Thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jewish men packed the streets and sidewalks for blocks around the Israeli consulate in New York City on Sunday to protest the potential end of the Israeli Haredi community’s exemption from military service.
The protest at the consulate, a block from the United Nations campus in Manhattan, illustrated the complex relationship between Israel and segments of the large population of very religious, anti-Zionist Jews in New York and its suburbs.
The protest, dubbed “the Cry of the Exile,” was organized by the Central Rabbinical Congress of the USA and Canada, a consortium of Orthodox Jewish groups, which said 100,000 people attended the demonstration.
Footage from the event showed protesters holding signs reading, in English, “We would rather die as Jews than live as Zionist soldiers,” and “Stop terrorizing religious Jews.”
In lieu of a central stage, rabbis who spoke at the demonstration were lifted up on a cherry picker, Haredi news outlet Kikar Hashabbat reported. The speeches were delivered in Yiddish, with parts translated into English for global media, the outlet said.
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Rabbis Aaron and Zalman Teitelbaum, the two rival leaders of the influential anti-Zionist Satmar Hasidic sect, both called on adherents to participate in the demonstration.
This aerial view shows an ultra-Orthodox protest against the attempt to draft ultra-Orthodox Israeli men into the IDF, outside the Israeli consulate in New York, October 19, 2025. (Screen capture via Behadrei Haredim, used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law)
The brothers, embroiled in a struggle for succession since their father’s death in 2006, avoided meeting each other at the protest, according to Haredi news site Behadrei Haredim.
Rabbi Moishe Indig, a Satmar community leader, said he was not sure organizers expected so many people to show up but he said he felt urgency building around the issue.
He said he was appreciative of the governments in New York and the US “for giving us the freedom and liberty to be able to live free and have our children go to school and study and learn the Torah.”
???? Orthodox Jews held a protest in New York City condemning Israel’s policies toward their religious communities
???? Protesters carried a large banner reading, ‘The State of Israel and its actions do not represent Jews or Judaism’ pic.twitter.com/gdPe0z556a
— Anadolu English (@anadoluagency) October 20, 2025
For the past year, the Haredi leadership in Israel has pushed to pass a law keeping its members out of the IDF, after the High Court ruled that the decades-long blanket exemptions from army duty traditionally afforded to the Haredi community were illegal.
Some 80,000 ultra-Orthodox men aged between 18 and 24 are currently believed to be eligible for military service, but have not enlisted. The Israel Defense Forces has said it urgently needs 12,000 recruits, due to the strain on standing and reserve forces caused by the war against Hamas in Gaza and other military challenges.
The government’s failure to codify the Haredi draft exemption has led both of Israel’s Haredi parties, the Sephardic Shas and Ashkenazi United Torah Judaism, to bolt the government, though Shas remains in the coalition.
Police drag away ultra-Orthodox protesters who sat on the road during a demonstration against Haredi enlistment, outside a conference honoring ultra-Orthodox soldiers in Jerusalem, January 28, 2025. (Chaim Goldberg/Flash90)
Last week, Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee chairman Boaz Bismuth, of the ruling Likud party, said he submitted principles for a new law on Haredi enlistment.
According to Hebrew-language news reports, the document stipulates that within five years, 50 percent of the annual Haredi draft cohort will be conscripted, and the age of exemption will remain at 26. Yeshiva budgets will only be cut for failing to meet enlistment quotas after a year, and personal sanctions will only go into effect after two years if the overall enlistment goal is not met.
Sam Sokol contributed to this report.
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