JERUSALEM, Israel – Out of the blue late on Tuesday morning, the news came across the cellphone: Israel’s High Court had ruled unanimously that Haredi (ultra-Orthodox) Jewish Yeshiva students could no longer be exempt from the military draft. Presumably, the drafting of the Haredim could begin almost immediately.
Within a few hours, the narrative among big media and Israeli opposition leaders had been set. It wasn’t about the new prospective Haredi soldiers, or whether the ultra-Orthodox rabbis and students would take to the streets in protest.
No, the narrative was well described in the second phrase of the lead sentence in an Associated Press article: “… a decision that could lead to the collapse of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s governing coalition as Israel continues to wage war in Gaza.”
For Netanyahu’s many opponents, both inside and outside Israel, the timing couldn’t be more exciting, with the nation wearied by the prolonged operation in Gaza and threatened by a much greater force, Hezbollah in Lebanon.
The exemption for the Haredi students rankles strongly among secular and even some Religious Zionist Israelis who resent the Haredim for refusing to serve while the rest of the nation pays taxes for their welfare.
At the same time, their non-Orthodox sons and
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