Shas chairman Aryeh Deri has claimed that politicians should not be the ones calling on young haredi men to enlist in the IDF, insisting that the responsibility lies with the military itself.
"I don't need to call for enlistment," he told Kol Barama Radio in an interview. "An army that knows how to bomb Iran can deal with this as well. The army doesn't really want haredim. It's a major headache for them. They want a secular army, not soldiers who listen to rabbis."
According to Deri, the demand for haredi enlistment "was a deception all these years, and there was no problem. Now, after the failure of the concept of 'a small, technological army was exposed,' a storm has erupted."
Regarding whether haredim should be allowed to remain in yeshiva, he asked, "Who is the Sanhedrin that will decide which young man should study and which should go to the army? Do we know how to determine who is a prodigy and who isn't? The Torah was given to anyone who wishes to sit and learn it. Our struggle is for anyone who wishes to study Torah to be able to do so."
"[What about] someone who doesn't want to learn? As long as the army does not have genuine frameworks approved by the leading Torah sages and the status of Torah scholars has not been regulated, there is a problem.
"When the rabbis decide, after the status of those who study Torah has been regulated, then it will be possible to discuss what happens with those who are not studying," Deri concluded.