Amid the ongoing dispute over military draft exemptions, Haredi demonstrators plan another protest Monday evening outside Prison 10, following instructions from senior rabbis.
In a statement distributed by the Jerusalem Faction, organizers declared: “The great battle against the draft decree is intensifying. The army continues abducting yeshiva students from their homes, and now, in their audacity, they are entering Haredi neighborhoods to carry out arrests.”
Additional demonstrations are expected Tuesday afternoon against the detention of draft dodgers. Flyers circulated by the “Joint Committee for Salvation from the Draft Decree” stated: “We will not compromise on any Jewish soul. No compromises! No quotas! No targets! Not 50% and not even 1%.”
Other notices published a transportation schedule for the rallies, urging participants to “strengthen the holy soldiers who sanctify the Name of Heaven” and calling imprisoned draft resisters “our emissaries.” Names of rabbis endorsing the protest were included on the posters.
Haredi newspapers have also called for a public fast and prayer this Thursday to annul what they termed the “draft decree.” The newspaper HaPeles warned of “wicked attempts to arrest yeshiva students” and announced a coming “major protest of anger.”
In recent days, Haredi outlets reported continued attempts by the military to detain yeshiva students and said that the “Magen u’Moshia” center would establish an alert system to warn of arrest efforts. That group published an ad under the headline: “With strategies you shall wage war.”
At the same time, Rabbi David Stav, founder of the Tzohar rabbinical organization, sharply criticized the refusal to enlist, saying: “We are at a further point in this war when tens of thousands of Israeli families are again separated from loved ones returning to battle, while a large segment of the population absolves itself of national responsibility. Not only does this violate the mitzvah not to stand idly by as Jewish blood is spilled, but to claim that such evasion is a Torah value is nothing less than a disgrace of Hashem’s name.”