When the Haredim Cry ‘Anti-Semitism’ and Discover They Have Lost Public Sympathy

When public sympathy is lacking, old exile-era arguments come out. The Haredi leadership has discovered a convenient rhetorical weapon, branding the attorney general and senior justice system officials as “anti-Semites.” Faced with polls showing a wall of alienation and anger, Haredi politicians are mobilizing the language of exile and turning cuts to daycare subsidies into “decrees” and “persecution of Jews.” What do the polls say about the attitudes of other sectors, and what are the accusations trying to hide? An analysis of “The Index” by Shmuel Rosner, The Index, N12 Magazine. Published: 11.06.26, 20:04

The situation of Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara is quite bad. The situation of the Haredi leadership is even worse. Why bring this up? Because political leaders in Haredi parties and in other parties, this week it was Minister David Amsalem of Likud, often attach the label “anti-Semites” to Baharav-Miara and to other senior figures in the judicial and administrative establishment. So there is a kind of competition over image here: Moshe Gafni wants you to think that the attorney general, or her deputy Gil Limon, or the justices of the Supreme Court, are anti-Semites. But for you to think that, you have to believe Gafni, or his colleagues, and so his own image also matters. Someone who thinks Gafni is a person whose claims are worth hearing will consider the possibility that Baharav-Miara is an anti-Semite. Someone who thinks Baharav-Miara is not an anti-Semite may conclude that Gafni is not a person worth listening to. In this contest, as we said, Baharav-Miara is not in such a good position, but Gafni, who we will use as a stand-in for the Haredi leadership, just as we use her as a stand-in for the top of the government bureaucracy, is in worse shape. She, the attorney general, enjoys high trust from part of the public and low trust from another part. Let us assume it is roughly half and half, depending of course on the exact wording of the question: a survey by the Israel Democracy Institute found that 42% of Israelis said the attorney general’s professional performance was poor, and 48% said it was good. Since not all respondents are lawyers, let us assume that by “professional performance” they mean a personal assessment. So perhaps some of those who say her performance is poor would be willing to go so far as to agree that she is an anti-Semite.

Haredim protest in Jerusalem, archive. The Haredi leadership is trying to portray legal and administrative criticism as deliberate persecution against it | Photo: Chaim Goldberg, Flash90

But if they consider that possibility, they will have to look to the other side, to the side that cries “anti-Semites.” Gafni, as a stand-in, is a public representative with almost no supporters left for him and his sector. At the annual conference of the Jewish People Policy Institute, which will be held this coming Sunday, data will be presented on the “closeness” of sectors to other sectors. They show that the Haredim are at the bottom of the Israeli society closeness scale. No sector, except their own, feels very close to them. At the same time, as a survey we conducted a few weeks ago shows, a large majority of non-Haredi Jewish Israelis express anger toward the Haredi sector. In other words, there is alienation, and there is anger (come learn everything you need to know about the Haredi challenge).

The charge of “anti-Semitism” is directed by Haredi speakers and their supporters at non-Haredi leaders, spokespeople or publics, and this happens often. This week, Supreme Court Deputy President Noam Sohlberg narrowly escaped: Minister Amsalem said of him that he was “more stupid than anti-Semitic.” This is a fascinating claim that says mainly something about the consciousness of the Haredim themselves, and also of those who support them. In their minds, at least implicitly, they still live in exile, among the gentiles, in a place where every claim, or sanction, or criticism is tainted by suspicion of hatred toward Jews. The harassing official is the Catholic Pole who received anti-Jewish education. He is the Lutheran German, following the founder of the movement, Martin Luther, who was also anti-Semitic. He is the Ukrainian, descended from the Cossacks. He is the Spaniard, descended from the Kingdom of Aragon, which expelled the Jews. All of these are anti-Semites, and probably so are the bureaucracy of the heirs of the Zionist movement, who struck old Jewry and came to redeem the land, those who want to “starve” Haredi children, as several Knesset members claimed.

Ad Survey by the Israel Democracy Institute: The public is divided over Baharav-Miara, 48% support her, 42% oppose her | Photo: Yonatan Sindel, Flash90

In January this year, when two babies died in a daycare center in Jerusalem, Haredi leaders spoke in Hebrew, in Israel, as their great-grandparents would have spoken about foreign regimes, in foreign countries. “The cry of the blood of the infants of the house of study, toddlers who had not tasted the taste of sin, is rising from the ground. We must all stop the persecution.” This is a quote from former minister Moshe Arbel of Shas. “The severe decrees... [created] severe overcrowding in the daycare centers,” said a statement from United Torah Judaism. “A very large population is being pushed at once into distress,” Aryeh Deri claimed. The imagery comes from another world, from another reality. “Overcrowding,” “stuffed,” “infants of the house of study,” “the children of yeshiva students are expelled,” “their blood was abandoned,” “toddlers who had not tasted the taste of sin.” It is not always easy to know whether Haredi leaders really feel this way, or whether they have simply trained themselves to use this language in the hope that the Haredi community in Israel will be seen by other Israelis as a community of persecuted Jews in Europe in previous centuries.

Haredim block Jaffa Street in Jerusalem. Most of the public strongly supports economic sanctions against draft dodging Haredim | Photo: Chaim Goldberg, Flash90

Ad Does it work for them? Let us consider two findings. After the death of the babies in a Haredi daycare center, which, as noted, the Haredim tried to link to budget cuts to daycare subsidies for those who do not show up for military service, a large majority of the public, 70%, did not agree with the claim that “the blame for the deaths of the toddlers lies with the attorney general because of her decision to freeze day care subsidies.” The Haredim agreed with it, 74%. But the religious public no longer did, 67%. The traditional and secular publics even less so. In general, a majority of Jewish Israelis today support sanctions against Haredim who do not enlist, including canceling daycare subsidies, in a recent survey we conducted, 76% said yes to canceling the subsidy. A majority of religious Israelis also support such a move, 53%. Cutting daycare subsidies is apparently not yet seen as an anti-Semitic move.

Could it become one? Here is a second finding: nearly half of Jews in Israel believe there is “discrimination” against Haredim in the country. This is indeed a claim that echoes what once existed in exile, when there was, well, discrimination against Jews. Two-thirds of Likud voters believe there is discrimination against Haredim. So do most supporters of the Religious Zionist Party. To them, of course, the cry of anti-Semitism is directed.

And why might it be effective? Because if we place it in a larger basket of claims, it somehow joins a strong, charged feeling in the religious-right camp of Israeli society that someone or something, an establishment, an ethnic group, a class, an elite, is discriminating against its members. Note the following figure. 62% of those who identify as supporters of the “right” believe there is discrimination against Mizrahim in Israel. But among those identifying as supporters of the “center,” that figure drops to 17%. 54% of religious Israelis believe there is discrimination against Mizrahim in Israel. Among secular Israelis, the figure drops to 28%.

The Haredim use the language of the persecuted minority to conceal the fact that they are part of the ruling majority | Photo: Yonatan Sindel, Flash90

Ad The language of discrimination, the language of harassment, is spoken a lot in the coalition’s support camp. בלי להיכנס לשאלה אם אכן יש אפליה או לא (זו לא שאלה שתמיד קל לענות עליה), זו שפה שיש לה כוח שכנוע במחנה הזה. The Haredim, with their cry of anti-Semitism, seek to ride on a situation that is easy to identify, a situation in which a camp that managed, in the previous elections and in many of those before them, to form a majority, is a camp that speaks the language of the minority. The cry of anti-Semitism is the cry of the minority, resting on thousands of years of Jewish history as a minority. The Haredim, in effect, want us to get confused. To forget for a moment that we are the majority. To forget for a moment that we came here, established a state, so that we would no longer need the language of the minority. If we only forget, they will gain.