"Announcement on increase in recruiting Haredim - false and misleading"

Yesterday, the media circulated the Ministerial Committee announcement stating that since the approval of the new draft law, there was an increase in recruiting haredim. Yesh Atid minister, Peri, presented it as an overwhelming success of new law and the failure of the Haredi leadership.

Now it has been exposed: the publication wrongly mixed the recruitment data prior to approval of the law with those that followed it, proving –on the contrary – a sharp drop in recruiting, and a failure of the law. Hiddush organization which revealed the data claims that the "announcement about a dramatic increase in recruiting Haredim is correct just as a Hamas announcement of an overwhelming victory in Gaza."

A Ministerial Committee statement said "There has been a dramatic increase of 39% in the IDF Haredi recruitment in the recruitment year of 2013-14 relatively to the previous year. In the past year 1972 haredim enlisted for military service, compared with 1416 who enlisted in the previous year and 1327 the year before that."

Hiddush CEO, Uri Regev, said in response 'This is exactly the same data submitted two months ago to the Knesset committee of Shaked and correctly presented as something of a failure. The number of recruits dropped by half due to the conscription law."

Regev called on the government to "stop deceiving the public. The Draft Law caused huge damage to the extent of recruiting the Haredim. Hopefully the Haredi enthusiasm at the Solid Rock Operation will fix it a little." Regev also said, I wish that the government and political parties which passed the draft law will understand that one does make revolutions in Facebook statuses and press releases but through real changes in society."

Vice President for Research and Public in Hiddush, Shahar Ilan, lists some data that Minister Peri did not bother to share with the public: in the first half of the 2013-2014 recruit year (July to December of 2013), before the ensuing struggle over the conscription law, 1235 haredim were drafted.

In the second half (January to June 2014), i.e. during the fight for the law and after it, a dramatic drop of 50% occurred to 623 recruits. That is the announcement joined data from before the struggle over the law and after it. The data of the past six months indicate absolute failure.

Failure is very evident when you look at the data over the same period last year. In the six months before the growing struggle over the conscription law (the second half of 2013) there was a dramatic increase in the recruitment of 56% of haredi recruits, from 793 in the same period in 2012 – to 1235 haredi recruits in 2013.

However in the first half of 2014 which was influenced by the struggle over the draft law and the passing of the law, there was an increase of only 18% from 623 to 737 recruits. 18% are about half the increase needed to meet the target set even by the government. This means that if the rate of recruitment throughout the year, the IDF would not even get close to reaching the target.

'בחדרי' גם ברשתות החברתיות - הצטרפו!