The departure of the United Torah Judaism (UTJ) party leaves Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s cabinet with the smallest of majorities, 61 of 120 members in parliament
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An Israeli ultra-Orthodox Jewish party has faced criticism for leaving the government coalition in a long-running dispute over military service exemptions, as the army seeks personnel for troops ffor Gaza.
The departure of the United Torah Judaism (UTJ) party leaves Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s cabinet with the smallest of majorities, 61 of 120 members in parliament.
The conscription of ultra-Orthodox Jews is a hotly debated subject in Israeli society and Netanyahu’s cabinet.
As long as they commit themselves full-time to religious study, the ultra-Orthodox have been essentially excused from military duty under a deal that dates back to the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948.
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Ultra-Orthodox parties have campaigned for decades for the exemptions to continue, but their demand has become increasingly unpopular among other sections of Israeli society after more than 21 months of war with Hamas in Gaza.
Late on Monday, the UTJ party said it was leaving the coalition over the government’s failure to secure the exemptions. Its defection takes 48 hours to come into effect.
The announcement that three more Israeli soldiers had been killed in Gaza on Monday, taking the army’s overall losses there to 458, fuelled criticism of the UTJ’s position.
“Even as this news was already on the desks of the prime minister and coalition leaders, they continued with full force to promote the d