Exemption from military service in Israel

Exemption from military service in Israel is covered by the Israeli Security Service Law (חוק שירות ביטחון) which states the grounds for exemption from serving in the Israel Defense Forces Exemptions are given based on the following criteria:

According to 2007 IDF figures, the largest single group of young (Jewish) Israelis who avoid conscription consists of women who claim exemptions on religious grounds. This group made up 35% of all women eligible for the draft. Amongst males, the overall percentage of non-participation was 27.7%. This figure included 11.2% for Torato Omanuto, 7.3% for medical and psychological grounds, 4.7% because of criminal records and 4.2% because of residing abroad.

Accordance with section 36 of the Security Service Law, the security minister may exempt certain people from an army service in the IDF, for reasons related to the volume of the military forces or reserve forces, or for reasons related to educational needs, settlement needs, security needs, economy needs, family needs and various other reasons.

In accordance with section 5 of the Security Service Law, a medical board is authorized to determine if a candidate is unfit for national security service. due to the pressure the hareidy community to draft to the military they start to consider not face at all the whole draft even to get exempt.

In 2005 32.1% of the Jewish females did not enlist in the military on religious grounds, and the overall rate of non-enlist Jewish girls has risen to 42.3%. These high rates indicate that refraining from the draft is relatively common, at least among Israeli women. In 2008, the proportion of females who did not enlist rose to 44%, from which 34.6% did not enlist on religious grounds. As a result, the Israeli military tightened the way it handles cases in which Jewish women request an exemption on religious grounds, through investigating the truthfulness of their claims, in order to expose young women who lied about being religious.

Section 94 of the Security Service Law describes another method of draft evasion: defecting from the military on the day of recruitment. When a soldier fails to show up to be recruited he is defined by the military as a draft evader. After being defined as a draft evader, an arrest warrant is issued against him and thereafter the military police is responsible for locating and capturing him. After being caught by the military police, it would be decided whether the draft evader would go through disciplinary proceedings (which means that they would get a limited punishment and not a criminal record), or whether he or she would face a military court where the punishment is not limited and the criminal conviction is registered.

...
Wikipedia