Rabbonim in the dati leumi and chareidi worlds are working to prevent changes in current regulations towards facilitating drafting women into the IDF. The IDF is seeking to get stricter, hoping to apprehend non-religious girls who sign declarations that they are Shomer Shabbos. One problem, and there are many more, is that the IDF wants more control over the decision-making policy, including reversing decisions made by rabbonim who sign affidavits that a girl is religious.
Kikar Shabbos News reports speaking with military officials in the hope of obtaining some accurate facts and figures. According to the report, 19,000 females declared themselves being religious and seeking a deferment from military duty as such.
397 were summoned to an induction center for a follow-up interview towards determining if they truly maintain a religious lifestyle, and they admitted they do not. An additional 240 were summoned and did not make any such confession, insisting they are religious. A total of 3.35% of the women were summoned by the military from the 19,000 who received deferments.
However, in these cases, the military did its homework and they have proof to the contrary from social media and other sources. Hence, they did not receive their deferment.
(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)
Join the official YWN WhatsApp status
2 Responses
In addition to the many issues that apply to men, an issue with women is that of what in America is called “sexual harassment”, that women are pressured to engage in גילוי עריות. This prohibition applies not only to frum women but to all Jewish women (and arguably to non-Jewish women, since the prohibition was included in the mitsvos applicable to non-Jews as well). Even if the Jewish girls buys a cheeseburger on Shabbos, she is still within her rights to refuse serve based on Torah law. In practice, what the Hareidim and the Zionists have worked out, is an agreement to protect girls from hashuva families, while letting the zionists do what they will with the rest.
And if they’re not frum…so what? Granted that per IDF regs they should be drafted, but by us, no woman should be drafted, even if she isn’t religious! So it’s still legit for us to want as many women as possible, exempted.