The Shas Party announced on Wednesday that it would leave Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition over its failure to pass a law exempting Haredi men from military conscription.
In doing so, Shas joins another ultra-Orthodox party, United Torah Judaism, which quit the government on Monday night.
The immediate significance of the move is that the government, which enjoyed a comfortable 67-seat majority, is now reduced to a minority of 50 seats in the 120-seat Knesset.
However, the government is not in imminent danger of collapse as Shas said it would not support a no-confidence motion to bring down the government until after the end of the parliament’s summer session, which concludes on July 27, Kan News reported.
Shas members will also remain on Knesset committees, and party chairman Aryeh Deri will continue to attend the reduced kitchen cabinet. The party will also support any deal involving the release of hostages held by Hamas.
The party doesn’t hold Netanyahu responsible for the impasse. Shas spokesman Asher Medina blamed Yuli Edelstein, chairman of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, for the failure to reach an agreement on a military draft bill.
“I know that Netanyahu did everything he could,” Medina told radio station Kan Reshet Bet.
Opposition leader Yair Lapid of the Yesh Atid Party, responding to the announcement, called for elections.
“A minority government cannot send soldiers into battle, decide who will live and who will die, decide the fate of Gaza and close an agreement with Syria and Saudi Arabia,” Lapid said.
“It cannot continue to transfer billions to the corrupt and draft dodgers at the expense of the taxpayers, and certainly a minority government cannot free the ultra-Orthodox from conscription,” he added.
The Haredi community faces widespread anger in Israeli society for opposing sending its young men to serve in the army.
Israel’s Supreme Court ruled last year, following the expiration of a previous exemption law in 2023, that the state must begin drafting Haredi men into the Israel Defense Forces.
This year, the IDF began initiating criminal proceedings against Haredi draft candidates who fail to report for enlistment.
