This article is being written at a time when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government is hanging by a thread, its ultimate fate unknown. The prime minister himself is the one trying to push for snap elections, while his coalition partners are digging in and trying to prevent him from doing so.
The ultra-Orthodox draft crisis over amending the army enlistment law, which lit the fire that is running wild now, was not born yesterday. It has accompanied Israel ever since the inception of the state, and it has reached even higher peaks than now. The feud is now being waged between the ultra-Orthodox factions, who want to perpetuate the exemption of ultra-Orthodox Jews from being drafted into the Israel Defense Forces, and Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman and his Yisrael Beitenu faction, who insist on enforcing the draft. This issue could be solved now the same way as was done in the past: by a temporary compromise, on the way to a temporary arrangement, until the Supreme Court steps in again to set limits and open the struggle anew.