yitzhak Goldknopf, leader of the United Torah Judaism party, called the ruling \u201ca sign of disgrace and contempt.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cThe State of Israel arose to be a home for the Jewish people whose Torah is true Torah, and there is no power in the world that can do it,\u201d he said. \u201cWithout the Torah, we have no right to exist.\u201d <\/p>\n
Ultra-Orthodox Jews view religious study as fundamental to the preservation of Judaism. For many of those who live in Israel, that means study is\u202fjust as important to Israel\u2019s defense as the military. <\/p>\n
Gantz, of the National Unity Party, said that the court \u201cruled the obvious today. The time has come for the government to do the obvious. It\u2019s time for action.\u201d <\/p>\n
This is a developing story and will be updated. <\/p>\n\n
The Israeli Supreme Court on Thursday ordered the government to\u00a0stop funding religious schools whose students defy the country\u2019s mandatory military service, posing one of the most serious threats to date for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu\u2019s governing coalition. Netanyahu relies on two Ultra-Orthodox parties \u2013 Shas and United Torah Judaism \u2013 to maintain a governing coalition. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":17398,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-17397","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17397","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17397"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17397\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17398"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17397"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17397"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17397"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}