Israel needs a government that doesn’t serve the interests of the ultra-Orthodox leaders, opposition party heads stated as thousands took to the streets to block roads in protest at the haredi draft on Wednesday.
“Israel needs a new agreement, a fair agreement between the government and its citizens – an agreement that says we are all building this country together,” opposition head Yair Lapid said, slamming Netanyahu for his refusal to cease funding those who do not serve in the IDF.
“While soldiers are being killed every day in Lebanon, he keeps giving them more and more of the working and serving public’s money so that they will not enlist in the IDF.”
Former IDF chief of staff Gadi Eisenkot said that Netanyahu’s legacy would be allowing the non-working and non-serving public to paralyze the country, shutting down the working and serving sector at the end of the workday.
“The next government will act according to the national interests of the State of Israel, not according to the interests of Deri, Gafni, and Goldknopf,” Eisenkot said.
Other opposition leaders also slammed the protests
Former prime minister Naftali Bennett criticized the protesters while stuck in traffic on the way to celebrate his daughter finishing pre-school.
“I have been in traffic for two-and-a-half hours. I am here because of a group of evading privileged people – I and every taxpayer are funding them because they decided to bury the country,” he told Kan Reshet Bet.
“The operatives of Shas and United Torah Judaism are holding the haredi public hostage. They are turning the broader public against them,” Yisrael Beytenu chairman Avigdor Liberman said.
“Those responsible for the traffic jams and road blockages during rush hour are the same leaders who are concerned with securing power, prestige, and money for themselves. Once again, the price is being paid by those who serve, work, and pay taxes.”
Leader of the Democrats party, Yair Golan, called to “block every shekel that finances draft evasion,” as well as institutions that incite against service, and rabbis, activists, and elected officials who encourage haredim against joining the IDF.
“In the world they have built here, there is no equality before the law. There is no obligation to serve. There is no education that gives children the tools they need for life. There is no basic Israeli solidarity. There is a wall. They built a wall,” he wrote, noting how the haredi youth is denied core studies from a young age, and raised in a system of “poverty, ignorance, dependence, and the denial of professional opportunities.”
“They are blocking roads now; tomorrow, we will block the money, the political deals, and send the haredi power brokers into the opposition to do some deep soul-searching. That is a promise,” Golan said.