Israel News, Monday, 27.10.2025  
  The fact that an opposition leader like Lapid – considered to be liberal, moderate, and presumably a fan of democracy – can get away with suggesting that a huge swath of Israelis be disenfranchised without triggering shock says a great deal about Israeli society  Allison Kaplan Sommer

 Israel’s opposition leader Yair Lapid made a proposition Monday that would provoke outrage in any (other) Western democracy: No army service – no vote.

Lapid said that if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government allowed the ultra-Orthodox to continue evading the draft, the next government – theoretically led by today’s opposition parties – would pass a law that would assure that any Israeli citizen who did not enlist in the military would lose their right to vote in elections.

Lapid pitched the extreme measure in reaction to the push by Netanyahu’s coalition to follow through with their long-standing promise to pass legislation that will officially exempt the vast majority of ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students from Israel’s universal military service. Netanyahu has vowed to usher through the passage of such a law ever since he brought the Haredi parties into his government in 2022.

His failure to do so is the biggest threat to the stability of his coalition.

Ultra-Orthodox leaders remained patient with Netanyahu throughout nearly two years of the war, but their forbearance ran out over the summer when military authorities became more aggressive about rounding up and arresting young men who did not respond to enlistment orders.

That’s when the ultra-Orthodox United Torah Judaism party resigned from the governing coalition and the other ultra-Orthodox party, Shas, threatened to join the exodus as well. Shas never quite pulled the plug – their top officials quit their ministries – and last week, resigned from their leadership roles in the Knesset. But they still haven’t exited the coalition and all of the ultra-Orthodox parties have – for now – stopped short of voting to dissolve the current government.

But they have made plenty of noise, intensified since the cease-fire agreement with Hamas. Demonstrations by the ultra-Orthodox public against drafting yeshiva students have blocked major roads on a regular basis, and are expected to peak in coming days. A massive prayer rally is expected to draw hundreds of thousands to the entrance to the Knesset on Thursday.

Meanwhile, the government is scrambling to find a solution. Tasked with fixing the problem is Likud MK Boaz Bismuth, chair of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee. Bismuth replaced MK Yuli Edelstein as chair in August, after Edelstein resisted advancing strong exemption legislation – and was punished for his sins.

Bismuth has promised a bill that “respects Torah scholars” and “balances” between Torah studies and IDF service, but he must craft legislation that won’t be struck down by the High Court of Justice as being illegally discriminatory.

Opposition leaders like Lapid smell an opportunity. The Israeli public is filled with exhausted reservists for whom the gap in military service is infuriating and intolerable. The idea of formalizing ultra-Orthodox exemptions has never been popular among mainstream Israelis, and the issue crosses ideological lines.

There are many right-wing religious and settler reservists who support Netanyahu and the coalition, but are still determined to press for equal military service for all citizens.

The military reservists are well-organized and motivated. They will undoubtedly fight to end the reality in which they carry more and more of the burden while the ultra-Orthodox sector receives more and more of the budget. On the other hand, the powerful ultra-Orthodox leaders are just as well-organized and motivated – and Netanyahu’s determination to stay in power is at an all-time high.

But what is missing from the conversation completely?

The fact that more than 20 percent of Israeli citizens are Arab – nearly all of whom do not serve in the army. In Lapid’s vision of denying the vote to those who don’t serve in the army, would they be disenfranchised as well?

It seems that for Lapid, the ultra-Orthodox, Netanyahu and even the reservists – Israeli Arabs are invisible and unworthy of consideration in this debate at all. (In the case of some of them, it is worse: they would embrace the opportunity to take away the Arab vote as well, especially without the appearance of targeting them.)

The fact that an opposition leader like Lapid – considered to be liberal and moderate and presumably a fan of democracy – can get away with suggesting that a huge swath of his country’s citizens be disenfranchised without triggering shock and outrage says a great deal about Israeli society and discourse today.