OCTOBER 16, 2026 13:27

When Israelis go to the polls on October 27, the choice extends beyond selecting leaders to determining if the country will emerge as a secular Hebrew democracy or a strict rabbinical theocracy, chess grandmaster and activist Garry Kasparov stated in a New York Times op-ed released on Thursday.

Just as Abraham Lincoln noted that the nation could not endure half slave and half free, Israel cannot continue half theocratic and half secular, Kasparov, who had a Jewish father, stated.

Americans settled that conflict through four years of fierce civil war. Israel's vote on October 27 provides a peaceful path away from this impasse, he added.

Democracies rely on compromise, Kasparov noted, yet at times such deals grow perilous.

Soviet upbringing influenced Kasparov's perspective on Israeli democracy

His early years in the Soviet Union molded his outlook on both American and Israeli systems. I observe this pattern in two democracies I closely connect with, the United States and Israel, he explained.

As a young Soviet citizen with a Jewish father, I became a firm backer of Israel as a liberal outpost amid illiberal states supported by Moscow, Kasparov wrote.

Though I dismissed the anti-American and anti-Zionist stance of the Communist regime I knew, I also pursued a nuanced view of the United States and Israel.

Israel confronts a breaking point and threat of lasting division

I saw early that the United States hit a breaking point just 84 years after its founding. The nation's creators included both slaveholders and opponents. They could launch the union yet not confront the peculiar institution. This ensured the birth of the United States but left it with a flaw that nearly tore it apart for good.

Kasparov sees Israel facing a similar flaw and threat of lasting division. The core issue is not slavery but the haredi ultra-Orthodox exemption from IDF service. He stressed in the New York Times that no moral parallel exists between the haredim and slave owners.

He points to the 1948 temporary deal by then-prime minister David Ben-Gurion with haredi leaders, which exempted 400 yeshiva students from service to focus on Torah study. Today more than 50,000 avoid the draft for the same reason.

The agreement now burdens later generations and is kept alive by a nationalist far right and a prime minister ready to stretch rules to retain power, Kasparov said.

Haredi draft exemption weakens Israel's social fabric

In Israel today, ultra-Orthodox political sway erodes the social agreement that unites the nation.

Israelis from Ben-Gurion's era may not have grasped the foundation they built, Kasparov argued. They may have viewed the exemptions as minor relief for a few hundred men. Many American founders likewise expected slavery to fade gradually.

Instead slavery grew sharply after 1776, just as religious sway in Israel surged in the years after 1948. The draft exemption grew especially galling to secular Israeli Jews after October 7 and the Gaza conflict.

The haredi draft stands as one example of corrosive religious influence, Kasparov said. Their control over laws on marriages, divorces, funerals, transport, and public services on Shabbat proves toxic and unjust to millions who do not observe the day.

The ultra-Orthodox parties in the Knesset focus so narrowly that they back anyone, regardless of misconduct claims, who protects their privileges, Kasparov wrote. This has made the haredim key allies to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's far-right coalition.

Netanyahu's ties to haredi parties in the Knesset

Without the ultra-Orthodox, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would lack support for many of his authoritarian moves, he argued, and without Netanyahu the ultra-Orthodox would lose their protected standing.

Despite warning that Israel must pick between secular democracy and rigid theocracy, Kasparov said he opposes suppressing religion and culture. When I grew up in the Soviet Union, Communist enforcers imposed atheism and stifled Jewish traditions. That is not the outcome I seek for Israel.

I simply support equality under law and an Israel that fulfills its founders' vision as a light unto the nations, rather than a global outcast limited by far-right and religious interests, Kasparov wrote.

Israel's election on October 27 offers a bloodless path out of this impasse.