In 2018, a bill was put before the Knesset to expand the number of Ḥaredim conscripted into the Israeli military, while still preserving some of the exemptions for yeshiva students. Because Avigdor Liberman—the head of the Jewish Home party—refuses to join a governing coalition absent a promise the bill will remain unchanged, while the ḥaredi parties will only join the coalition if it is modified, Benjamin Netanyahu has been unable to form a governing coalition. Thus, new elections will be held in September. The former parliamentarian Yohanan Plesner, who served on the Knesset committee that produced an earlier version of the bill, comments:

March 15 marks the beginning of this year’s Israel Apartheid Week, during which campus groups around the world hold rallies and events for the purpose of defaming the Jewish state and mustering support for the movement to boycott, divest from, and sanction it (BDS). Richard Kemp comments: