A 23-year-old yeshiva student was arrested Wednesday morning at Ben-Gurion Airport on his way to Uman and transferred to a military prison. The detainee is a student at the "Chut Shel Chessed" yeshiva, headed by Rabbi Shalom Arush.
Last week, Attorney-General Gali Baharav-Miara instructed that the draft obligation be enforced on young men seeking to travel to Uman, and that they be arrested if necessary.
In an early August statement, the attorney-general stated the government had not yet actualized the sanctions it should impose on eligible haredi men who didn't report for duty.
Masses of yeshiva students demonstrated last month outside the gates of Prison 10 in Beit Lid, protesting the arrest of yeshiva students and against the draft law.
Over 50,000 draft orders sent since July
Throughout July, the IDF sent out 54,000 draft orders to all eligible men in the haredi community, and also updated its enforcement and sanction plan, making it more efficient.
A senior source in the ultra-Orthodox parties told Walla last week that there are "quiet understandings" between the IDF and the ultra-Orthodox leadership: "You don’t make noise and protest – we won’t arrest deserters." According to him, both sides do not want escalation, which is why the IDF stopped actively initiating arrests of draft evaders.
Sarah Ben-Nun contributed to this report.