Haredi parties furious after daycare subsidy bill is pulled from vote

Israel’s coalition crisis deepened on Monday after the government told ultra-Orthodox parties that the daycare subsidy bill would not be brought to a vote, amid sharp public criticism. In response, the Haredi factions said they would oppose other legislation the coalition wants to advance, including a bill to establish a political commission of inquiry.

The dispute is now also affecting the government’s broadcasting bill. Haredi leaders are blocking that measure too, arguing that the planned government app would operate on Shabbat and could include pornographic content funded by the state. United Torah Judaism chairman Yitzhak Goldknopf told the Knesset committee on Sunday that he would vote against the bill, saying, “The amendments are not enough. We demand that the government app that will carry the channels’ broadcasts not work on Shabbat at all and that indecent content not be included under the law. They are increasing desecration of Shabbat under state sponsorship.”

The daycare bill itself, which subsidizes childcare for children of draft dodgers, had passed a preliminary reading about two weeks ago after United Torah Judaism threatened to support a state commission of inquiry into the October 7 attacks. The proposal would calculate the state’s share of tuition based only on the mother’s status.

At that earlier stage, many coalition lawmakers, including some from Likud, backed the bill. By contrast, Religious Zionism refused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s request to support it, and party leader Bezalel Smotrich said, “They finished the draft and now they still demand the daycare law? That is absurd.”