From 'better to die' to enlistment: Why haredi draft calculus is shifting - analysis

Of those 4,000 recruits, roughly 1,000 entered combat units.

While that is still only slightly more than one-quarter of the estimated 14,000 haredim who reach draft age each year – and while it falls well short of meeting the IDF’s stated manpower shortage of some 7,500 combat soldiers and another 7,500 soldiers needed in noncombat roles – it is nevertheless a significant trend.

Just as significant is when it is taking place.

This increase comes as leading haredi rabbis have adopted increasingly strident positions against enlistment, extremist protesters continue to harass haredi recruits at induction centers, and the coalition has tried to roll back some of the very sanctions that appear to be encouraging more haredim to serve.

According to the Yediot Aharonot report, based on IDF Manpower Directorate figures, one reason for the increase is the shift from institutional sanctions against yeshivas to personal sanctions against individuals, together with stepped-up enforcement, arrests of draft dodgers, and the threat of criminal proceedings.

The figures lend weight to the argument that sanctions matter.

For years, opponents of tougher enforcement argued that haredim could not be compelled to enlist, and that it would be impossible to force them into the army.

These numbers do not prove that every haredi man reaching conscription age can be drafted. But they do suggest that changing incentives changes behavior, particularly on the margins and among those who are not fully committed to remaining in the yeshiva world and learning full time. And oftentimes, what starts on the margins eventually seeps into the mainstream.

It would be a mistake, however, to attribute the increase solely to greater enforcement and sanctions.

Over the past two years, the IDF has made a concerted effort to create frameworks in which haredim can serve without fearing that military service necessarily means abandoning their way of life.

The establishment of the Hashmonaim Brigade, dedicated training tracks, clearer protections for religious observance, and additional programs tailored to the haredi community have reduced one of the principal obstacles to enlistment.

In other words, the state has not relied only on a stick; it has also offered a “safe” landing spot in the army to assuage fears that if haredi youth enlist in the army, they will in the intervening years throw off their black hats and black coats and come out something different entirely.

Sanctions may persuade someone sitting on the fence to reconsider avoiding military service. But that decision becomes considerably easier when the army offers a framework that allows him to remain haredi while serving.

Israel has seen this dynamic of policy impacting ingrained behavior before. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu triggered it when he was finance minister in Ariel Sharon’s government in 2003.

When Netanyahu slashed child allowances that had disproportionately benefited large haredi and Arab families, many in both communities howled and predicted disaster. But what followed, at least in haredi society, was a profound shift in economic behavior.

Haredi women entered the workforce in unprecedented numbers, and employment among haredi men also rose. The cuts did not change ideology, but they did change behavior.

The immediate impact in the Arab sector was not to drive women into the workforce, but rather to accelerate a drop in fertility rates.

The lesson many policy-makers drew was simple: Economics matters, and people want to eat.

The same logic appears to be at work today. “Emergency” fundraising campaigns abroad in Lakewood and Los Angeles by leading haredi rabbis can help offset some of the loss of government support to yeshivas, but they cannot replace billions of shekels in state funding.

Likewise, while the state may never arrest tens of thousands of draft evaders, the cumulative effect of losing daycare subsidies, housing benefits, and other forms of government assistance does appear to be influencing decisions.

This is not meant to draw a direct line from the arrests and cut childcare subsidies to the increase in conscription. The increase in enlistment undoubtedly reflects several factors, including the IDF’s efforts to accommodate haredi recruits and an enhanced sense of responsibility by some since the October 7 massacre.

But these numbers reinforce the argument that personal sanctions are also changing behavior.

If the polls are correct, and the next government will likely be less dependent on the haredi parties, that combination of incentives and enforcement is likely to be stepped up.

And if that happens, “We would rather die than enlist” may continue to echo at anti-conscription demonstrations. But for a growing number of young haredi men, it may no longer reflect the choice they are making.