AFP Asia Business

A new draft law on conscripting ultra-Orthodox Jews, whose support is crucial for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, has sparked uproar in Israel, with the opposition denouncing it as a special privilege for “draft-dodgers”.Under a ruling established at the time of Israel’s creation in 1948, men who devote themselves full-time to studying sacred Jewish texts are given a de facto pass from mandatory military service.But this exemption has come under mounting scrutiny from the rest of Israeli society — particularly when tens of thousands of conscripts and reservists are mobilised on several fronts, despite the fragile truce halting the war in Gaza.The ultra-Orthodox make up 14 percent of Israel’s Jewish population.Keeping ultra-Orthodox parties on board is key to the survival of Netanyahu’s right-wing coalition, and their opposition to mandatory military service proposals sparked a mass rally in Jerusalem in October.Two ultra-Orthodox parties rejected a draft bill in July that would have seen an increasing number of ultra-Orthodox men enlisted each year, and financial penalties for those who refuse to comply.On Thursday, a new draft was put forward by Boaz Bismuth, the chairman of parliament’s cross-party foreign affairs and defence committee, which rolls back significantly from the previous text.The new proposal includes only minimal penalties for ultra-Orthodox draft dodgers, notably a ban on travelling abroad or obtaining a driving licence.It also lowers enlistment quotas and facilitates exemptions for ultra-Orthodox men who study in religious seminaries known as yeshivas.Lawmakers will debate the text on Monday.The centre-right Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper ran a front-page headline on Friday reading “Conscription on paper only”, denouncing “an obvious fraud”.”The new ‘conscription’ law will not recruit anyone,” it read.Bismuth has called the bill “balanced” and “responsible”.- ‘Contemptible politics’ -The ultra-Orthodox United Torah Judaism party quit the government in July over the previous draft conscription bill, and now Netanyahu’s coalition only holds 60 out of 120 seats in parliament.Ministers from the other main ultra-Orthodox party, Shas, resigned from the cabinet over the issue, though the party has not formally left the coalition.Shas is now threatening to bring down the government if Netanyahu fails to grant the exemptions he had promised the ultra-Orthodox parties in 2022 when forming the coalition.The decades-old de facto exemption was challenged at the Supreme Court level in the early 2000s, since when successive Israeli governments have been forced to cobble together temporary legislative arrangements to appease the ultra-Orthodox, who are the makers and breakers of governments.The opposition has slammed the latest draft bill, believing it is too soft, and is vowing to bring it down.Opposition leader Yair Lapid called the text an “anti-Zionist disgrace” on X, denouncing the “contemptible politics of the corrupt and the draft-dodgers”.”This law is a declaration of war by the government on the reservists,” said former prime minister Naftali Bennett, who is expected to run against Netanyahu in elections due by November 2026.In June 2024, Israel’s Supreme Court ruled that the state must draft ultra-Orthodox men, declaring their exemption had expired.The government has also been forced to cut certain subsidies to yeshivas, much to the chagrin of the ultra-Orthodox parties.- ‘Flagrant inequality’ -Only two percent of ultra-Orthodox Jews respond to conscription orders according to the military, which has created units specifically for them.There are around 1.3 million ultra-Orthodox Jews in Israel, and roughly 66,000 men of military age currently benefit from the exemption, a record number according to local media reports.On November 19, Israel’s Supreme Court ruled that the government was required to present an effective proposal for conscripting the ultra-Orthodox.The ruling notes that the “flagrant inequality” created by their exemption has “worsened significantly” with the war in Gaza, triggered by Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.It also says ultra-Orthodox conscription fills a “real security need” as the army requires about 12,000 soldiers to fill its ranks.The court did not set a deadline for the adoption of a conscription law, but only for a debate on the issue in parliament.

With a pot of glue, a blade and a keen eye, Manal al-Saadani repairs tattered banknotes — a necessity in the Gaza Strip, where the cash in circulation is wearing out.For every revived note she gives back to a customer, they give her a few coins in return.As Gaza remained blockaded for much of the Israel-Hamas war since October 2023, basic supplies were depleted, including banknotes, with no new ones supplied to its banks.Every day, Saadani carries her small plastic table a few kilometres from Al-Bureij refugee camp and sets it up in the market in Nuseirat camp in the central Gaza Strip.A string of people come to Saadani’s table, showing her the flaws in their Israeli shekel notes.”I decided to work and started repairing banknotes,” she told AFP, explaining it is her only source of income.”Because I’m a woman… most people on the street stood by me and supported me. They would bring me 20-shekel notes and tell me: ‘We want you to repair this for one or two shekels.’ Which I accepted, and thank God for that.”Working on a thick sheet of glass, she uses the blade from a utility knife to work the glue into the paper and smooths it out on the surface with her fingertips.Saadani holds the notes up to the light, studying the damage and examining her handiwork.But she wishes she was at home with her daughters instead.”Look at me with compassion and mercy and understand me as a Palestinian mother,” she said, her voice straining with emotion.”I am very tired.”- Cash crisis -The Israeli new shekel is used throughout the Palestinian territories. One shekel is worth $0.30.The Bank of Israel’s first Series C notes entered circulation in 2014. They feature the portraits of prominent Hebrew poets, with the 20 note in red, the 50 in green, the 100 in orange and the 200 in blue.Saadani rubs colours back into the notes to refresh their appearance.”Go and buy some biscuits with it,” she said, handing back a customer two 20-shekel notes.Nabila Shenar, one of Saadani’s customers, explained how tattered banknotes make life difficult.”Most of the money is damaged,” she told AFP.”If we try to use this money to buy anything from any grocery store, they tell us it’s damaged and unusable.”Therefore, we’ve had to go to people who repair money for two shekels for 20-shekel notes and three shekels for 50-shekel notes.”They need to find a solution to this problem and provide us with money so we can live our lives and buy what we need, but because of these damaged banknotes we can’t buy anything.”

Elfyn Evans’ hopes of claiming his first World Rally Championship title suffered a major blow on Friday when the Welshman lost valuable time with a puncture in Saudi Arabia.He had to change a rear-left tyre which cost him around two minutes, giving the title advantage to his Toyota teammate Sebastien Ogier.”We had a puncture alarm right at the beginning,” said Evans.”It was going down quite slow but it was so far to go that we had to make a decision to change it where we could. Not ideal.”France’s Ogier, three points behind Evans going into this season-closer, ended the day in sixth, but crucially over two-and-a-half minutes up on Evans, despite being hampered by a double puncture himself.”Tomorrow we’ll have to cross our fingers to not have any more punctures,” said Ogier.”I don’t want to take any risks otherwise there’s a big chance we won’t finish this rally,” he added.If Ogier does triumph it will be quite remarkable in that he has skipped four events in the 14-rally season. It would also mark a ninth title, which would draw him level with the record set by another French legend, Sebastien Loeb.There was drama for the rally leader Adrien Forumaux, who ended Friday topping the time sheets but dropped to fourth after a one minute penalty.The lead was inherited by Martins Sesks ahead of the final day’s three stages at this inaugural visit to Saudi Arabia.

Israeli forces killed 13 people on Friday in an operation in southern Syria, saying they targeted an Islamist group, in Israel’s deadliest attack on the country since Bashar al-Assad’s overthrow last year.Since an Islamist coalition overthrew longtime ruler Assad in December of last year, Israel has conducted hundreds of strikes on Syria’s military arsenal as well as incursions into the country.The Israeli army said an exchange of fire in the operation to detain militants in the Syrian village of Beit Jin left six Israeli soldiers wounded, with three of them in a serious condition.The official SANA news agency, quoting the Syrian health ministry, reported 13 dead and 24 more wounded in the Israeli operation.The Syrian foreign ministry condemned the operation as a “war crime” and accused Israel of wanting to “ignite the region”.An AFP journalist saw several wounded people being taken to a hospital in Damascus, around 40 kilometres (25 miles) from the village.”We were asleep when we were woken up at three in the morning by gunfire,” wounded resident Iyad Taher told AFP at al-Mouwassat hospital in the Syrian capital.”We went outside to see what was happening and saw the Israeli army in the village, soldiers and tanks. Then they withdrew, the air force came, and the shells started falling. I was hit by shrapnel in the neck.”The Israeli army said the targets of the operation were fighters from the Islamist group Jamaa Islamiya, which is based in neighbouring Lebanon and allied with Palestinian armed group Hamas.”The suspects operated in the area of Beit Jin in southern Syria and advanced terror attacks against Israeli civilians,” it said in a statement.A local official told AFP that Israeli forces raided the village to capture three men, sparking clashes.”Following the clashes, the Israeli occupation forces shelled the area with artillery and drones,” village official Abdul Rahman al-Hamrawi said.At the hospital, Ahmad Kamal told AFP he and others “opened fire on the Israeli patrol to defend ourselves and stop them from taking us. My brother was killed, and I was wounded”.- ‘Territorial integrity’ -In Damascus and other major Syrian cities, demonstrators marking one year since the Islamist-led offensive that toppled Assad denounced Israel’s attacks.Banners in Damascus read “Beit Jin makes us proud” and “stop Israeli attacks”.United Nations Deputy Special Envoy for Syria Najat Rochdi condemned Israel’s attack, calling it “a grave and unacceptable violation of Syria’s sovereignty and territorial integrity”.Rami Abdul Rahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor, said Friday’s operation was “the deadliest incursion since Israel began conducting operations outside the buffer zone in southern Syria”.Israel sent troops into and beyond the UN-patrolled buffer zone, which has separated Israeli and Syrian forces on the Golan Heights since 1974, in the immediate aftermath of Assad’s fall.In June, Syria accused Israel of “abducting seven people” from Beit Jin and killing one civilian “as a result of direct gunfire on the residents”.Israel accused the people of being Hamas members.Israel has occupied Syria’s Golan Heights, a strategic mountain plateau, since 1967, annexing it in 1981 in a move not recognised by the international community.Last week Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited Israeli troops deployed in the buffer zone, drawing a sharp rebuke from Damascus and others in the region.The premier has previously insisted that southern Syria be demilitarised following Assad’s overthrow.Israel’s key backer the United States has been pushing for a security pact between Syria and Israel, part of President Donald Trump’s goal to shore up the fragile Gaza ceasefire with a broader Middle East peace settlement.While Syrian and Israeli officials have held repeated rounds of talks, President Ahmed al-Sharaa has ruled out Syria joining the Abraham Accords, under which a handful of Arab countries have normalised ties with Israel.He recently met with Trump and warned in a UN speech that Israel’s persistent attacks put the region at risk, but backed diplomacy.”In the face of this aggression, Syria is committed to dialogue,” he said.burs-nad/dcp