Shocking scenes as huge crowds of ultra-Orthodox Israelis protesting against military conscription throw bottles at female reporter before boy, 15, falls to his death during demonstration
A large rally today of ultra-Orthodox Jewish Israelis protesting the military draft turned violent when the crowd threw bottles at a female reporter and a young boy fell to his death.
The crowd of an estimated 200,000 people, mostly men, blocked roads around the Route 1 highway leading to Jerusalem today.
Photos show many people climbing onto the roofs of buildings, a gas station and cranes.
Video footage showed an excited crowd chasing a female reporter from Israeli news outlet V1, who was covering the event, and throwing glass bottles at her.
Hundreds of police officers cordoned off many roads in the city, while crowds of people set pieces of tarpaulins on fire.
Demonstrators crowded onto the tops of buildings, gas stations, bridges and balconies, some of their fellow protesters holding signs that read: ‘Better to go to prison than to the army.’
The helicopter took off among the citizens who gathered to participate in mass worship.
The Israeli ambulance service said that a 15-year-old boy fell to his death and the police launched an investigation into the incident.
Video footage showed the excited crowd throwing glass bottles at a female reporter from Israeli news outlet V1, who was covering the event, before pursuing her.
People react as Israeli mounted police disperse ultra-Orthodox Jewish men protesting against conscription for the Israeli army in Jerusalem on October 30, 2025
Israeli police officers disperse ultra-Orthodox Jewish men who were blocking a road during a protest against plans to require them to serve in the Israeli army in Jerusalem on October 30, 2025.
The debate over compulsory military service and those exempt from it has long caused tensions in Israel’s deeply divided society and put Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu under increasing political pressure over the past year.
Ultra-Orthodox seminary students have long been exempt from mandatory military service.
Under a rule established when Israel was founded in 1948, when the ultra-Orthodox was a small community, men who devote themselves full-time to the study of sacred Jewish texts are effectively excused from military service.
This exemption has come under increasing pressure since the beginning of the war in Gaza, at a time when the army is struggling to fill its ranks.
In June 2024, the Supreme Court ruled that the state must draft ultra-Orthodox men and declared that their exemptions had expired.
A parliamentary committee is now debating a bill that is expected to end exemptions and encourage young ultra-Orthodox men not in full-time education to enlist in the military.
Many Israelis are angered by what they see as an unfair burden carried by the mainstream serving population.
This frustration has intensified during conflicts that have spread from the Gaza Strip to Lebanon, Syria, Yemen and Iran, wars in the past two years in which the Israeli army has seen its highest death toll in decades.
An ultra-Orthodox Jew stands in front of police water cannon during a protest against plans to require ultra-Orthodox men to serve in the Israeli army on October 30, 2025 in Jerusalem.
Police use water cannon to disperse ultra-Orthodox Jewish men blocking a road during a protest against plans to require them to serve in the Israeli army in Jerusalem on October 30, 2025.
This has further fueled an already explosive debate over the new conscription bill, which is at the center of the crisis shaking Netanyahu’s coalition, which comes to power for a four-year term in late 2022.
Ultra-Orthodox Jewish leaders say it is sacrosanct to devote themselves full-time to scripture and fear young men will be alienated from religious life if they are drafted into the military.
‘Right now, those who refuse to join the army are being taken to a military prison,’ said Shmuel Orbach, one of the protesters.
‘It’s not that bad. But we are a Jewish country. ‘You can’t fight against Judaism in a Jewish country, it doesn’t work.’
However, last year the Supreme Court decided to remove the exemption. Parliament is struggling to draft a new conscription bill, which has so far failed to meet the demands of both the ultra-Orthodox and the nervous military.
The ultra-Orthodox Jewish parties Shas and United Torah Judaism (UTJ), two long-time staunch political allies, left Netanyahu’s coalition government in July over disagreement over draft new military legislation.
Their exit left Netanyahu facing an increasingly fragmented coalition; Far-right members of this coalition are unhappy with Israel’s US-brokered ceasefire agreement with Gaza’s dominant Palestinian militant group, Hamas.
The door was left open for ultra-Orthodox parties to rejoin the coalition if the dispute was resolved.
The debate over compulsory military service and those exempt from it has long caused tensions in Israel’s deeply divided society
Ultra-Orthodox Jews make up 14 percent of the Jewish population in Israel, or about 1.3 million people
But reaching a compromise acceptable to ultra-Orthodox political leaders could alienate many Israelis as the country enters an election year and risks being struck down by the Supreme Court.
Ultra-Orthodox Jews make up 14 percent of the Jewish population in Israel, or about 1.3 million people, and about 66,000 military-age men currently benefit from this exemption.
There has been a sharp increase in the number of ultra-Orthodox Jews enlisting in the military, but numbers still remain low at a few hundred in the past two years, according to an army report presented to parliament in September.
Polls over the past two years have consistently predicted that Netanyahu’s coalition would lose the next election.
