The IDF is increasingly concerned over a significant drop in enlistment to the Chashmonaim Brigade, the military’s Chareidi combat framework, amid the escalating battle over the draft law and the growing wave of arrests of draft evaders.

Sources involved in the recruitment process told Walla that in recent months there has been a sharp increase in the number of Chareidi young men who begin the enlistment track for the brigade and then halt the process or cancel it altogether. Unlike standard enlistment tracks, recruitment to the Chashmonaim Brigade is built around targeted outreach inside the Chareidi community, personal meetings, screening interviews, and repeated conversations aimed at easing concerns and building trust with candidates and their families.

According to those involved in the process, the recent wave of draft arrests and the public battle surrounding the draft law are now directly undermining that effort. They said the IDF is no longer dealing with isolated cancellations, but with dozens of young men who have chosen to stop the process after already entering the screening stages.

The expectation in the military had been that after several recruitment cycles, the brigade would grow to several hundred new recruits per intake. In practice, the numbers remain far below that level. In the most recent draft cycle in May, about 70 new soldiers enlisted in the brigade, despite an estimated annual pool of roughly 14,000 potential Chareidi recruits identified by the IDF.

The military has invested significant effort in tailoring the brigade to Chareidi life, including active batei medrash, three daily tefillos, frameworks for Torah learning, mehadrin kashrus, and a setting designed for the Chareidi recruit. But despite those accommodations, response from the Chareidi public has remained limited, and now, following the latest events, the IDF is seeing a pullback even among young men who had already expressed willingness to enlist.

People involved in the recruitment effort said candidates repeatedly cite the arrests of brothers, relatives and friends, along with growing pressure and sharper opposition within the Chareidi street toward anyone considering enlistment, as the reason they are stepping away from the process.

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)