The unanimous approval of 110 Knesset members to dissolve the Knesset in the preliminary reading

SadaNews - This afternoon, Wednesday, it was approved to dissolve the Knesset in the preliminary reading, with the support of 110 Knesset members who participated in the vote on the bill and without any opposition. This will be followed by voting in the first, second, and third readings before heading to early elections.

The Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Minister of Defense Israel Katz, far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, and Knesset member Aryeh Deri were absent from the session of the Knesset plenum and the voting.

The law stipulates that elections will not be held until 90 days have passed from the final approval of the Knesset dissolution bill.

This comes amid rising tensions within the ruling coalition led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and escalating the crisis over the exemption of Haredim from military service.

The newspaper "Haaretz" reported that a source in the "Degel HaTorah" party confirmed that the party will also support the opposition bills to dissolve the Knesset, indicating that the party "is aware of all Netanyahu's maneuvers" and is seeking to hold early elections "as soon as possible," suggesting that they could be on September 1st.

According to the same source, the "Shas" party is pushing to set the election date for September 15th, adding that the party does not understand the reasons for "Shas"'s insistence on this date, amid suspicions of coordination between party leader Aryeh Deri and Netanyahu. The source also noted that "Shas"'s position on supporting opposition bills to dissolve the Knesset remains undecided.

This position comes at a time when political pressures on the government are increasing, amid ongoing disagreements within the Haredi parties and the coalition on a number of internal files.

If the bills are approved in the preliminary reading, they will be transferred to one of the Knesset committees for discussion in preparation for presenting them in the first reading, opening the door to a legislative process that could lead to early elections.

In contrast, Netanyahu continues his attempts to prevent the dissolution of the Knesset, insisting on holding elections on their original date at the end of October, by continuing negotiations with the Haredi parties to convince them to postpone the step of overthrowing the government.

According to the procedures in the Knesset, based on the decisions of the legal advisor to the parliament, if the Knesset is dissolved after the approval of the dissolution law in the third reading, the passage of laws will later be limited to what is agreed upon between the political parties.

Nevertheless, the Knesset can still pass controversial legislative proposals before reaching that stage, including a project to separate the functions of the government legal advisor that may be presented in the first reading, along with the media reform proposal put forward for the second and third readings.

In this context, a source in the "Degel HaTorah" party indicated that the party is heading to support both proposals, within the framework of its political positions amid the tense parliamentary scene.

Before the vote in the Knesset plenum session, the Foreign Affairs and Security Committee is scheduled to hold a discussion on the exemption bill, which was reintroduced at Netanyahu's request in an attempt to meet the demands of the Haredi parties.

According to the data, the session is expected to last about an hour only, despite no updated version of the bill being published yet, despite the amendments made to it in the past period.

The last version of the project was published in November 2025, while the last official discussion on it was held at the end of January, and since then it has not been discussed again, which means it will need additional sessions to complete its preparation for the second and third readings.

After finishing this file, the committee is also scheduled to discuss for an hour a bill related to extending regular military service.