The Israeli politician Avigdor Lieberman’s insistence on increasing the number of Ḥaredim conscripted into the IDF—and ḥaredi politicians’ refusal to accept any such proposal—left Benjamin Netanyahu unable to form a governing coalition, precipitating the upcoming do-over elections. Meanwhile, the Religious Zionist parliamentarian Naftali Bennett and the leftist Ehud Barak have both endorsed a very different alternative to the current laws that allow ḥaredi men to avoid conscription by studying in yeshivas indefinitely. Amiḥai Attali writes:

[Barak and Bennett] are talking about a solution from outside the box: full exemption for ultra-Orthodox from serving in the army. No [enlistment] quotas and no criminal sanctions [for those who evade the draft], and no one forced to enlist against his will. . . . Such a solution would lead to the yeshivas being emptied of the considerable number of ultra-Orthodox boys seeking asylum there. The military police could no longer be used by rabbis as a tool to . . . force those whose souls do not desire to study the Torah to do so. As a result, the [state-subsidized] yeshiva budgets that are calculated per capita would shrink drastically. . . .

All those who leave the yeshiva would not have to leave the ultra-Orthodox world; they would be able to integrate into academia, the workforce, and even the army.

There has been a big shift in the ḥaredi community with exponential growth in the number of ultra-Orthodox men and women entering higher education. . . . Young people who grew up in households in which the only option was to study at a kollel (a religious seminary for married men) will, [absent pressure to avoid military service], suddenly have the opportunity to live an ultra-Orthodox lifestyle while making an honest living and strengthening the economy while they’re at it.

In a momentous meeting with the Syrian president Ahmed al-Sharaa in Riyadh, President Trump announced that he is lifting sanctions on the beleaguered and war-torn country. On the one hand, Sharaa is an alumnus of Islamic State and al-Qaeda, who came to power as commander of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which itself began life as al-Qaeda’s Syrian offshoot; he also seems to enjoy the support of Qatar. On the other hand, he overthrew the Assad regime—a feat made possible by the battering Israel delivered to Hizballah—greatly improving Jerusalem’s strategic position, and ending one of the world’s most atrocious and brutal tyrannies. President Trump also announced that he hopes Syria will join the Abraham Accords.

This analysis by Eran Lerman was published a few days ago, and in some respects is already out of date, but more than anything else I’ve read it helps to make sense of Israel’s strategic position vis-à-vis Syria.

Israel’s primary security interest lies in defending against worst-case scenarios, particularly the potential collapse of the Syrian state or its transformation into an actively hostile force backed by a significant Turkish presence (considering that the Turkish military is the second largest in NATO) with all that this would imply. Hence the need to bolster the new buffer zone—not for territorial gain, but as a vital shield and guarantee against dangerous developments. Continued airstrikes aimed at diminishing the residual components of strategic military capabilities inherited from the Assad regime are essential.

At the same time, there is a need to create conditions that would enable those in Damascus who wish to reject the reduction of their once-proud country into a Turkish satrapy. Sharaa’s efforts to establish his legitimacy, including his visit to Paris and outreach to the U.S., other European nations, and key Gulf countries, may generate positive leverage in this regard. Israel’s role is to demonstrate through daily actions the severe costs of acceding to Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ambitions and accepting Turkish hegemony.

Israel should also assist those in Syria (and beyond: this may have an effect in Lebanon as well) who look to it as a strategic anchor in the region. The Druze in Syria—backed by their brethren in Israel—have openly expressed this expectation, breaking decades of loyalty to the central power in Damascus over their obligation to their kith and kin.