Separate Fate or Shared destiny? Haredi Life in the Jewish State

A lot of people are very concerned about this issue, and obviously we are too. But I don't think that Haredi people in 2050 would be the same as Haredi people today. It really depends on how the government treats subsidies and budgets and the integration of them in the workforce and in the army and in Israel society in general. A lot of things could be changed, not in a sense that we want to change their way of life, but in the sense that they would be really a part of Israeli society. I think we see a lot of interesting trends that are actually opening them more to Israeli society. Welcome to the Pluralist Podcast from both sides of the ocean. Today, we're going to talk about the place of Haredi society, the ultra-Orthodox society within Israeli society. First of all, I want to say good morning to Josh, who has woke up very early in order for us to be able to record this episode. How are you, Josh? Hi, how are you, Bokertov? It's good to be with you. It's just, you know, five in the morning and a typical frigid, snowy day here in the diaspora. And I think, you know, it's dark outside. And hopefully that's not emblematic of our conversation. But it's really good to be with you again. And I'm excited for this conversation because I think many diaspora Jews, many non-Orthodox, you know, North American Jews have many questions. Haredi society is really a world unknown to most. And I think we need to unpack that a little bit and really explain not only how they have power, but some of the diversity and some of the background. And I'm excited to get into this conversation and how it plays out. Yeah, for sure. And I think that our role is to really give our listeners or people who are watching this a very complex picture of what it's actually like. Because I think a lot of times people hear sort of titles or buzzwords that do not convey a deep understanding of what's actually at stake. The Haredi Society was on the news a few weeks ago because of a tragedy when two babies died in an unsupervised childcare place in Jerusalem, two very young babies. And it sort of sparked, again, sort of the larger question of the Haredi Society, whether it's actually an integral part of Israeli society or whether it's sort of an autonomy that lives in a different world with different rules. and what does it mean for Israeli society as a whole and, of course, for members of the Haredi society. Right. So let's say exactly what happened. I think when you say unsupervised, I think we mean that this was an uncertified by the state or by the Ministry of Education, you know, a child care facility. According to my understanding, the babies actually suffered from dehydration and heat stroke because, you know, when it was cold outside, they amped up the heat. And what happened afterwards, Orly, with the set of protests. Why exactly did Haredim take to the street after the tragic death of these two babies? Well, first of all, you're correct. It was an uncertified and unsupervised place. And it seems that there were dozens of babies actually in a very, very tiny apartment with no proper conditions whatsoever. And it ended up with two babies who died. We actually don't know the exact reason for their death because their families refused autopsy. And the case reached the Supreme Court. And as the Supreme Court was debating it, huge protests of Haredim entered into Jerusalem and in other places gathered. They became violent. Actually, one female reporter of the main news channel was attacked while Haredim told her, why are you here? We don't want female reporters. We want male reporters. Don't blame us if we attack you. It was a very heated protest. And at the end, quite surprisingly, I must say, the Supreme Court declined to intervene and did not order an autopsy. So we don't know exactly what happened. The assumption is that probably they died of a heat stroke because it was too warm in that room. They didn't, the Supreme Court ended up not ordering the autopsy out of fear of backlash from the Haredim. And let it be said that there is a halakhic prohibition against any sort of post-mortem surgery or anything having to do with the body or with a corpse. You know, we've seen Haredim protest around even archaeological sites because they don't want to touch anything that could be with human remains, which I understand. But is this symbolic of something bigger, you know, that we're seeing in society and how do we understand their power? Yeah, I think it really shows the deep issue of the question whether the Haredim feel they're part of the Israeli society and the Israeli state or they are alienated from the state and from its institutions. And I think this was really one example showing that many of them do not feel a sense of belonging, a sense of commitment and a sense of identification with the state and its institutions. We've seen it before in other tragedies, like the tragedy in Mount Meron in Lagba Omer, when more than 40 people from the Haredi community died because the place, again, was unsupervised and the structures were not safe enough and it collapsed during the Lagba Omer. There was a stampede that crushed people to death. Right. Horrific, horrific tragedy. And we saw this also during COVID when within the Haredi community, there was no abiding to the rules and restrictions of COVID. You remember it was a while ago, but there was, of course, a restriction on how many people can gather. And schools were supposed to be closed and nevertheless, Haredi schools were open. And so we see this lack of respect for the law because it seems that like it's not our law, it's not our state. This is something that is very, we see it all along and we saw it also in this really latest tragedy. And I think in order to understand it, we need to go a little bit back to history, to how it all started. So, Josh, maybe remind us. Yeah, absolutely. You know, with the advent of the state of Israel, there was always this relationship between David Ben-Gurion as the first prime minister and the ultra-Orthodox community. And it depends really who's speaking on behalf of the community. So, for instance, the political party, Agudat Yisrael, was really a party that was imported from Poland and Russia, you know, to Israel. And they sort of represented them. Of course, you know, in another episode, we'll talk about the famous status quo letter that Ben-Gurion issued to the Agudat Yisrael, basically in exchange for their support of establishing the state. But a famous sort of monumental, almost mythic episode took place in 1950 when one of the leading rabbis of the Haredi community, he is known by his pen name, the Chazon Ish, or Avram Yeshayah Karlitz, who actually he immigrated to Israel, made Aliyah to Israel or to Eretz Israel in 1933 before the Holocaust. and he came to Ben-Gurion essentially saying that he needed to rebuild the Haredi world after the Holocaust and after it was really decimated. And the most important thing that he needed for that was Jewish education. It was to rebuild his yeshivot. So he made a proposal to Ben-Gurion and he said that, you know, I have these yeshiva students who cannot go to the army. They must be exempted from the army. And I just want to add, if I can, that the way in which he presented this was fairly creative and emblematic of, you know, both his worldview and really Ben-Gurion's, who was a scholar himself, having grown up in the yeshiva world. And he presented a text from the Talmud as, you know, now a famous story. I believe it's from Masechet Sanhedrin, maybe page 32a, in which, you know, just if memory serves me correctly. On top of your head, yeah. Yeah, right, exactly. He's talking about two camels going up on a single path. It's M'vobet Charon. And the question is asked, which camel should go first? That which is laden with a cart and that which is not. And of course, the Talmud responds and says, oh, that one which is carrying a heavy, a full cart should go first. And that which is that has an empty cart should yield to the one which has the full cart. And the metaphor was clear, of course. He says, you know, we, you know, Torah Jews, we ultra Orthodox Jews who, you know, carry on the tradition of Torah and mitzvot should, you know, have a free passage first. And you, with the empty cart or the agalareka, as we call it, you should yield to us. Now, Ben-Gurion sort of bought into that and said, okay, because we now have this modern Jewish state and you no longer need to be Haredi. You no longer need to live in these insular communities and live in sort of— And they were the underdog. Totally the underdog. Right. Oh, absolutely. And he's like, you know, how many people are we talking about? And he said, well, there's about 400 people. Now, Ben-Gurion, I think, was right about most things. You know, just ask him, he'll tell you if you read his diaries. Except this one, he got wrong because, you know, he imagined that these 400 yeshivas didn't. Fine. Okay, so don't go to the army. You know, they'll assimilate into Israeli culture fairly soon. Now, fast forward to today, how many are we talking about, essentially? More than 100,000. 100,000, you know, army eligible AIDS draft. And Orly, let me just ask you another question. You know, this notion of the agalarika, of the empty cart has made its way into Israeli culture. And, you know, we see it all the time. How does it make you feel to be called the empty cart? Like, you know, what do you what do you feel when you hear that? Well, I feel, first of all, anger. I think it's quite amazing, though, that this image has stuck in Israeli culture and in Israeli society. People mention it quite a lot. And it's also sort of resonates with a lot of people in the liberal camp who keep saying we are not the empty cart. It's something that is being said over and over again. And I think one other mistake of Ben-Gurion, which we might talk in a future chapter, is the fact that he gave the Haredes not only exemption from army service, but also complete autonomy in their education system. Although he said in the status quo letter that core subjects should be taught in all schools, including in Haredi schools. The fact that there are different educational systems is part of our major problem and a part of polarization of Israel society. But that's a subject for a different chapter. Your description is completely correct in the sense that it was this sort of sense of affinity that he felt toward the Haredi Judaism that has almost disappeared during the Holocaust. And that's why he said, OK, we'll allow them this, you know, small enclave and, you know, it would be OK. But what started with a very small group has evolved into something huge. And it is not only on the case of exemption from army service, but also when we're talking about the budget, state budget. And this is, I would say, like the next step was when Begin was prime minister, Menachem Begin, in 1977. He actually brought about the current model of the Haredi society which is dependence on state budget and state subsidies And a model in which Haredi men like the ideal of the Haredi men is for him to study in yeshiva his whole life while the woman provides for the family. So the woman would study core subjects. She would even go and study in the academy, in segregated spaces, and then she would provide for the family. But the men, they would just, you know, stay at home and learn all day. But that's a big problem, right? because we're talking about large families with, you know, the birth rate is very high. One salary is not really enough for them to provide for the family. And so they have to rely on state budgets, whether it's, you know, subsidies in, you know, daycare, municipal taxes cuts, and actually just funding stipends that are being given to the men through the yeshiva. And those budgets have grown tremendously. We're talking billions of shekels in total. Now, we have to understand that the amount that each family gets is a small sum, okay? Those are families that are living, that are very poor, some of them, you know, under the poverty line, so to speak, and they are living a very difficult life. I mean, you know, they are very modest in the sense that, not talking about their leaders, their leaders are very well off, but most already live a very difficult life. They're living in villas by, you know, in Kisaria, right? They're living in small cramped apartments in Nachlaot and Geula and Bnei Brak and different areas. Yeah. So explain to me two specific issues, I think. You know, and I look up the growing resentment of, you know, many Israeli, many non-Haredi Israelis towards the Haredi community, both in terms of the tax cuts, as you're saying, or the subsidies to, you know, for having more and more children. and the not only reticence, but the absolute refusal to join in national service, whether it's volunteer national service or army service. And I think that's been on the discussion table for a long time already, but I think it was amplified after October 7th and during the war of the last two years when many of our friends and relatives and members of our communities were serving for hundreds and hundreds of days of reserve duty, and they are not. How is that playing out? How are people seeing that and feeling that today? So it's true that October 7th was a watershed moment in many respects to Israeli society, but also in the respect of the lack of army service of Haredi men. We have to say, by the way, that while all Israelis have to serve in the army, both men and women, we're not talking at all about female Haredi, okay, about Haredi women. They are not serving. By the way, also, religious, national religious women are not serving. You know, a lot of people in the state do not know it. We're only talking now about service of men. And it has become a huge issue because it has become unbearable, right? First of all, because there was a huge need of the army to actually enlist soldiers, while there are, as we said, close to 100,000 people who are eligible for army service and are not serving. Not only that, by the way, because there was huge military needs during the war, people who were in gap year programs, like people on Mechinot, like part of the reform movement, Mechinot, other liberal Mechinot. Like the pre-army preparatory years. Yeah. So actually, some of them had to cut short their one year before army service because the army needed soldiers immediately. And when we took the case to the Supreme Court and said, well, why don't you take Haredim or even people who serve in the army, eventually national, religious, you know, religious Zionist soldiers who postponed their army service, they can, by the way, postpone their army service by up to eight years. We said it's discriminatory, right? You're taking a person who is just, you know, a few months out before the army and he's actually volunteering and helping Israel society. Unfortunately, the court refused to intervene, but it showed you how there was a huge real need of soldiers. And so that created a situation where not only liberal Israelis said, you know, enough is enough. We need to get the Haredim to serve in the army. It was actually across the boards. We're talking about coalition voters. We're talking about members of the religious side. People who voted for, you know, Smotrich, who were serving in the army, said, you know, that's enough. You know, it doesn't make any sense. Now, it was especially true because the slogan of the Haredim was, Namut velo nitgayes. Okay, we're going to die and we're not going to enlist. And the people said... We'd rather die before enlisting, right? Right. And the people said, well, we are enlisting and dying. I mean, it doesn't make, you know, it's just mind-boggling. So that's actually like a huge hot potato that is in front of the government today. And they don't have actually a solution, right? Because the Haredim is not going to give up. On the other hand, the vast majority of Israeli society is not willing to accept this huge exemption from the army anymore. Yeah. And it seems like we've really gotten to before, you know, a political gridiron here. And before we get into the political parties, I just want to, I've been thinking a lot about this and I'm trying to wrap my head around it because, you know, it's from our point of view as liberals who follow the rules of the state and adhere to that, you know, it's unthinkable that you should send your children into battle. I know both your sons and daughters served and that we should do that and that they simply do not have to risk their lives. Two things I want to add to this. One is that there was not only a pervasive feeling, but actually a proposed law in the Knesset that suggested that Torah study is equal to combat service. And, you know, even I think the most sympathetic people to the Haredim in Israeli society took a step back and said, OK, OK, that. And then I'm thinking about, you know, how this plays in historically. And I'm thinking a lot about the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century in Tsarist Russia, where Jews would be kidnapped out of yeshivot and out of the chedel and forced to serve in the Tsar's army for, you know, 25 or 30 years as a sort of a lifetime sentence. And I wonder, and maybe you can shed some light on this, if we think that the Haredim really see themselves in a similar situation, even though they're living now in what they would call a quote-unquote Jewish state. Now, I don't think we have time to get into the whole background of Haredi anti-Zionism, but I wonder if we see some similarity to this situation from Eastern Europe. Yeah, so I think it depends. I think some members of the Haredi community definitely see, are so alienated by the state that they might feel the situation is the same. But I think there is a real difference within Haredi society. And I think one important thing that we must say is that, you know, a lot of people say, oh, Haredi society is this big black one society that has one opinion, which of course it's not. Okay, like any society, there is a variety of opinions within Haredi society. So there are different sects, there are different groups, there are groups that are more Israelized, so more integrated into Israeli society. There are people who want a better future for their kids, there are people who want their kids to study both secular studies and religious studies so they would be able to provide for themselves and live a decent life. To make a living, right? Yeah, to make a living. And there are more and more people who are integrated in the sense that, you know, as I said, the women, you know, the mother of the family goes out and works. She sees sort of the world. She opens up to some extent the world. There are a lot of differences. And we have to remember this because often what we hear is only the voice of the all-male leadership, political and rabbinical leadership of the Haredi community. And this is a very extreme voice that is not representative of many, many voices within the Haredi community. We have seen it in our struggle for core subjects to be taught in Haredi schools, where we were contacted by Haredi parents who said, we are with you. You know, we want this. We want actually the schools to do what they're supposed to do according to the law, which is teach core subjects. And we saw it also very clearly. Like English, math, science. Exactly. Especially English and math, which are not being taught almost at all for Haredi boys. And we also saw it in our struggle against exclusion of women, especially on buses, but in other places, because the people who are most affected by it are Haredi women, right, who are moved to the back of the bus. And we actually had during the petition I litigated before the Supreme Court over a decade ago, we had Haredi women call me anonymously and tell me, we thank God that there are reformed Jews in the world because you are fighting the fight that we cannot allow ourselves to fight. And so it was clear that there are people that their voices are silenced and we need to raise their voice instead of them. So it's clear that we have a lot of people with different opinions. And unfortunately, the state is aligned with the most extreme voices because, of course, the strong political power of the Haredi parties. The current coalition and many, many previous coalitions relied on the Haredi parties as a major part of the coalition. And I think you're touching on something so fundamental to the core question of even what it means to have a Jewish state. in that, you know, when we talk about pluralism, we talk about, you know, each person should live according to their own beliefs and their own practice. And what I wonder about the Haredim is I'm not trying to tell them, don't live how you want to live. Don't observe Jewish law how you want to observe Jewish law. That's great. But on the flip side is that you are not allowed then to dictate how I should live and how I should observe Jewish law. And what we see in Israel is think, you know, the push towards making the entirety of Israeli society sort of accommodate itself to the perceived needs of the Haredi world. And I think you make a critically important point about the diversity within the Haredi community. And of course, we could go into, you know, the Lithuanian tradition versus the Hasidic tradition and even the Sephardic tradition and breaking that down and who's more stringent on what issues. But when I look at it, it really comes down to the prioritization of specific mitzvot, you know, among the highest are the observance of Shabbat in the public and the issues of what they would call modesty, right, and the place of women in society, which of course Iraq has been leading on, whether it's segregation of buses or anything having to do with public shared space about the place of women. And how do you see that playing out a little bit more in terms of those strict adherence to those specific mitzvot? They're less worried about lashon hara or talking other forms of observance or how do we treat the other or making sure that we love the stranger in our midst, which is very clear in the Torah. But those specific Shabbat, you know, modesty, kashrut even, of course, how does that play out for you a little bit? So, you know, it brings me back to the beginning with the empty cart, because oftentimes we hear, oh, we have to learn to live together side by side, right? We are different people. We have very diverse opinions. We're different groups in Israel. Everybody needs to give up on something, right? To settle on something. The reality is... To compromise, you're saying. Right But the reality is the compromise is always on one side right Only one side is required to compromise which is always the liberal side right So we had many years ago a case where we petitioned on behalf of residents in Rehovot who find out that a kole, a yeshiva was being built under their nose. Nobody told them anything. They didn't have any option to oppose it or demand for it to be allocated to a better purpose that actually serves this neighborhood. And then the court said, well, you know, we need to live side by side. What can we do? Each person has to compromise. But of course, they had to compromise. We cannot even fathom a possibility of, you know, I don't know, a reform synagogue built in Meir Shearim, right? Or like a dance hall or something. Like it would never happen because it's only compromising to one side. Why? Because this is the empty cart. What do you care to compromise about? You know, you don't have any values that should be protected. So that's like a huge issue for the liberal camp in Israel. And I think what we have seen over the years that some requirements, such as the modesty requirements, have become or been presented to Israelis as something that has to be kept and protected for the Haredes to live their lives. But the reality is different, OK, because we're talking about extremist norms that are relatively new. OK, years ago, years and years ago, there was no problem with showing female images with men and women going to, you know, I don't know, a medical health clinic together or sitting in a bus together. And over the years, sort of as a response to the growing modernization of Israeli society, we saw that there are stricter and stricter norms decided by the male leaders, which are supposed to restrict how women are going about in the public sphere. And this not only affects Haredi women, but all of us, because we are really living together with each other. And so one of the important things that Iraq did, other than the legal, you know, petitions and victories, is to educate the Israeli public, telling them, listen, this is an invented tradition in the sense that it's not really required for Haredim to stay completely segregated. they were in their public sphere, okay, when they go out and about and have, you know, get public services from different places. And the places of Haredi women, feminist Haredi women was really important in the sense who actually said, you know, we didn't need it when we grew up. It was never an issue. And so this was important to tell Israelis, this is not something that the Israeli society needs to allow the Haredi society, because in any democratic society, we cannot allow a woman to be treated differently from men in the public sphere. And it's not part, an inherent part of the Haredi way of life, in contrast to Shabbat, for instance, right? This is something different. And so this was, I think, a really important fact for people to understand, for people to learn. And, you know, in Hebrew, there is this phrase saying, shitat matzriach. Okay, you're trying to do many things. Sometimes you succeed, sometimes you don't. But why do you care? You can try to ask for really ridiculous things. And we saw in the... I think in English, we call this the moving of the Overton window, right? Where we try something that's so extreme. For instance, when the coalition was, you know, started in 2022, they said, you know, we should turn off all electricity in the entire state of Israel on Shabbat. Like, OK, that's ridiculous. But now, OK, that's extreme. Let's walk it back. Right. That's the that's exactly what you're. Yes, sort of, sort of. And what we found out is that sometimes people say, oh, without gender segregation here or that, we can't live. OK, someone told me that one of the top seniors in one of the health clinics in Israel, he told me, you know, if there would not be different buildings, OK, for Haredi men, Haredi women in ultra-authorized neighborhoods in Jerusalem, they would not come and, you know, have medical services. And it turned out that when they abolished it, well, they did come, right? didn't really need it. It was just a requirement that was actually baseless. And so they tried. They, you know, presented this requirement. But when the state said, the justice ministry said, no, we're not going to allow it as a result of our struggles, they said, okay, then it's okay. So I think, and this is what we see as- They just agree as to the- Right. And I think this is our role. Like we see Iraq's role is actually putting the red lines as to which norms and practices should be allowed and which should not. Really good example, going back to the issue of army service for Haredim is that now in an attempt to actually try to get some Haredim to join the army, the army promises them they would have army bases without any female soldiers in sight. Okay, so like they're going to serve for two years and they're not going to meet any female soldier the whole time. Now, it doesn't make sense. Any contact with... Yeah, none whatsoever. Now, when they go out to the streets here in Mea Shearim or whatever, you see women, right? Don't make women disappear. So it's clear that this was just this is something that is to the hospital, to the doctor. They've, of course, an interact in Israeli society. Yeah, it's way beyond the red line, but it's actually going to happen now. And we're going to petition to the court because we're saying, you know, that's not OK. Now, it's OK to tell them Haredi soldiers were not going to stay in the same room, you know, together with a woman. Right. Or would not have a female soldier touch them. Right. No physical contact. But from here to, you know, a complete disappearance of female soldiers, that's like a huge problem. And I think it's important that was what we've been doing all along, to really draw the red lines and to say to people, this is something that should not be allowed in a Jewish and a democratic state. So it touches on so many themes. You know, one, listen, I have to say that this is if I were to compare this to something else, it really does remind me of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan that went in and erased pictures in books and on signs and in the public square. And I hate to make those comparisons because, you know, the Taliban were also quite violent, of course, see that the direction it's going in. And I think that, you know, I would wish that non-Orthodox Jews felt more ownership over Jewish law and were more well-versed to confront them and say, no, actually, you know, we recognize the tradition that we have of putting a fence around the Torah, right? That comes from, you know, Pirkei Avot even, you know, from our own tradition. And that's, you know, can be very beautiful. However, when you put so many fences and so many barriers and so many barriers, you get to a point where you're so far from what the actual intention of Jewish law was from the beginning. And that, you know, when someone says to have separate buildings or to have complete segregation is mandated by the Torah. And we say, you know what, actually, we also read the Torah. We also study Jewish law. And no, it's not, actually. That's an entirely extremist position. And I think these are the important discussions to be had. And I loved how you modeled that with, you know, sort of drawing red lines. Now, just one other point on this is that we experienced this a little bit in North America in the lead up to the elections of the World Zionist Congress with the ultra-Orthodox party, Eretz HaKodesh, where there was a debate on whether the voting website should be open on Shabbat or not. And exactly what you're saying about, you know, of course, we should compromise and we should acquiesce to them. When my counterpart or, you know, a colleague in the Haredi party said to me, you know, look, we attend Jewish Federation functions and events and dinners all the time. And in order for us to attend, they go out of their way to make it glat kosher for us. And isn't that beautiful? And isn't that what we should have here? And I said, you know, that is great. That's wonderful. And that's, you know, true pluralism and that you're able to attend with everyone else because your Kashrut needs are met. But I said, you know what, if you were to go to the Federation tomorrow and say, you know what, we'd love to come to the big dinner, you know, next month. But, you know, in order for us to come, you just need to make it completely gender separate. You know, men and women need to sit totally separately in this big ballroom that you've rented and, you know, to have the dinner. I think they would say, get the hell out of here. You know, no way. We are not doing that. And where is the red line? I said, because that's what you're asking us to do. You're asking us to completely say, you know, we want you to change your way of life because, or what we sometimes say, the firmest common denominator, you know, that we have to bow down to that. And, you know, I think that there has to be a serious confrontation of this. Yeah, but I just want to mention, you mentioned the World Zionist Congress elections. I think what's amazing is that the Haredi factions within the World Zionist Congress had to have female representatives because this is what the World Zionist Congress constitution abides. So you know that in the Knesset, the Haredi parties do not have female members of Knesset. Suddenly, in the Dianist Congress, they understand they don't have any choice, so they can have. So it also shows you that they're trying to present those really unbelievable demands as like a complete truth that could never be changed. And we see that it could actually be changed. And another thing I wanted to say is that, you know, what I often say is, right, all of those chumrot, right, of those like modest streganists, you know, that, right, 200 years ago said, right, that's like the beginning of orthodoxy. You can't have anything in you, right? Innovation is now forbidden, according to the Torah. Right, right. And so, but what I keep saying is that, you know, the people who are the most innovative are the Charedim, right? I mean, actually, Reformed Jews are very, like, well, you know, the traditional Jews, because we keep evolving, right? Like, the halacha is evolving. And they're like, no, no, no, we can't do anything. But they're doing, you know, so many new humrot. And it's like every day. So that's also sort of, when I tell this to Israel, it's sort of really, you know, like, puts things into perspective. Oh, absolutely. And I see that more as a way to maintain control rather than out of some deep theological expression. I mean, you know, Anat Hoffman, our good friend and leader and hero, once explained it in the following way, that if you're a child growing up in a Haredi society and you have big questions about the world, you know, if you're interested in learning how to kosher an oven, well, then you'll go to your father and ask that. If you're interested in like everything else, like the birds and the bees or what this thing called the Internet is or, you know, how does the world work? Then you go to your mother and the men are feeling this deep sense of inadequacy and unable to, you know, answer those big questions or a fear of them. And so they need to sort of keep that compression almost, you know, and we're seeing that bubble up. Yeah, completely, because actually the mother is the one who goes out and knows, you know, what's going on in the world, whereas the dad is, you know, stuck in the yeshiva. And so I think the whole issue of exclusion of women and sending them to the back of the bus is sort of the message of the Haredi leader saying, you think you're so smart, you know, go sit at the back of the bus. You're not part of sort of the decision making process and you have to know your place. So that's definitely, you know, a major part of the problem. Right. And the growing relationship with modernity. And I think that the, you know, the question of smartphones and the porousness of these insular societies in terms of, you know, allowance of internet. And I think we're going to see more changes than that. But let me ask you, let get to the political question now because you know we see two main Haredi parties right The Ashkenazi party and the Sephardic party Sha And when we look at the political situation in which we find ourselves first of all there are these two mainstream Haredi parties which get a sizable portion of votes and mandates in the Knesset, enough for them to be sort of the swing party that can really make or break a coalition. And so we know even from the 90s that the Haredi parties would often join the coalition and be somewhat agnostic about the big political questions, the big security questions, you know, Oslo and the future of the relationship with the Palestinians in exchange for continual support for their institutions. How do you see that changing? And what do you see as we lead up to an election potentially this year? And we can add that, you know, at the time of recording, the budget was just past its first round. Right. You know, with a lot of spending for the Haredim. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So, first of all, we need to understand that the Haredim have unproportional political power in the Knesset. We're talking about around 13 or 14 percent of Israeli population, adult population is Haredi. And they have 18 representatives in the Knesset, okay, out of 120. just to give you, you know, in contrast, compare it to their Arab population. OK, the Palestinian citizens of Israel are 20 percent of the population and they have only 10 representatives in the Knesset. Just understand like the numbers, because the voting rate in the Haredi community is probably close to 100 percent. OK, the rabbi said, OK, go and vote. Almost everybody, not everybody. OK, we said there is a diversity of opinions. Some don't, but a huge majority votes for the Haredi parties. And as you said, the Haredi parties traditionally had one important goal, which is to grant exemption from army service and budgets for the institutions, billions and billions of shekels for the Haredi schools and for the yeshivot. We have to mention, which is something we haven't mentioned up until now, which is we talked about a lot of challenges in the integration and not really integration of Haredi into Israel's society. One of the biggest challenges is the economic challenge. OK, even if we're not talking about the army at all, the fact that half of the Haredi men are working, only half, OK, compared to around 80 percent in the general population of men working, means that in a few decades, when the Haredi population is going to grow, the adult population is going to constitute a third or even more of Israeli society. Israeli economy will not be able to sustain itself if half of the men are not going to work. Okay, this is something that top economists here in Israel have been saying for many years, that even for this reason, we need to integrate them in the workforce because we won't be able, right, the system would not be able to sustain itself. So that's like a huge thing. So we said that they rely on huge budget because they're not working. And this was their main goal. And they used to be able to go with either the right or the left, depending on who gives them more. And they were really a swing factor in Israeli politics. This has changed over the last, I think, more than a decade. The Haredi parties today are completely aligned with the right, right-wing party, and specifically with Netanyahu. It was many, many years. You mentioned the Rabin government, Ovadia Yosef, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef of the Shas party, then actually gave Rabin sort of the political support that he needed for the Oslo agreements. Those are different days. OK, we're talking not only the parties themselves, many of the voters are not only right wing, but extreme right wing people who are not aligned with liberal values and politically are on the right wing. And so today, when we're looking at the Israeli political map, the Haredi parties are always counted within the current coalition. OK, and the opposition parties are a different force. where now we have to say that the issue of the exemption from army service have been pending before the Supreme Court for many, many, many years. And the court struck down a few times a law that aimed to give exemption and to ask for some enlistment of a small number of Haredi. Like a symbolic number of... Right. And the court kept saying this is not a real law and it actually continues the discrimination between those who have to go to the army and those who do not have to go to the army. And that's why it's unconstitutional. That's why the Supreme Court struck it down. It's been years since the last time the courts struck down the former law. And the court kept giving extensions to the government on another month, another year to actually pass a new law that would maybe solve the problem. Obviously, this coalition is not going to solve the problem at all. But since there is no law in effect, no subsidies can be given to people who are supposed to go to the army and are not going to the army. So it means over the last year and a half, there has been a huge cut in subsidies and state benefits for the Haredi sector. And it, of course, causes them huge economic problems because they can't go on doing that. And that's why it's important for the Haredim to pass some kind of a law that will allow them to get back the budgets. And those things are interwined, right? The budget and the law exempting them for army service are interwined. They both need them to pass for them to be able to sustain their way of life. So help us understand it, because I think many of our listeners may see this as confusing in terms of why, you know, the Khairim would support this draft or exemption bill, or we call it the exemption bill, they call it the draft bill. And, you know, in terms of, you know, it does require certain numbers to be drafted. Are they saying this is, you know, the lesser of evils or, you know, how do we explain their support for it, even though, or do they see this as something that will pass, but won't really be enforced at some point because how can you arrest a hundred thousand people, you know, like what's... Yeah. So, yeah, actually, there was a recording of the leaders, a few rabbinical figures of the Haredi society just a few days ago, where they said, of course, this law is not going to enlist any Haredi into the army. We're not going to allow it. It's just going to be, you know, a law. Nothing would happen. We'll just pass it and continue to get our budget. So it's clear that the intention... Explain this. This was an internal conversation around the table of some of the Haredi leaders and rabbis that got leaked to the press, which was, you know, really dramatic. You thought people would be shocked. Of course, nobody was shocked because everybody knows it's like a sold gate. You know, it's clear that nobody, that this government is not actually willing to create a major change. The major problem is that the fallback position should have been that everybody is going to the army unless there is some people who are exempt. And I can even say, right, we talked about the 400 people who got exemption. Let's talk about 1,000, 2,000, you know, genius Haredi people who are exempt from army suits. That's okay, right? We have some, you know, very... Which, by the way, that was the state in 19th century Europe that not everyone was a full-time yeshiva student. It was only those, you know, iluim or, you know, those really successful yeshiva students who were seen as, you know, the 1% or something like that or 10% of the society. Now, all of a sudden, that's different, right? Completely. there is actually no precedent in the history of the Jewish people to the current model of Haredi society ever. And it doesn't happen in any other place in the world, right? So this is something novel. We talked about invented traditions. This is something novel that happens only now in Israel. And we have to tell our listeners that many Haredi men are suffering because not everyone is cut out to study the yeshiva from, you know, dawn to dusk, right? So a lot of people, it's not for them. They may go and be registered in the yeshiva, but actually go and work without actually paying taxes or doing anything formal because they are not actually able to do it. For the leadership, as you said before, they want to keep them closed, right? For the leadership, they're not going to allow anybody to go out. But in fact, some people actually want to serve in the army because they feel they are excited about it. They want to be part of the army. And some people go out and want to work, but it could hurt their status within the Haredi society. So if now the current fallback position is in the current law that is being debated in the Knesset, the fallback position is everybody exempt. Maybe a few people would be enlisted. And this is creating an absurd situation where nobody's enlisting. Plus, another major issue is that there are no personal sanctions that if a person is not going to the army, he's going to be, I don't know, he has his license revoked, he won't be able to leave the country, he won't be eligible to subsidies. They're talking about like groups, you know, sanctions on a yeshiva or not something that people would actually feel. And so it's clear that the law has no real enforcement mechanisms. And that's why it's a joke. And everybody knows it's a joke. Right. Right. Yeah, you know, we have a million of other things we could talk about, but I think we're running out of time, aren't we? I think we're running out of time. We have to end. And my hope is that this is helpful for our listeners to really begin to unpack the enigma that is the Haredi world and Haredi society and to begin to understand the disproportional power that they have in society. And as we lead up to the next elections, I'm sure we'll explore this a bit more and look at some of the specific characters and how they're portrayed and who are the players and what impact they have. Yeah, I do want to end sort of, I don't know, a lot of people are very concerned about this issue. And obviously we are too. But I think a lot of people say, well, you know, in 2050, 40% of Israel will be Haredi. And first of all, we can, you know, debate the number. But I don't think that Haredi people in 2050 would be the same as Haredi people today. It really depends on how the government treats subsidies and budgets and the integration of them in the workforce and in the army and in Israel society in general. A lot of things could be changed, not in a sense that we want to change their way of life, but in the sense that they would be really a part of Israeli society. I think we see a lot of interesting trends that are actually opening them more to Israeli society. For instance, more and more families are joining state Haredi school systems. They want to be part of the public school system and have their kids study religious studies. It's still a small system, but partly as a result of our petition, which tells the Ministry of Education, you have to supervise private Haredi schools. And if they don't teach the core subjects, you have to cut their budget. Some people are moving to the state system and saying, OK, we want to have like a, you know, supervise state system, which is both religious and teaches secular subjects. And we see more and more people who want a different life, who want a better future. And so I think we have a lot of potential for positive changes against without changing, you know, the beliefs of people, but also without coercing, you know, their beliefs on others who are not interested in that. So in the sense, I think I'm optimistic. Well, that's a fantastic way to end, I think, this episode. And, you know, I think that you're doing incredibly important work on this. And there's obviously more to talk about. And I look forward to our next episode. Thank you. Looking forward to seeing all of you next time. Bye-bye.