The Israel Defense Forces sent out the first batch of 1,000 conscription orders to ultra-Orthodox men aged 18 to 26 on Sunday morning, in the first of three such waves scheduled for the next four weeks.
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant ordered Thursday that the first batch of draft notices be sent out after the weekend.
While prominent ultra-Orthodox rabbis have urged yeshiva students to ignore any communications from the Israeli military, the army said last week that orders would be sent to those it believes actually show up at the absorption center.
The Israeli military said that among the 3,000 are men who are employed, enrolled in higher education institutions or hold driver’s licenses – indicators that they are not engaged in full-time yeshiva studies despite previous exemptions from study.
The orders, which are the first step in the selection and evaluation process the military conducts for recruits before they enlist in the army next year, come after a landmark High Court ruling last month declared that there was no longer a legal framework for the state to refrain from conscripting Haredi yeshiva students into military service.
The government was ordered to immediately begin conscripting 3,000 Haredi men – the number the military said it could handle at this preliminary stage.
Police clear ultra-Orthodox Jewish youths who were blocking a road to protest military recruitment in Bnei Brak, near Tel Aviv, Israel, Tuesday, July 16, 2024. (AP/Ohad Zwigenberg)
Of the 3,000 soldiers called up for service, 15% are married and 85% are single, the latter being mostly destined for combat missions. According to Israeli army data, 50% of potential soldiers are between 18 and 21 years old, 40% between 22 and 23 years old and 10% between 24 and 26 years old.
Normally, the recruitment process lasts about two years from the moment the first draft order is sent. For these 3,000 Haredi soldiers, the process is expected to be accelerated. The IDF said their first visit to the absorption center for evaluation would take place within two weeks, and they could be drafted no earlier than 45 days later.
The Israeli military said it would act in accordance with the law and that those who ignored the multiple conscription orders would not be allowed to leave the country and could be arrested by military police and taken to military prisons.
The conflict over the drafting of ultra-Orthodox men into the army is one of the most tense in Israel. Decades of government and judicial attempts to resolve the issue have never led to a stable solution. Haredi religious and political leaders fiercely resist any attempt to draft young men.
Many ultra-Orthodox Jews believe that military service is incompatible with their way of life and fear that those who enlist will be secularized. Israelis who enlist, however, say that the decades-long system of mass exemptions weighs unfairly on them, a feeling that has grown stronger since the Oct. 7 Hamas attack and the ensuing war, in which more than 680 soldiers were killed and more than 300,000 citizens were called up to serve in the reserves.
In light of the high court’s position, the government, which includes the ultra-Orthodox Shas and United Torah Judaism parties, has sought to pass legislation that would slowly increase Haredi enrollment, but significant rifts remain between Haredi factions and many senior lawmakers from non-Haredi parties.
Jeremy Sharon and Sam Sokol contributed to this report.
