Shas party chairman Aryeh Deri on Thursday dismissed the suggestion that he should call on army-age Haredi men who are not studying Torah to enlist in the Israel Defense Forces, in accordance with the law.
“The army, with all due respect, that knows how to bomb Iran – that army knows how to cope. Let them cope,” Deri told the ultra-Orthodox Kol Berama radio station.
“The army doesn’t want Haredi soldiers,” he claimed. “It’s a big headache for them. They want a secular army; they don’t want an army that listens to its rabbis.”
The military has said repeatedly that it urgently needs 12,000 new recruits amid the ongoing multifront conflict. Currently, approximately 80,000 Haredi men between the ages of 18 and 24 are eligible for military service but have not enlisted.
In July, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir reiterated that the military must expand its ranks and draft more ultra-Orthodox soldiers, as data showed an increase in Haredi enlistment over the past year that still fell short of the army’s target number.
