The Haredim are calling for a day of prayer against the draft law. They have lost the plot.

Earlier this morning, the Council of Torah Sages issued a melodramatic call to arms—or rather, a call to prayer—declaring a “special day of prayer” on Ta’anit Esther to combat what they hysterically label a “war against the yeshiva world.”

Their enemy? The Israeli government’s push to draft yeshiva students into the IDF.

Their weapon? Psalms, tears, and a sanctimonious plea to the Almighty to “annul all harsh and evil decrees.”

Their reasoning? “The strength of the Jewish people lies only in its voice.” Translation: Forget the soldiers bleeding on the front lines; the real heroes are the 80,000 Haredi men sitting in study halls, dodging the draft while others die to protect them.

Let’s cut through the sanctimonious drivel. Rabbi Dov Landau and his ilk claim the government is “attacking their lives” by asking them to serve. Attacking their lives? Are you kidding me? The IDF isn’t rounding them up for execution—it’s fighting tooth and nail to protect their lives, along with every other citizen’s. If Israel doesn’t defend itself, those 80,000 yeshiva boys—and their families—could be slaughtered, God forbid, by enemies who don’t differentiate between them and any other Jew. This isn’t hypothetical; it’s history, from 1948 to today. The Haredim aren’t separate from “us”—they’re part of this nation, whether they like it or not. To pretend otherwise is delusional rubbish that shouldn’t need explaining.

And yet, here we are. While reservists—fathers, husbands, sons—leave their businesses, their kids, their lives to fight, the Haredi leadership clutches their pearls and cries persecution. The workforce is bleeding because every able-bodied person is stretched thin, but the yeshiva world? They’re too busy planning a global prayer day to notice.

Rabbi Yaakov Medan, a Religious Zionist giant whose own sons have served (one losing both legs in this very war), put it bluntly: “Women at home with kids by themselves, struggling, and the Haredim just continue on like nothing is wrong. This is not Torah.” He’s right. Torah demands responsibility, not retreat. In a milchemet mitzvah—a war of survival—everyone’s obligated, no exceptions. The Mishnah doesn’t mince words: even a bride steps out from her canopy.

Then there’s the sheer gall of their “day of prayer.” A respected rabbi nailed it: “They’ll be praying to God to help them shirk their moral and ethical duties.” Thursday’s Yom Tefilah feels like a plea for divine backup to keep dodging the draft while others bear the burden. Soldiers risk death daily, sacred souls who step up, while the yeshiva boys plan their Purim parties and month-long Pesach breaks. A whole month off from both army service and their supposed “intense Torah study.” Some weapon that is.

Rabbi Dov Landau doubles down, rejecting any compromise on the draft law. “Better a known certainty than an unknown possibility,” he says, arguing the current law is the “worst possible” and will “greatly harm the Torah world.” Harm the Torah world? What about the harm to the nation they’re part of? What about the reservists on their fourth stint, surrounded by enemies plotting their deaths, while Haredi leaders plot their next exemption? The rabbi I quoted wasn’t sugar-coating: “Angry doesn’t even begin to describe what I feel. It’s more like fury, rage, and disgust." When your child’s life is on the line, and the Haredim are whining about their “war” from the safety of their study halls, rage is the only rational response.

Meanwhile, Housing Minister Yitzhak Goldknopf threatens to resign—sort of—but not really. He’ll let a couple of MKs vote against the budget, maybe step down from a cushy Prime Minister’s Office gig, but don’t expect him to sacrifice his Housing Ministry throne. It’s all theater, a tantrum to keep the status quo while reservists’ wives struggle to pay bills and their kids ask why daddy’s gone again.

The Haredim’s letter invokes Mordechai and Esther, casting themselves as victims in a Purim-style drama. But here’s the irony: Mordechai didn’t sit around praying for someone else to save the Jews—he acted. Esther didn’t hide in a yeshiva—she risked her life for her people, she dressed up and then she married Achashverosh, who had beheaded his last wife and wasn't exactly a paragon of virtue himself. She went to live in his palace, with no access to the Judaism she held so dear. She went so far as to approach him, which could have easily resulted in her death, and halachically, meant that she could not return to Mordechai. Did she fast and pray? Sure she did. But she realized that alone wasn't enough; she hoped that the fasting and praying would help her when she acted, but not that they in and of themselves were the complete solution.

The Haredim are not fasting for salvation; they’re fasting to preserve their privilege. “It is a time of trouble for Jacob, and from it we will be saved,” they write. Sure, but who’s doing the saving? Not them.

This isn’t Torah. The Jewish people’s strength isn’t “only in its voice”—it’s in its unity, its sacrifice, its willingness to stand up and fight when survival’s at stake. The Haredim have forgotten that. They’ve lost the plot, and the rest of us—soldiers, families, a nation under fire—are paying the price.

The sad truth is nothing is going to change until their Rabbis decide it should. And that's not happening anytime soon, if ever.