History in the Making: Torah Study is Enshrined in State of Israel’s Basic Law

New York (VINNEWS/Rabbi Yair Hoffman)

The Israeli Knesset made history on Monday evening, July 13, 2026, passing a new Basic Law that officially enshrines Torah study as a fundamental value of the State of Israel. The bill, authored and championed by the haredi parties, passed its final second and third readings by a vote of 63 in favor and 52 against. For the first time since Israel began legislating its Basic Laws, a Basic Law now anchors the status of Torah study.

Because Israel has no written constitution, it relies instead on a series of Basic Laws that carry an especially high legal standing. This new law places Torah study into that elevated category, declaring that “Torah study is a fundamental value in the heritage of the Jewish people and in the State of Israel.”

Who Authored the Bill

The legislation was formally introduced by MK Moshe Gafni, chairman of Degel HaTorah, together with MK Yaakov Asher. An earlier version of the proposal had been advanced by Shas chairman Arye Deri, who made clear it was a condition for his party’s support of any other coalition legislation. United Torah Judaism chairman MK Yitzhak Goldknopf and Shas leadership stood firmly behind it as well.

Gafni framed the law in sweeping historical terms. He argued that the message emerging from the Knesset is that there is honor for those who study Torah. After passage, he declared that “the day the thing arose and came to be,” calling it a historic step in which the Jewish state reconnects with the eternal values on which the Jewish people was built. Deri, for his part, called the moment a historic chapter, saying that for the first time the Jewish state recognizes the supreme value of the holy Torah and the standing of those who study it, and calling it “a victory for the world of Torah.”

The Surprises in the Voting

The most striking element of the vote was the rebellion inside Netanyahu’s own camp. Likud MKs Yuli Edelstein and Dan Illouz voted against the law. Both had recently announced their departure from Likud, and their opposition was expected by the time of the final vote. In the earlier readings the coalition dissent had been even broader. At first reading, the “no” votes from within the coalition included Dan Illouz and Yuli Edelstein of Likud, Sharon Haskel of the National Right, and Moshe Solomon of the Religious Zionist Party.

The dissent of Moshe Solomon carried particular weight because he spoke not as a secularist but as a religious Zionist rabbi and army officer.

He noted that he received rabbinic ordination in 2001 and completed an officers’ course in 1996, and that over the previous three years he had taken part in hundreds of funerals and shiva visits for fallen soldiers. He observed that many of the fallen had study texts among their personal belongings, said that this too is Torah, and argued that the bill as presented did not come to glorify the Torah. His stance was costly: earlier in the process, after the haredi parties demanded that Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich remove Solomon over his opposition, Smotrich announced his dismissal from his post.

The other headline was Netanyahu’s absence.

The prime minister did not appear at the plenum for the final vote. This repeated a pattern, as he had also stayed away from the first-reading vote on the bill establishing a political commission of inquiry into the October 7 massacre. The absence was pointed, because earlier in the process the haredi parties had specifically demanded that Netanyahu show up. At the first reading they insisted he vote in favor so the law would pass with a majority of at least 61 votes, giving it stronger legal footing against future petitions to the High Court, and he came specially to the plenum from the opening ceremony of the Maccabiah. This time he did not come, drawing the “coward” charge from rival Gadi Eisenkot.

The Deal Behind the Law

Hebrew-language coverage makes clear this Basic Law did not stand alone. It was the first piece of a broader package, in which the haredi parties gave up passing a daycare-subsidy law in the current Knesset, but in exchange secured passage of the Torah Study Basic Law in three readings, along with a law preventing the arrest of draft evaders and a kashrus law.

In return, the haredi parties agreed to support the bill splitting the role of the attorney-general, and they had already voted in favor of establishing a political commission of inquiry into the October 7 massacre.

There was also real friction within the haredi world itself. Both Degel HaTorah under Gafni and Shas under Deri decided to “swallow the bitter pill” and agree to remove the clause equating Torah scholars with soldiers, while Agudas Yisrael objected, with faction chairman Minister Yitzhak Goldknopf stating that he had not agreed and would oppose the removal. Shas MK Yinon Azoulay openly acknowledged from the committee podium that removing the clause was not to their liking but that they accepted the request.

It should be noted that the only two entities that are still around now in both name and body who were the original signers of Israel’s declaration are the Council of Jewish Women and, perhaps shocking to many – Agudath Yisroel.

What Could Be Positive About the Law

Supporters see profound value here. For the haredi community, the law affirms something they hold as central to Jewish identity: that Torah study is not a private pursuit but a foundational value of the Jewish people and the Jewish state. Deri argued that the Torah is the basis of the Jewish people’s identity, that it preserved the nation through thousands of years of exile, that it kindled the yearning to return to the Land of Israel and establish an independent Jewish state, and that it gives meaning to Jewish existence today.

Backers also frame the law as a corrective to what they see as harassment of Torah scholars. Gafni argued that today a person walking down the street who studies Torah can be placed under arrest, and that there is a degradation of the value Israel accords to Torah study. Goldknopf described the law as correcting an absurdity that should never have existed, saying the Jewish state was forced to legislate a Basic Law simply to state that Torah study is the foundational value on which the survival of the Jewish people rests. MK Yaakov Asher invoked Rav Saadia Gaon’s teaching that the Jewish nation is a nation only by virtue of its Torah, describing the yeshivos and study halls as the pure oil that has preserved the chain of generations.

Other Pro-Torah Results That Could Follow

Beyond the immediate victory, one can imagine a range of downstream benefits for the Torah world if the law endures. These are projections, not established facts, but they follow naturally from a Basic Law of this kind.

First, and most concretely, the law is widely understood as constitutional scaffolding for a future exemption law. The approved wording may assist the haredim in advancing a future conscription-exemption law before the High Court. Deri and Gafni were satisfied even with the softened text precisely because it may help in future litigation over any exemption law. If that holds, yeshivos and kollelim could gain a measure of long-term stability against future legal challenges.

Second, a Basic Law elevating Torah study could serve as a shield for continued state funding of Torah institutions, giving budget allocations for yeshivos, kollelim, and Torah education a firmer legal anchor than ordinary legislation or annual coalition bargaining provides.

Third, one can envision the law being cited in a wider array of contexts over time: in disputes over the character of public institutions, in questions of religious accommodation in the army and workplace for those who do serve, and in the framing of Israel’s self-understanding as a Jewish state. A value written into a Basic Law tends to radiate outward into how courts and ministries interpret other laws.

Fourth, on a symbolic and communal level, formal state recognition could strengthen the morale and confidence of the Torah community, affirming that a way of life sustained for thousands of years now holds honored constitutional standing. Asher expressed this spirit by quoting the verse, “Not by might, nor by power, but by My spirit, says the Lord of Hosts.”

What Could Be Negative About the Law

The criticism is severe and comes even from within the religious and coalition worlds. The central concern is the military draft. Attorney-General Gali Baharav-Miara warned that it is legally untenable for the government with one hand to increase the burden on those who serve while with the other hand enabling, and some would say even encouraging, mass draft evasion.

Opposition leaders were blunt and vowed revenge at the ballot box. Former prime minister Naftali Bennett condemned the law, branding it a “Basic Law of contempt for Torah.”  Some wryly commented that, “If that is the case, then he ought to be one who supports it.”

Bennett further warned that the next government would repeal it, leaving the mark of shame on the MKs who supported it. Bennett argued the IDF desperately needs twenty thousand soldiers and that the coalition again declared political interests more important than security. Eisenkot, the former deputy chief of staff, argued that Torah study is an important value but cannot serve as political cover for abandoning the mission of defending the state. One protest group representing military families charged that while reservists are laying tefillin on tanks in Lebanon, Gaza, and Syria and studying Gemara under fire, the government was passing another law of contempt aimed at those who serve.

There is also the raw fact of internal contradiction the law exposes. Even Illouz, who opposed the bill, cast his vote in a way that underscored the tension. He declared he was “against the law, against the desecration of G-d’s name, in favor of the Torah,” speaking while holding a volume of Mishnayos he studies during votes in memory of his mother who passed away this year.

Possible Repercussions Going Forward

The law’s real-world effect will depend on what comes next, and a collision with the courts looks likely. In April, the High Court of Justice ordered the state to move toward stripping financial benefits from draft evaders and pursuing criminal enforcement. This new Basic Law may be deployed against that ruling, setting up a constitutional showdown between the Knesset and the judiciary. Notably, Deri tied the entire fight to the broader battle over the legal system, framing opposition to the haredi bills as an effort to preserve what he called the power of the “legal junta.”

A related bill freezing the arrest of haredi draft evaders is also advancing. IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Eyal Zamir attacked that arrests-freeze bill as an incentive not to enlist that would create a deep rupture. Back in March he had warned the army could soon collapse without a solution to its manpower crisis.

Politically, the law sharpens an already bitter divide heading into the October 27 elections. Opposition leaders have promised to repeal it if they win, which means this historic law could also prove temporary. For now, the haredi parties have secured a landmark victory, while the deeper national argument it represents, over Torah study, military service, and who carries the burden of Israel’s defense, only grows more intense.