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Israel’s ultra-Orthodox don’t serve in its armed forces. That’s getting harder than ever to justify and threatens Benjamin Netanyahu's coalition.
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2024/03/orthodox-military-israel-netanyahu/677758/
Right. Because that's what any country looks for in immigration: a very large, very insular, uneducated group who relies on government welfare and only wants to leave because they might be called upon to do their duty to the country that has provided for them all these decades. I can't imagine any country that would pass up this golden opportunity ...
And if the demographic changes continue, eventually there will have to be a drastic change or Israel as we know it will collapse and another great Israeli-Arab war will occur. At that point the question will be does the US want to put boots on the ground to secure their power projection base in the middle east when they already have the United Arab Emirates.
A democratic leader cannot afford to alienate 13% of a country's population so it will be hard to move Israel into a secular direction.
Also yeah, the idea that they can just emigrate is fucking laughable. Israel is the only state that will have them barring them claiming asylum for some fucked up reason.
I think it's high past time that Haredi stop being catered to. There is no reason to allow them to continue to live the way they do given the climate of the world both politically and literally.
Truth be told, while I don’t know the group and have no real opinion on them either way, I can’t help but find an exemption to the draft to be a decidedly good thing.
Maybe some changes need to happen with regard to them, I don’t know. But expanding an already-awful military draft to force even more people to aid in an honest-to-god ethnic cleansing campaign is… not the answer.
The issue lies in the fact that the very religious part of the populace in Israel is predominantly responsible for the settlements that have repeatedly been the entire reason for neighbouring hostility.
By allowing their exemption you, as the Israeli government, are essentially telling them that their actions are not only justifiable but something that the rest of the nation is supposed to die for. It's allowing these families to completely detach themselves from the harm they perpetuate.
While in theory less conscription is a good thing, maybe more exposure to the consequences of their actions is just what's needed to make that life less attractive. Fanatic Zionists deserve no special treatment and much, MUCH less for the rest of Israel to send their children to war just so they can keep being assholes.
...This is an extremely good point I didn't consider. Thank you very much for making this post!
I understand this idea, however, in Israel, people generally want to serve, even those who are disabled find a way to serve. It's part of the community and it's something that ties everyone together. While we don't particularly see service in the US (or other places) as something good, in Israel, it's actually a thing.
Service in the IDF is not meant to be part of an ethnic cleansing campaign, it's meant to protect Israel from its neighbors who have been openly hostile to the country since its inception.
What it's meant to be and what it's doing, then, are two entirely different things.
Truth be told, I can't imagine seeing commonplace military work as anything other than a sad state of affairs, these days. It's indicative of either a dire situation or (more frequently) politicians grabbing / holding power with guns and soldiers as the tools. Both are depressing at best. I can see some ways why Israeli citizenry might feel differently, but I can't agree and I can't relate.
That is not really possible in a democratic context, because if you run for election on such a platform, you are handing the opposition 13% of the national vote. For free.
I think I might just be a bit hopeful that other parties in Israel don't want to partner with them, since they're basically extremists in their own way.
It is the hypocrisy that is so noxious.
Many religious communities are opposed to being in the military. For example, the Amish and Shaker communities in christendom, who have pacifism as a religious principle. The hypocrisy comes about when you realize that many of the conflicts that are most acutely influencing the diminished relationship between the political state of Israel and its neighbors are driven by the Ultra-orthodox.
They insist on public subsidies to provide for their ever growing families. They insist on unmitigated privileges in the name of religious freedom. They then deliberately expand and settle into land that the political state of Israel agrees is not simply theirs. They instigate conflict and then pretend to be innocent of it, preferring others to fight their battles.
It is a remarkably cynical worldview of realpolitik. And because they have Netanyahu reliant on them, it works.
73% of Israelis (in the article there is a link) oppose continued service exemptions for the Ultra-orthodox. That is 84% of all non-Ultra-orthodox citizens...it is an overwhelming majority.
Israel is a dysfunctional political body. That's it, that's the sentence.
The stat from the linked article that says there are more Arab Israelis in the IDF than the Haredi is particularly heinous in this context.
The trouble is in the form...to exist you require protection and something in the form of total military dominance. Just look at American indigenous people.
These communities are the vestiges of a world that just doesn't exist anymore, and the fact that we have been supporting them with any benefits whatsoever has always baffled me. Freedom of religion is an important thing, even if I don't really appreciate faith as a concept, but claiming that your religion is so important that you deserve to almost exclusively take from the society you live in is just an example of the same kind of exceptionalism that has plagued this country for decades. When you're certain that you're doing god's work, there's not much room to argue.
I mean, to the degree that you feel like your fundamental philosophy for addressing life is valuable and you recognize that it's important to have professionals continue to focus on refining and teaching that philosophy, it's valuable to subsidize those philosophers, as it's rarely the sort of thing that is going to bring in the cash. This is true in basically every tradition. That it's going off the rails here isn't a condemnation of the whole theory, but these people do seem to be taking advantage of their situation.
This is true in general, but when it comes to the Israeli Haredi community I can't help but disagree that it serves any philosophical purpose. I don't think comparing them to others is appropriate.
The philosophy practiced by the ultra religious is not one that exists for the benefit of all people, but for the benefit of people part of said religion. If you happen to not ascribe to their beliefs they will treat you with disregard at best, and horrible scorn at worst. These "philosophers" are part of the reason I can't visit family in Jerusalem without feeling incredibly uncomfortable being myself.
Support of insular communities and philosophers is fine, but only if they do not actively harm the country by spreading backwards and dated ideals. I mean, look at what growing religious fundamentalism brought into our government. The idea that a secular teenager from Haifa has to give up almost three years of their life - potentially dying - just so another from Hebron can keep squatting in someone else's house - partially perpetuating the entire reason that we have conscription at all - is absurd.
The other thing to consider is that for decades, these people have designed their lives around a compact with their nation. I wouldn't have ever agreed to that compact myself, but thank the One Who Is, I'm not Israeli leadership.
The article makes mention of Amish and Shakers, who have a similar arrangement in my country. Our situations are quite different of course. Israel does need a strong military to survive amongst their neighbors. But if I mentally substitute their sect names for "Ultra-Orthodox," I find I'm not as inclined to disparage.
The one good thing I can see is that this issue seems like it might be chickens coming home to roost for Netenyahu. Couldn't have happened to a nicer guy, and I mean that literally. A wiser and more humane man would probably not find himself in a situation where the pacifism of others threatens to tank his political prospects.
The Amish are the diametric opposite of these people though. They grow their own food, they handle their own healthcare and education, they largely don't accept government payments, and they still pay almost all taxes with the exception of social security (and they also don't receive social security payments so it's a wash). They are not totally self-sufficient and are still connected to the outside economy, but they still pay their own way and aren't a drain on society.
Somewhat biased source: https://amishamerica.com/do-amish-pay-taxes/
In contrast,
https://foreignpolicy.com/2023/07/27/israel-ultra-orthodox-judicial-religion-netanyahu/
I'm no fan of Ultra-Orthodox sorts of any religion, but I'm extremely skeptical whenever a group of people is judged by whether they're "a drain on society." Arguments like that always seem to boil down to numbers: what's this group's contribution to GDP, what proportion of that group takes government subsidies or welfare benefits etc. Numbers are useful in many ways, but in my experience, arguments that rely on numbers to judge the value of humans are prone to cherry-picking of data, not to mention the fact that it can lead to some pretty dark places.
The assumption here is that the Haredim choose the life they lead to cynically exploit the beneficence of the Israeli people. I honestly don't know enough about the situation to make that determination, nor is it my place to. I do have to wonder whether any group of people is willing to endure high rates of poverty simply to avoid paying their way in the world.
It just sounds too much like other arguments I find pretty unsavory and unconvincing for comfort, I guess.
I think that's a fair snap judgement, but upon closer inspection it really does appear to be a sort of caste system where the ultra-orthadox get to reap a lot of the benefits while not contributing back in a remotely fair way.
Namely because it allows them to fully exempt out of the military service, because they're studying the Torrah full-time. Which means instead of serving in the military for a few years and then moving on to the workforce, they've kind of sidestepped both for 10+ years.
I think it'd be less of a problem if the exemption was only for say 2-5 years instead of 10+.
There are also pacifists and pacifists. I have great respect for pacifists who are willing to drive ambulances in combat zones.
Would you explain why you use this phrase?
Non-paywall link: https://archive.is/QuofW
https://web.archive.org/web/20240317185814/https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2024/03/orthodox-military-israel-netanyahu/677758/