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← How Israel Enforces Its Draft

Blocked Highways and "We Will Die and Not Enlist": Israel's Draft Protests and the Police Line

Evidence rating: CONFIRMED for the protests, the police statement, and the politicians' quotes, from the Jerusalem Post and news video. STRONG for this page's lesson: organized mass refusal of a draft is visible and powerful, and a state with a war to fight answers it with a clear line between permitted speech and the actions that could actually stop the draft.

The protests​

In June 2026, while Israel and the United States were at war with Iran, ultra-Orthodox (Haredi) Israelis protested against legislation to draft their young men. The Jerusalem Post reported: "There have been several protests this month in Jerusalem, Tel-Aviv, and Ramat Gan, again demonstrating against the IDF haredi draft legislation being pushed through the Knesset." "Protesters have blocked highways and railways for hours, causing heavy traffic congestion and disruptions to school transportation services, before being dispersed by police" (Jerusalem Post, June 25, 2026).

Short videos from the same week carried the protesters' slogan: "We will die and not enlist" (Roya News English, June 21, 2026).

The police line​

The Israel Police statement, as quoted by the Post: "The Israel Police views the right to protest as a cornerstone of a democratic state and permits protests as long as they are held within the framework of the law. At the same time, the police will not allow riots of any kind, disruptions to freedom of movement, or any behavior that may endanger public safety."

That sentence is the model. Speech against the draft is permitted. Blocking roads, the kind of disruption that raises the cost of a draft, is not. The Post reported that police internal investigators questioned an officer filmed beating a protester: "you can see an individual dragging a protester to the ground, punching them in the stomach, kicking them in the head, and then walking away." The officer "was released without restrictions."

U.S. law draws a similar line: "The First Amendment protects the right to express opposition to the draft," but "this protection does not extend to actions that directly interfere with the lawful operations of the Selective Service System" (The Gun Zone).

The politicians​

Shas party chairman Arye Deri, whose community's sons are being drafted, protested the police response: "Itamar Ben-Gvir, wake up! It is unacceptable that what the police did not do in Kaplan against anarchists who sought to destroy the country, they are doing right now against citizens crying out that they have been turned into criminals just because they study Torah."

Opposition leader Yair Lapid answered: "Arye Deri sits in the cabinet and sends our children to fight and die for the country - and then he walks outside and sends his own children to block roads against drafting into the IDF." And: "We will return, draft everyone, and bring order to the streets of Israel."

Source: Jerusalem Post, June 25, 2026.

"Draft everyone." That is an Israeli party leader's promise in the middle of a war that many Israeli voices also want American soldiers to fight on the ground (Jerusalem Post column on American troops).

Watching the teachers​

A May 2026 post relayed a Haaretz report that "a secret spy unit is operating inside Israel's Education Ministry," tracking teachers' "social media posts, protest participation, and political statements," "headed by a former Shin Bet operative" (@Truthtellerftm, May 24, 2026). Shin Bet is Israel's internal security service. If accurate, it is a state tracking protest participation among the people who teach its children, during a war.

Sources​

Status: Yair Lapid, Arye Deri, and Itamar Ben-Gvir are alive. Nothing here states or implies that any named person committed a crime.

Last Updated: 2026-09-26

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