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An impending political storm over drafting ultra-Orthodox Jews into the military is posing a risk to the administration and fracturing the state.

The public mood on the issue has changed profoundly in Israel following two years of hostilities, and this is now perhaps the most explosive political issue facing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The Judicial Struggle

Politicians are now debating a draft bill to terminate the exemption given to ultra-Orthodox men enrolled in yeshiva learning, established when the modern Israel was declared in 1948.

This arrangement was declared unconstitutional by Israel's High Court of Justice two decades ago. Interim measures to continue it were finally concluded by the bench last year, pressuring the administration to commence conscription of the ultra-Orthodox population.

Some 24,000 enlistment orders were issued last year, but merely about 1,200 men from the community enlisted, according to military testimony shared with lawmakers.

Friction Boil Over Into Public View

Friction is spilling onto the city centers, with parliamentarians now deliberating a new conscription law to compel Haredi males into military service in the same way as other Jewish citizens.

Two representatives were confronted this month by radical elements, who are furious with the Knesset's deliberations of the draft legislation.

In a recent incident, a elite police squad had to assist Military Police officers who were surrounded by a big group of Haredi men as they sought to apprehend a man avoiding service.

These enforcement actions have sparked the creation of a new communication network called "Emergency Alert" to spread word quickly through the religious sector and call out activists to block enforcement from happening.

"This is a Jewish state," said an activist. "One cannot oppose Judaism in a Jewish country. It doesn't work."

A Realm Set Aside

But the transformations sweeping across Israel have failed to penetrate the walls of the religious seminary in an ultra-Orthodox city, an Haredi enclave on the edge of Tel Aviv.

Inside the classroom, teenage boys learn in partnerships to discuss Jewish law, their brightly coloured writing books standing out against the lines of formal attire and small black kippahs.

"Visit in the early hours, and you will see a significant portion are engaged in learning," the head of the academy, Rabbi Tzemach Mazuz, said. "Through religious study, we shield the troops wherever they are. This is how we contribute."

Haredi Jews maintain that constant study and Torah learning defend Israel's armed forces, and are as crucial to its security as its conventional forces. That belief was acknowledged by the nation's leaders in the earlier decades, Rabbi Mazuz said, but he acknowledged that Israel was changing.

Rising Societal Anger

This religious sector has significantly increased its percentage of the nation's citizens over the last seventy years, and now accounts for a sizable minority. An exemption that started as an exception for several hundred religious students evolved into, by the onset of the 2023 war, a body of approximately 60,000 men left out of the national service.

Opinion polls suggest approval of ultra-Orthodox conscription is growing. Research in July showed that 85% of secular and traditional Jews - encompassing almost three-quarters in the Prime Minister's political base - backed consequences for those who declined a call-up notice, with a firm majority in approving cutting state subsidies, the right to travel, or the right to vote.

"I feel there are individuals who live in this country without contributing," one serviceman in Tel Aviv explained.

"In my view, regardless of piety, [it] should be an excuse not to go and serve your nation," said a young woman. "If you're born here, I find it rather absurd that you want to exempt yourself just to learn in a yeshiva all day."

Voices from Within the Community

Advocacy of extending the draft is also expressed by observant Jews not part of the Haredi community, like a Bnei Brak inhabitant, who is a neighbor of the seminary and notes observant but non-Haredi Jews who do perform national service while also maintaining their faith.

"I'm very angry that this community don't serve in the army," she said. "It's unfair. I also believe in the Jewish law, but there's a teaching in Hebrew - 'Safra and Saifa' – it signifies the Torah and the weapons together. That is the path, until the arrival of peace."

Ms Barak manages a modest remembrance site in the neighborhood to soldiers from the area, both religious and secular, who were killed in battle. Rows of photographs {