Bnei Brak Erupts in Turmoil After Extremists Hunt Down Female IDF Soldiers

By: Fern Sidman

The streets of Bnei Brak, a city long associated with religious devotion and communal insularity, erupted into scenes of chaos and fury this week in an episode that has sent tremors through Israel’s political, security, and religious establishments. What began as a visit by two young female Israel Defense Forces soldiers to a private home spiraled into a violent confrontation between extremist rioters and the police, exposing once again the volatile fault lines between segments of the ultra-Orthodox community and the state. Kol Olam, which closely tracked developments as they unfolded, reported on Sunday that the two servicewomen were chased through the streets by hundreds of men, rescued only after a dramatic police operation that underscored the gravity of the unrest.

Bnei Brak Israel is “Nogozone” https://t.co/5FYq8Gg11P

— The Jewish Voice (@TJVNEWS) February 15, 2026

According to the report at Kol Olam, the two soldiers, who serve in the IDF’s Education and Youth Corps, were visiting the home of a fellow soldier when false rumors began to circulate that they were members of the Military Police. In recent months, extremist elements within some Charedi circles have spread unfounded allegations that Military Police officers are “grabbing” young ultra-Orthodox men to force them into military service.

This rumor mill, fueled by long-standing tensions over conscription and the relationship between the Charedi community and the state, proved combustible. The two women, easily identifiable as soldiers by their uniforms, became the focal point of an eruption of rage that bore no relation to their actual roles or intentions.

Kol Olam reported that as word spread, crowds gathered with alarming speed. Footage that circulated widely on social media, and which Kol Olam analyzed in its coverage, shows the two young women running through narrow streets under police escort, pursued by a swelling mass of men. The images, stark in their symbolism, depicted soldiers of the state fleeing from fellow citizens, shielded only by the thin blue line of the police.

The atmosphere quickly devolved from verbal hostility into outright violence. Rioters overturned trash bins, set fire to a police motorcycle, and even toppled a police vehicle. One officer was reported wounded amid the melee, and the sense of lawlessness that enveloped the neighborhood recalled earlier flashpoints of unrest that have periodically flared in ultra-Orthodox enclaves during moments of acute tension with state authorities.

Kol Olam emphasized that the two soldiers themselves were not physically harmed, a fact that offers some measure of relief in an otherwise harrowing narrative. Yet the absence of physical injury does little to mitigate the psychological trauma of being hunted through the streets of a city that is, in theory, part of the same national collective they serve. Large police forces were dispatched to the area to restore order and to extract the women from danger.

In the aftermath, authorities arrested twelve suspects in connection with the riots, signaling a determination to impose accountability. Police Chief Commissioner Danny Levy traveled personally to the scene, a gesture that Kol Olam interpreted as a recognition of the severity of the incident and its potential implications for public order.

The reaction from Israel’s political leadership was swift and unequivocal. Kol Olam reported that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Israel Katz, National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, and IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir all condemned the attack in strong terms. Each emphasized that the violence was the work of an extreme minority, not reflective of the broader Charedi community.

According to a report at Israel National News, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir held a personal conversation on Sunday with the two female commanders who were attacked earlier in the day, seeking to reassure them and check on their condition.

In the call, Zamir conveyed unequivocal institutional support, telling the officers that the Israel Defense Forces stands firmly behind them and that no individual has the right to demean them or obstruct the vital duties they perform. He emphasized that their service represents the values and authority of the entire IDF and that they have the full backing of both its leadership and its ranks.

Zamir further committed to a thorough examination of the incident to ensure that such an episode is not repeated. He stressed that a situation in which IDF soldiers—whether women or men—cannot move freely within the State of Israel is unacceptable and must be rectified.

The chief of staff added that the military will not tolerate harm to its personnel and that he expects the full force of the law to be applied against those responsible for attacking the two commanders.

The statements of Israeli leaders sought to isolate the perpetrators morally and politically, while reaffirming the legitimacy of the IDF and the police as institutions charged with safeguarding the state and its citizens. The chorus of condemnation reflected a rare moment of cross-portfolio unity, underscoring the extent to which the episode was perceived as a direct challenge to the rule of law and the social contract.

Equally significant, as the Kol Olam report noted, were the denunciations from within the religious leadership. Former Sephardic Chief Rabbi Harav Yitzchak Yosef and Shas chairman Aryeh Deri both publicly condemned the rioters, urging community leaders to reject the violence as fundamentally at odds with derech haTorah.

Their intervention was not merely rhetorical; it signaled an awareness that the moral authority of rabbinic leadership is critical in curbing extremist impulses within religious communities. By framing the violence as a violation of Torah values, these leaders sought to reclaim the ethical narrative from those who cloak aggression in the language of religious grievance.

The Bnei Brak unrest cannot be understood in isolation. It sits within a broader context of escalating tensions over conscription, state authority, and the evolving relationship between the Charedi world and Israeli civic life. For decades, exemptions from military service for ultra-Orthodox men have been a source of controversy, periodically erupting into protests and confrontations whenever policy shifts threaten the status quo. In recent months, the intensification of public debate over equalizing the burden of service, coupled with misinformation campaigns alleging forcible conscription tactics, has heightened anxieties within certain quarters of the community. The false accusation leveled against the two female soldiers tapped into this reservoir of fear, transforming rumor into mob action.

Kol Olam’s detailed account of the riots highlights the peril of rumor-driven mobilization in densely populated urban environments. Bnei Brak’s narrow streets and tight-knit social networks can amplify both solidarity and hysteria. When grievances are refracted through the prism of perceived existential threat, the boundary between protest and persecution collapses. The spectacle of women in uniform being chased by hundreds of men is not merely an affront to the dignity of the individuals involved; it is a symbolic rupture in the fabric of Israeli society, in which military service has long functioned as a shared civic rite.

The incident also raises uncomfortable questions about the gendered dimensions of hostility toward the IDF in certain extremist milieus. The two soldiers belonged to the Education and Youth Corps, a branch dedicated to fostering values and civic engagement within the military. Their very presence in uniform in a Charedi neighborhood became, in the eyes of their pursuers, a provocation. The hostility they faced was not only institutional but also cultural, reflecting deeper tensions over the role of women in public space and in national service. That these women were targeted on the basis of a false rumor about their function compounds the injustice of the episode.

In the wake of the unrest, the challenge confronting Israeli society is not merely to prosecute those responsible, but to address the informational ecosystems that incubate such violence. The Kol Olam report pointed to the pernicious role of disinformation in inflaming fears about Military Police “grabbing” young men. In the absence of trusted channels of communication between state authorities and Charedi communities, rumors metastasize into perceived threats. Restoring trust will require sustained engagement, transparent policy discourse, and the amplification of credible voices within the community who reject violence unequivocally.

The images from Bnei Brak will linger in the national consciousness. They confront Israelis with a disquieting mirror: a society fractured not only along ideological lines, but along epistemic ones, where competing realities breed fear and fury. Kol Olam’s frequent references to the condemnation from both political and rabbinic leaders offer a glimmer of hope that a moral consensus can yet be forged against such lawlessness. Whether that consensus will translate into durable mechanisms of prevention remains an open question.

What is certain is that the day Bnei Brak turned on two of its own daughters in uniform will be remembered as a warning. A warning of how quickly misinformation can mobilize mobs, how fragile the bonds of shared citizenship can become under strain, and how essential it is for leaders—secular and religious alike—to speak with one voice against violence.