{"id":542849,"date":"2026-07-15T15:02:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T15:02:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/542849\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T15:02:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T15:02:09","slug":"naftali-bennett-slams-bezalel-smotrich-for-pushing-draft-evasion-law-while-idf-fights-in-lebanon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/542849\/","title":{"rendered":"Naftali Bennett slams Bezalel Smotrich for pushing draft evasion law while IDF fights in Lebanon"},"content":{"rendered":"

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich<\/a> is the true architect of the draft evasion law, former prime minister Naftali Bennett said in an interview with 103FM on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

“This is terrible, a real desecration of the term ‘religious Zionism,’\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was no politician who pushed harder for the transfer of billions to draft-dodging haredim<\/a> than Smotrich. He should be ashamed, he should go home, he should clear the field. He disgraces every person who wears a knitted kippah”\u00a0<\/p>\n

Bennett said watching the government\u2019s conduct over the past few days has been \u201cpretty hard,\u201d particularly as fighting continues in Lebanon.<\/p>\n

“My eldest son is also in Lebanon<\/a>. This government is pushing horrific laws on their backs,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\"OppositionOpposition Leader Yair Lapid and former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett attend an election event for the joint list \u201cTogether\u201d ahead of the upcoming elections, in Tel Aviv, central Israel, May 12, 2026. The list is set to be led by Bennett. (credit: MIRIAM ALSTER\/FLASH90)<\/p>\n

“I want to address the soldiers and tell them: I see you. Hold on tight, there are still 104 days of plunder and evasion, the reinforcements are on the way, and this terrible government is going. We will fix it together.”<\/p>\n

Bennett dismissed the argument that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was forced to pass these laws to preserve the right-wing bloc as “nonsense.”<\/p>\n

“I am a consistent political right-winger. I was not the one who handed parts of the Land of Israel to the enemy, I was not the one who released thousands of terrorists, and I will not allow a single centimeter of land to be handed over,” he said. “That is not the story.”<\/p>\n

New laws will see billions transferred to haredi community, Bennett claimed<\/p>\n

Bennett slammed the government’s policies, noting how the \u201ccrazy\u201d laws will see the transfer of \u201ctens of billions to healthy young Haredim.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are 100,000 of them, and if only 20 percent of them enlisted, there would be no manpower problem. It is very solvable. We will cancel the draft-exemption laws and pass the law we prepared, the Service Law, which redirects the money we save from the evaders to the people who serve, and first and foremost, to reservists,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

With his plan, he explained, reservists could receive NIS 1 million to help purchase a first home, and free daycare for their children from ages zero to three.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will shower a lot of good on these few people,” he promised, though he said the project could only work by bringing the haredim into employment and service, claiming this could increase Israel’s GDP by NIS 70 billion a year.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe money exists,” he said. “And that is why I am returning to politics, to fix the state, the economy, the distorted situation with our haredi brothers. This is my life\u2019s mission.”<\/p>\n

Plans may not be ‘sexy,’ but are still important<\/p>\n

Bennett noted that while his plans may not seem as \u201csexy\u201d as just getting rid of Netanyahu<\/a>, it is \u201cmuch more important.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bennett also praised the growing number of parties in the opposition bloc, calling their leaders \u201cexcellent people.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cRight now there are fragments of parties, and we will need to consolidate them and decide whether it is right for them to run as one large party, if they overcome personal issues, and if not, some of them will need not to run, and some will join existing parties,” he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich is the true architect of the draft evasion law, former prime minister Naftali Bennett…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":542850,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,1982,85,46,953,43,238,2396],"class_list":["post-542849","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-israel","tag-benjamin-netanyahu","tag-bezalel-smotrich","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-naftali-bennett","tag-news","tag-politics","tag-prime-minister"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/542849","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=542849"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/542849\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/542850"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=542849"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=542849"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=542849"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}