The idea that the Haredim could one day determine the future of Israel sounds dramatic. At first glance, it also sounds premature. They do not make up half the country. They are not close to holding a majority in the Knesset.
But that is not really how political power works in Israel.
In 2025, the Haredi population numbered roughly 1.45 million people, or 14.3 percent of Israel’s population. In 2009, it was about 750,000. More striking still, 57 percent of Haredim are under the age of 20. Their population is growing at around 4.2 percent a year, driven largely by very large families and a young age of marriage. The average Haredi fertility rate in 2021–2023 was around 6.5 children per woman, compared with 2.2 among other Jewish women in Israel.
That does not mean the Haredim will become a majority next decade. Current forecasts put them at around 16 percent of the population by 2030. The official Central Bureau of Statistics projection used by the Israel Democracy Institute places them at about 20 percent by 2040 and 24.4 percent by 2050. A newer IDI projection is slightly lower, at roughly 22 percent by 2050.
They do not need 51 percent of the population, however, to become one of the most decisive forces in Israeli politics.
Who are the Haredim?
“Haredi” is usually translated into English as “ultra-Orthodox,” although the community is far from uniform.
Broadly speaking, Israeli Haredi society contains three major streams: Hasidic, Lithuanian and Sephardi. The Hasidic world is organized around different dynasties and rebbes. Lithuanian Haredim are historically centered on the yeshiva tradition and rabbinic scholarship. Sephardi Haredim developed their own institutions and political identity, most visibly through the Shas movement.
These communities have their own schools, newspapers, charities, rabbinic authorities and political organizations. In neighborhoods such as Jerusalem’s Mea Shearim or large parts of Bnei Brak, daily life can look radically different from secular Tel Aviv only a short distance away.
For many Haredim, Torah study is not simply a private religious practice. It is the organizing principle of society.
That difference has become increasingly important as the community has grown.
Eighteen seats can matter more than eighteen seats
In the current 25th Knesset, Shas holds 11 seats and United Torah Judaism holds seven. Together, the two principal Haredi political blocs therefore control 18 of the Knesset’s 120 seats — exactly 15 percent of parliament.
In a political system dominated by coalition governments, 18 seats can be worth considerably more than 15 percent of the chamber.
Israeli governments generally need at least 61 members of the Knesset behind them. When the larger political blocs cannot reach that number alone, smaller parties suddenly become indispensable. Haredi parties have repeatedly used that position to protect institutions and policies important to their voters: funding for religious schools and yeshivas, welfare support for large families, religious authority over parts of public life, and historically, broad exemptions from military service.
This is why demographic power can become political power long before a community reaches anything close to a majority.
The Haredim do not have to “take over” the Knesset. They only have to become difficult to govern without.
Their relationship with Zionism is more complicated than it looks
Images of Haredi men burning Israeli flags or marching with Palestinian flags are among the most visually striking images associated with the community. They are also easy to misunderstand.
Not every Haredi is anti-Zionist.
A Pew survey found that only about one-third of Israeli Haredim described the term “Zionist” as accurately describing them, reflecting the long-standing theological distance between parts of ultra-Orthodox Judaism and political Zionism. Yet mainstream Haredi parties participate directly in the Israeli state, sit in the Knesset and negotiate with Israeli governments.
At the far end of the spectrum are groups such as Neturei Karta, which reject the legitimacy of a Jewish state established before the arrival of the Messiah. Their protests have included Palestinian flags, anti-Zionist slogans and the burning of Israeli flags.
They are highly visible precisely because they are extreme. They should not be treated as representative of the entire Haredi population.
The more interesting reality is that a community can remain deeply skeptical of secular Zionist ideology while simultaneously becoming increasingly powerful inside the political institutions of the State of Israel.
The issue tearing Israeli society apart
Nothing exposes the divide between Haredi and secular Israel more clearly than military service.
Military service is a defining institution for much of Jewish Israeli society. Generations of young Israelis have entered the army shortly after school, followed by years of reserve duty.
For decades, large numbers of Haredi men studying full-time in yeshivas were exempt.
That arrangement became progressively harder to sustain as the Haredi population grew. An exemption involving a small community in the early years of the state has become a national political issue involving tens of thousands of draft-age men.
In June 2024, Israel’s Supreme Court ruled unanimously that there was no legal basis for continuing the blanket exemption and that the state had to begin applying conscription law to Haredi men.
Implementation has been another matter.
During the July 2024–June 2025 conscription year, about 24,000 initial enlistment orders were issued to Haredi men. Only 2,738 reported to recruitment centers, and according to data presented by the state, just 798 had actually enlisted at that stage of the process.
The dispute has become even more explosive during years of war and extended reserve duty. Many non-Haredi Israelis ask why their families should carry an increasing military burden while a rapidly growing section of society remains largely outside the system.
Haredi leaders answer that yeshiva study is itself essential to the survival of the Jewish people and that military life threatens the religious structure of their communities.
Neither side sees the argument as merely administrative.
For both, it has become a question of what Israel is supposed to be.
A society where women often work more than men
Haredi family economics also challenge many assumptions outsiders have about a deeply conservative religious society.
Employment among Haredi women is high. In the latest IDI data, approximately 81 percent of Haredi women were employed, compared with about 54 percent of Haredi men.
The reason is closely connected to the religious model of the household. A significant number of Haredi men spend long periods in yeshiva or kollel studying religious texts, while women earn income and raise large families at the same time.
The result is an unusual social structure: culturally traditional, rigidly separated by gender in many areas of life, yet economically dependent to a remarkable degree on female employment.
The gap in employment is only part of the economic story. Haredi workers earn considerably less on average than other Jewish Israelis, and educational differences remain substantial. In the 2024–25 school year, around 420,000 children were enrolled in Haredi education, accounting for 21 percent of all Israeli students and 27 percent of the Hebrew-language school system.
In many boys’ schools, mathematics, English and science receive far less attention than in the state system. Haredi girls generally receive considerably more secular education than boys. This difference later appears in employment and higher education.
As the community grows, these choices no longer affect Haredim alone.
They affect Israel’s tax base, workforce, military manpower and economic productivity.
Israel’s high-tech economy meets a community wary of modernity
One of the most interesting contradictions is the relationship between Haredi society and technology.
Israel has built an international reputation around high technology, cybersecurity, advanced weapons systems and research-intensive industries. Yet sections of Haredi society have historically treated unrestricted internet access and smartphones as threats to religious life.
That does not mean Haredim simply “reject technology.”
The reality is changing quickly. According to IDI data, 69 percent of Haredim now report regular internet use, compared with 94 percent of other Israeli Jews. Filtered phones, restricted internet services and community-specific digital platforms have allowed technology to enter Haredi life without completely dismantling its social boundaries.
This matters because the Haredi society of 2050 is unlikely to be an enlarged copy of the Haredi society of today.
Fertility has already fallen from 7.5 children per woman in the early 2000s to around 6.5. Internet use has risen dramatically. Haredi women have entered the workforce in large numbers. A modern Haredi middle class is developing alongside communities that remain far more isolated.
Demography is changing Israel, but Israel is also changing the Haredim.
So, will the Haredim rule Israel?
Not in the simple sense suggested by the phrase.
There is no serious demographic projection showing Haredim becoming an outright majority of Israel in the near future. Even the official projection for 2050 places them at about one-quarter of the population.
But numerical majority is the wrong measurement.
If Haredi parties continue to vote cohesively, maintain strong turnout and preserve their ability to negotiate as disciplined political blocs, their influence can grow much faster than their percentage of the population.
They may increasingly determine which coalition can reach 61 seats. They may have greater leverage over education budgets, military service laws, welfare policy, public observance of religious rules and the relationship between religion and the state.
At the same time, the price of remaining socially and economically separate will rise.
A 2026 Israel Democracy Institute study estimated that if current patterns of education, employment and military participation remain largely unchanged while the Haredi share of the population grows, the resulting loss of potential GDP per capita could exceed 10 percent by 2050.
That is why the real question is not whether Israel will suddenly wake up one morning under Haredi rule.
The change is likely to be slower and more consequential than that.
Every election brings more Haredi voters. Every generation brings more Haredi students into the education system. Every coalition negotiation gives their parties another opportunity to translate demographic growth into political leverage.
Israel’s future may therefore depend on two transformations happening at the same time: how much the Haredim change Israel, and how much Israel changes the Haredim.