Knesset approves law permitting IDF to revoke girls' exemptions

 https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/309069

 According to the letter of the law, any girl who reaches draft age and signs a declaration that she eats only kosher food and does not travel on Shabbat, is entitled to an exemption from IDF service. In October, 2020, legislation was passed entitling the IDF to challenge such declarations and even revoke them, and on Wednesday, the Knesset passed, in its first reading, an extension of three years to this law, with 55
“What did the Chief Rabbinate – the halakhic authority of the State of Israel – have to say on this issue of drafting girls into the IDF?” demanded MK Moshe Gafni? “The Rabbinate stated that it is absolutely forbidden. Why are you bringing this law to a vote now? What for? You really want to go into minute detail about whether a girl made Kiddush on Shabbat, whether she’s really traditional? Is this a democratic state? This is forbidden, yehareg ve’al ya’avor [a sin that one is forbidden to commit even if one must give up his life due to refusal to submit] … This law goes against the decisions of all the rabbis of Israel.”
MKs voting in favor and 50 against.

MK Yisrael Eichler (UTJ) asked his fellow Knesset members to “imagine to yourselves that the Rabbinate got up one day and announced that it was establishing committees of inquiry to investigate the level of religious observance of this person or that. You would be up in arms, screaming that it was an Inquisition,” he accused. “But now, when it’s the Defense Ministry doing that, checking up on girls to see whether they really know Jewish laws, whether they really are traditional, you’re fine with it … The law requires only a declaration that the girl in question does not travel on Shabbat and that she eats kosher food. She doesn’t need to know the entire body of Jewish law. What these committees are trying to do is coerce these girls to enlist.”