Two Yeshiva Bochurim Arrested in Eilat, Handed to Army

Two bnei Torah were arrested Tuesday in Eilat and transferred to military police custody: a bochur from Chevron Yeshiva and a newly married avreich from a Yerushalmi kollel.

Yakir Ralbag, a talmid at Chevron Yeshiva (Knesses Yisrael), was detained in Eilat and immediately handed over to the military police. A second arrest involved an avreich from a Yerushalmi kollel, classified as absent from service for over 450 days and married only three months, who was caught during a family vacation in the resort city.

The arrests came on a day of heightened tension, following the publication of a formal legal opinion ordering a drastic tightening of enforcement policy against those absent from military service for 350 days or more. The document, released Tuesday, revealed that 64 draft evaders had managed to leave the country without being caught and were arrested only upon their return to Israel.

In a follow-up meeting convened by Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara, the military police and the prosecution were instructed to improve enforcement. Military officials announced that proactive enforcement would resume in October, coordinated between the military police and civilian police stations.

The Eilat arrests occurred hours after a turbulent night in Modi'in, where serious clashes and public disorder erupted following an attempt to arrest a bochur from Yeshivas Ohr HaChaim, twenty days before his wedding. Hundreds of protesters arrived at the scene after the "Tzeva Shachor" alert system was activated, and the military police were forced to leave without making an arrest.

Media figure Yinon Magal sharply criticized the decision, declaring: "The directive from Attorney General Miara and Gil Limon to intensify arrests of chareidim a minute before elections is a blatantly political decision, intended to agitate and incite the chareidi public and to bring the draft issue to the top of the agenda in order to harm the religious bloc."

Meanwhile, chareidi affairs correspondent Yoeli Brim reported that if the detainees are not released immediately, the Peleg Yerushalmi is preparing to launch mass protests and block major traffic arteries.

A senior figure in one of the chareidi parties told Kikar Hashabbat: "The situation we find ourselves in now, and throughout this period, in which there is no draft law and there are efforts by the legal authorities to push the IDF and the police to renew arrests that will clearly lead to riots and protests, proves to us first and foremost that the Peleg Yerushalmi was right all along in all its claims on the draft issue."

The senior figure made clear that "we will not be able to give a hand to any formation of a government without it passing first and foremost the draft law that will bring a solution, before everything else."

According to the document published Tuesday, between September 1 and 22, the Population Authority and the military police concentrated efforts to locate deserters and evaders at Ben Gurion Airport, the Allenby Crossing, and the Begin Crossing. During the operation, 212 deserters and evaders were arrested, of whom approximately 163 were assessed to be from the chareidi public.