Security source rejects Netanyahu claim that soldiers are being arrested inside yeshivas

At a Saturday night press conference on the so-called historic agreement with Lebanon, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also addressed recent ultra-Orthodox protests against the arrest of draft dodgers. He said authorities are detaining Torah students inside yeshivas, but a security source told N12 that this has never happened.

The security source said the IDF has never sent personnel to arrest draft evaders inside yeshivas, adding, "זה מעולם לא קרה". The source was responding to Netanyahu’s remarks and said the prime minister’s assertion was false.

Netanyahu claimed that Haredi hesder yeshivas had sent him a message saying that when people are sent into yeshivas, remove Torah students, and take them to prison, nobody enlists. He said the arrests of yeshiva students are producing the opposite effect and reducing Haredi enlistment.

He argued that, as in a European country where police would take yeshiva students to prison, such a policy should be shocking, and said arrest policy should be stopped because it does not achieve the desired result. At the same time, he said sanctions should still apply to those who do not study Torah, and that "all the weight of the law" can be used against them.