Islamic State vs. Israel: How Great a Threat?

Thus far, Islamic State (IS) and its affiliates have generally refrained from attacking Israel, although they have gotten dangerously close to its borders. But, argue Shlomo Brom and Yoram Schweitzer, any number of regional developments could change the organization’s calculus:

In the scenario of a de-facto division of Syria [among the warring parties], the confrontation between enemy groups could gradually die down, whereupon Islamic State and [other] Salafist jihadist entities might turn more of their attention to Israel. Also, competition among the various actors in Syria is liable to develop over their desire to prove their ideological commitment to the struggle against Israel. The spread of IS to southern Syria might not only generate [more opportunities for attacking] Israel, but also lead to friction with the Druze in the Jabel Druze region. This friction might prompt internal pressure in Israel to intervene.

Furthermore, pressure from Islamic State on Jordan could result in Israel positioning itself alongside Jordan in a fight. In Sinai too, the failure of Egyptian army actions to defeat the Salafist groups there may well lead to the reality of a jihadist entity being in control of that territory. [If] Egypt ceases its efforts against it, Islamic State is liable to turn its attention to Israel.

Read more at Institute for National Security Studies

More about: Druze, Egypt, ISIS, Israel & Zionism, Israeli Security, Jordan, Syrian civil war

It’s Time for Haredi Jews to Become Part of Israel’s Story

Unless the Supreme Court grants an extension from a recent ruling, on Monday the Israeli government will be required to withhold state funds from all yeshivas whose students don’t enlist in the IDF. The issue of draft exemptions for Haredim was already becoming more contentious than ever last year; it grew even more urgent after the beginning of the war, as the army for the first time in decades found itself suffering from a manpower crunch. Yehoshua Pfeffer, a haredi rabbi and writer, argues that haredi opposition to army service has become entirely disconnected from its original rationale:

The old imperative of “those outside of full-time Torah study must go to the army” was all but forgotten. . . . The fact that we do not enlist, all of us, regardless of how deeply we might be immersed in the sea of Torah, brings the wrath of Israeli society upon us, gives a bad name to all of haredi society, and desecrates the Name of Heaven. It might still bring harsh decrees upon the yeshiva world. It is time for us to engage in damage limitation.

In Pfeffer’s analysis, today’s haredi leaders, by declaring that they will fight the draft tooth and nail, are violating the explicit teachings of the very rabbis who created and supported the exemptions. He finds the current attempts by haredi publications to justify the status quo not only unconvincing but insincere. At the heart of the matter, according to Pfeffer, is a lack of haredi identification with Israel as a whole, a lack of feeling that the Israeli story is also the haredi story:

Today, it is high time we changed our tune. The new response to the demand for enlistment needs to state, first and foremost to ourselves, that this is our story. On the one hand, it is crucial to maintain and even strengthen our isolation from secular values and culture. . . . On the other hand, this cultural isolationism must not create alienation from our shared story with our fellow brethren living in the Holy Land. Participation in the army is one crucial element of this belonging.

Read more at Tzarich Iyun

More about: Haredim, IDF, Israeli society