Knesset Legal Advisor Warns Draft Law Grants Broad Criminal Immunity to Yeshiva Students

The Knesset's legal advisor has issued a sharp critique of the proposed draft law aimed at integrating yeshiva students into military service. In a summary opinion submitted on Sunday, the legal team warned that the bill grants sweeping criminal immunity to a specific group without the balancing oversight mechanisms that existed in previous arrangements. The draft law removes key conditions such as prohibiting yeshiva students from working and mandatory appearance requirements for deferring service, which were part of earlier versions.

Deputy Legal Advisor Adv. Miri Frenkel-Shur highlighted that the bill focuses solely on freezing arrests and criminal proceedings against yeshiva students, while omitting measures to reduce inequality, which had served as a normative compass in past frameworks. The legal office emphasized the absence of balancing tools like recruitment targets, economic sanctions, or budget cuts to yeshivas, leaving the law's framework incomplete.

Additionally, the bill cancels financial penalties for yeshiva heads who submit false affidavits and removes existing supervision provisions even for Hesder yeshivas and high-level Zionist yeshivas, a move insufficiently explained during committee discussions. The proposed oversight relies on Ministry of Education inspectors who conduct economic rather than individual student reviews, rendering supervision largely theoretical.

The legal opinion concludes that the arrangement shifts enforcement burdens to the IDF and creates an unusual workload for the military prosecution, undermining the principles of equality before the law and the rule of law. The Knesset's Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee is scheduled to hold a decisive vote on the draft law today, following debates on the updated text ahead of its second and third readings in the plenum. This vote comes amid ongoing efforts to finalize legislation that would formalize the freeze on arrests and criminal proceedings against yeshiva students whose Torah study is their primary occupation.