Haredi rabbi’s rant against ‘accursed’ IDF chief sparks political firestorm

A Haredi rabbi cursed IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir on Monday at a Bnei Brak anti-enlistment protest led by Sephardic ultra-Orthodox party Shas, which later distanced itself from the comments as condemnations poured in from across the political spectrum.

The uproar over the comments came as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Haredi coalition partners are seeking to enshrine blanket Haredi exemptions from the draft and push through a quasi-constitutional bill that would put Torah study on par with military service.

Speaking at the Monday night event, where hundreds of men protested the arrest of Haredi draft dodgers, Rabbi Yosef Aryeh Yazdi noted the 30-day prison sentence given in May to a soldier whom Zamir called out for wearing an unauthorized “Messiah” patch.

“The accursed IDF chief of staff — may his name and memory be erased — sent him to prison for a month. Why? Because he yearned for the Messiah,” Yazdi said.

“I agree with the IDF chief — may his name be erased, but he’s correct: This entire army wants to root out the Torah, to root out belief, to root out the Messiah,” the rabbi added.

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Yazdi also said: “In the army they are educating people toward the most severe transgressions in the Torah in this impure country. This whole army desires to uproot the name of God.”

“Don’t fall into that. Don’t go to the army,” he said.

הרב משה יזדי בבני ברק בעצרת המחאה של מפלגת ש"ס נגד המעצרים בבני ברק: "הרמטכ"ל ימח שמו וזיכרו שולח חייל לכלא כי הוא שם פתק משיח, בצבא מחנכים לעבירות החמורות ביותר" pic.twitter.com/bP5Cwz0wIF

— יואלי ברים yoeli brim (@yoeli_brim) June 29, 2026

According to Hebrew media, protesters at the rally yelled “traitor” and other invective against Shas party head MK Aryeh Deri, Netanyahu’s ally, who has been more moderate than some Ashkenazi counterparts in the Haredi parties’ bid to enshrine draft exemptions.

The rally was endorsed ahead of time by Shas’s Council of Torah Sages. Alongside Yazdi at the head of the protest were Shas MKs Yoav Ben Tzur, Michael Malkieli, Moshe Abutbul and Yonatan Mishraki, as well as Israel’s former Sephardic chief rabbi Yitzhak Yosef, brother of current Chief Rabbi David Yosef, of Shas’s founding dynasty.

Yitzhak Yosef said at the rally that Israel’s enforcement against Haredi draft dodgers smacked of racism.

“Ninety-five percent of the detainees are Sephardic,” he claimed, according to the Kikar HaShabbat news site. “We’re a racist country.”

Shas, PM distance themselves after Bennett claims Yazdi gets state funding

Yazdi’s comments sparked an uproar in the opposition on Tuesday morning, and later triggered condemnations from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Shas itself.

President Isaac Herzog also denounced Yazdi’s “shocking statements,” saying: “Even in times of deep disagreement, there is no place for curses, insults, or derogatory language — certainly not toward the commander of the IDF and of our soldiers, our sons and daughters.”

“Public leaders are required to maintain responsible and respectful discourse,” said Herzog.

Former IDF chief Gadi Eisenkot, currently the leading candidate to unseat Netanyahu in the upcoming elections, said “the unbridled incitement…  in the shameful presence of Netanyahu’s coalition partners, recklessly crosses red lines” by declaring open season on IDF soldiers and commanders.

“This low point is a direct result of the culture of hatred and division that Netanyahu has driven the country into for years in order to stay in power,” said Eisenkot.

Former prime minister Naftali Bennett, whom Eisenkot recently passed in polls as Netanyahu’s top rival, claimed Yazdi receives state funding and vowed to put an end to such funding for “anyone who preaches against Zionism and the State of Israel.”

“The rule is simple: Anyone who teaches against Zionism and against the State of Israel will not receive a shekel from the state. Anyone who chooses not to work doesn’t get money. Anyone who chooses not to serve doesn’t get money,” said Bennett. “That’s it. This is the new deal between the state and its citizens.”

Bennett cited the government’s online foundations database, which shows that the Bnei Brak-based Torah VeChaim (Torah and Life) Foundation, with which Yazdi is affiliated, has for years — including when Bennett was premier in 2021-2022 — received state funding to the tune of NIS 650,000 ($218,000), or nearly two-fifths of its income.

The foundation was established to support the eponymous kollel avrehim, or Torah study hall for married scholars, that late Yemenite-born Shas grandee Rabbi Shimon Baadani founded in the 1970s, when Bnei Brak’s Torah study centers were almost exclusively Ashkenazi-led.

Yazdi, a close disciple of Baadani, heads the Beit Abba kollel, which lies in the same complex as the Torah VeChaim Kollel and was under the ceremonial presidency of Baadani, who regularly delivered lectures at Beit Abba as well. However, The Times of Israel could not confirm that Beit Abba directly received state funding.

Following the statements from Eisenkot and Bennett, Netanyahu issued his own condemnation of Yazdi’s “shameful remarks.”

“Even when there are disagreements among us, there is absolutely no place for severe incitement against the IDF and its commanders, who protect us all,” said the premier.

Defense Minister Israel Katz similarly condemned Yazdi’s “grave inciting remarks” against Zamir.

“Even when there are public disagreements, it is forbidden to cross red lines of incitement and harm against those who bear the heavy responsibility for the country’s security,” Katz said.

Shas itself eventually put out its own statement decrying “the extreme statements heard last night against the IDF chief of staff at the Bnei Brak protest rally in honor of the Torah.”

The comments “do not reflect the views of our rabbis, the Council of Torah Sages, and are contrary to the path of the Shas movement,” the party said.

Controversy around the issue of Haredi enlistment has risen sharply in recent months, with the IDF suffering a personnel shortage amid the regional conflict that began with the Hamas-led onslaught of October 7, 2023.

In June 2024, the Supreme Court ruled the decades-long Haredi exemption lacked legal basis, triggering a government scramble to pass a law that would enshrine the exemption.

With hundreds of thousands of reservists currently serving hundreds of days in the military every year, the legislative push has posed a political liability for Netanyahu ahead of the coming election, which is set to take place by October 27.