In Israeli domestic politics, issues surrounding the Haredim and their relationship with the state are again at the forefront. Recent legislation regarding the enlistment of yeshiva students—a longstanding point of contention that, given the current demands the war is placing on reservists, has become a greater than ever source of resentment—came close to toppling the government last week. Then followed a dust-up in the Knesset concerning the appointment of local rabbis, the details of which are too arcane to explain here, which also highlighted the tensions between Haredim and non-Haredim.

Brian Horowitz suggests looking to tsarist Russia’s nine decades of efforts to conscript Jews to think about solutions to the problem of haredi enlistment. During the reign of Tsar Nicholas I (1825–1855), Russian Jews had good reason to see army service as cruel, dangerous, and likely to destroy conscripts’ connection to Judaism. Their attempts to resist conscription ended up having terrible effects on Jewish communal life. Yet the Russian government had more success when it adopted more liberal policies:

In the case of haredi conscription in Israel, it might be possible to put in shorter service terms for members who receive secular education and training for jobs outside yeshiva study halls. However, if haredi recruitment is imposed like in Nicholas’s time with the power of selection in the hands of the rabbinic elite, a similar situation will likely arise in which some boys will go to the military because they lack prowess as scholars, while others will be victims of corruption. This picture will not be pretty.

Some people will continue to strive to change haredi attitudes toward the state. I don’t think that we should expect change in the short run. . . . Today’s stratification of military service in Israel cannot stand, but the proposals for haredi service must include incentives as well as demands.

While Horowitz looks at the problem as an outsider, it’s worth noting that the haredi journalist (and yeshiva student) Moshe Shafer takes a similar approach, arguing that Israeli Haredim have based their approach to the Israeli government on strategies of premodern Jewish representatives “pleading before the classic Polish aristocrat.” He believes it’s time for a change, calling on his fellow Haredim, who have already accepted the rights of citizenship, to accept the responsibilities as well.

Robert Clark explains why the resumption of hostilities is both just and necessary:

These latest Israeli strikes come after weeks of consistent Palestinian provocation; they have repeatedly broken the terms of the cease-fire which they claimed they were so desperate for. There have been numerous [unsuccessful] bus bombings near Tel Aviv and Palestinian-instigated clashes in the West Bank. Fifty-nine Israeli hostages are still held in captivity.

In fact, Hamas and their Palestinian supporters . . . have always known that they can sit back, parade dead Israeli hostages live on social media, and receive hundreds of their own convicted terrorists and murderers back in return. They believed they could get away with the October 7 pogrom.

One hopes Hamas’s leaders will get the message. Meanwhile, many inside and outside Israel seem to believe that, by resuming the fighting, Jerusalem has given up on rescuing the remaining hostages. But, writes Ron Ben-Yishai, this assertion misunderstands the goals of the present campaign. “Experience within the IDF and Israeli intelligence,” Ben-Yishai writes, “has shown that such pressure is the most effective way to push Hamas toward flexibility.” He outlines two other aims:

The second objective was to signal to Hamas that Israel is not only targeting its military wing—the terror army that was the focus of previous phases of the war up until the last cease-fire—but also its governance structure. This was demonstrated by the targeted elimination of five senior officials from Hamas’s political and civilian administration. . . . The strikes also served as a message to mediators, particularly Egypt, that Israel opposes Hamas remaining in any governing or military capacity in post-war Gaza.

The third objective was to create intense military pressure, coordinated with the U.S., on all remaining elements of the Shiite “axis of resistance,” including Yemen’s Houthis, Hamas, and Iran.