Hundreds Protest Jailing of Yeshiva Student for Evading Draft
Image by Getty Images
At least six protesters were arrested and a police officer was wounded in demonstrations protesting the arrest of a yeshiva student for ignoring a draft notice.
The demonstrations took place Sunday in Jerusalem and other cities with large haredi Orthodox populations, including Bnei Brak, Modiin Illit and Beit Shemesh. The hundreds of protesters blocked busy intersections during the demonstrations.
The yeshiva student has been arrested several times, the first time in March, for ignoring his call-up notice. He is being held in a military prison and reportedly has begun a hunger strike, according to The Jerusalem Post.
The student reportedly is affiliated with the Jerusalem Faction, a non-Hasidic haredi faction led by Rabbi Shmuel Auerbach, who has ordered his students to ignore draft notices.
Under a law passed in March, haredi men will be criminally charged for evading the draft, but the penalties will not go into effect until 2017.
The Tal Law, which allowed haredi men to defer army service indefinitely, was invalidated by the Supreme Court in February 2012 and expired in August that year.
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.
We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.
If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
