Israel's religious right reshapes state through Knesset coalitions, not force
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Ultra-Orthodox and religious-nationalist parties are expanding religious authority over Israeli public life through Knesset coalitions and state institutions. Sex-segregated spaces keep expanding and religious schools receive more public money while remaining free of obligations to teach science, maths or English, deepening an ethnonational order in which Palestinians have never held equality.
Key Facts
- The current Knesset contains five Haredi and religious-nationalist parties: Shas, United Torah Judaism, Religious Zionism, Otzma Yehudit and Noam.
- Haredi parties focus on religious education, military exemptions, budgets and religious institutions, while Religious Zionism and the Kahanist right fuse religion with nationalism, settlement, war and land control.
- In Israel, religious schools receive more public money while remaining free of any real obligation to teach science, maths or English.
- Israel was established as a Jewish state, and Palestinians have never enjoyed equality within the political system it created.
Religious Parties in Knesset
The current Knesset contains five Haredi and religious-nationalist parties: Shas, United Torah Judaism, Religious Zionism, Otzma Yehudit and Noam. They do not form a single bloc and disagree on key issues. Haredi parties mainly focus on the independence of religious education, military exemptions, budgets and religious institutions. Religious Zionism and the Kahanist right fuse religion with nationalism, settlement, war and control of the land. Despite these differences, their combined weight in coalition politics has moved a wider range of religious demands into the centre of state policy.
Religious Authority in Public Life
Sex-segregated spaces keep expanding across Israel, justified as respect for the religious public. Religious schools receive more public money while remaining free of any real obligation to teach science, maths or English. Religious demands carry greater weight in public life, while the limits of individual freedom are increasingly drawn around a religious-national vision of the state. Religion has long shaped marriage and divorce, conversion, the Sabbath and the recognition of Jewish identity. What is changing is the growing power of religious and religious-nationalist forces to define the state's Jewish character in more explicitly religious terms.
Palestinian Inequality
The religious turn does not occur in a secular state or an equal political order. Israel was established as a Jewish state, while Palestinians have never enjoyed equality within the political system it created. For Palestinians, the religious turn does not create the inequality they face. It brings religious entitlement into an existing ethnonational order.
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Israel's religious right reshapes state through Knesset coalitions, not force
