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The High Court of Justice on Friday ordered the state to provide information on core curriculum studies and oversight in the ultra-Orthodox school system in light of petitions challenging the recent transfer of funds to religious schools by the Finance Ministry without the required deliberations and vote legally required in the Knesset Finance Committee.
In its ruling, the court instructed the Education Ministry to submit information detailing what core subjects, such as math, science and English, ultra-Orthodox institutions are required to teach to receive funding, how those conditions differ from those required of state schools, and how they determine how much of the curriculum is being taught.
The state must also provide details regarding the training of teachers who teach core subjects in Haredi institutions, and student participation in external exams. These include the Meitzav exam, administered to fifth- and eighth-graders in Israeli schools, which tests language, math and science skills, and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)’s Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) study, which tests the abilities of 15-year-olds in 81 countries, including Israel, which has participated in the study since 2002.
Finally, the court demanded data on the existing Education Ministry oversight of ultra-Orthodox school systems, including inspections, self-reporting and how such findings are documented.
The state is required to submit all documents already in its possession by January 18, 2026.
The ruling came after the court heard the state’s arguments on Thursday regarding two separate but related petitions. The first, filed in March by the religious freedom and equality group Hiddush and MK Naama Lazimi, called for ultra-Orthodox schools to be subject to oversight ensuring they teach the full core curriculum as a condition for receiving public funding.
The second petition, submitted by opposition party Yesh Atid, challenged last month’s transfer of NIS 1 billion ($315 million) to ultra-Orthodox schools, arguing it was illegal because many of those schools do not meet their legal obligation to teach the required core curriculum hours.
“For many years, the state has paid enormous sums to educational institutions that are supposed to provide their students with proper education, including the full core curriculum, but do not do so, while presenting a false picture to the court and to the Education Ministry, which cooperated with them. This situation will not continue,” Dr. Yifat Solel, legal adviser to Hiddush, said in a statement Sunday.
Last month, the Knesset Finance Committee approved the transfer of NIS 786 million ($247 million) to school networks affiliated with the ultra-Orthodox Shas and United Torah Judaism parties, and NIS 136 million ($43 million) to so-called “recognized but unofficial” schools, which commit to teaching 75 percent of the state-set core curriculum but in practice often do not. An additional NIS 151 million ($47 million) was also allocated to so-called talmud Torahs, which do not teach the core curriculum.
In response to the petition against the transfer by Yesh Atid lawmakers, the High Court issued an interim order freezing the transfer of funds on December 31, infuriating the ultra-Orthodox political parties.
Knesset Legal Adviser Sagit Afik, meanwhile, demanded that the Finance Ministry disclose full details of funds transferred without approval by the Knesset Finance Committee, after the High Court hearing revealed that some 90 percent of the money in question had already been transferred before the committee voted on and approved the measure in late December.
In a letter sent Thursday to Finance Ministry Legal Adviser David Kopel, Afik wrote that during the hearing, she learned that it was an “accepted practice” within the Finance Ministry to transfer funds before approval was granted by the Finance Committee, and “sometimes even before a budget request was submitted.”
She said that the “disgraceful” practice was never disclosed to the Knesset, nor in any documents submitted or in discussions held by the Finance Committee, and that transferring funds before approval by the committee, let alone before the transfer request, is illegal.
Afik requested that the Finance Ministry provide all information on budget requests that the Knesset Finance Committee approved after the funds had already been transferred over the past five years.
The legal adviser has previously criticized Knesset Finance Committee Chair Hanoch Milwidsky for holding votes on budget transfers without a discussion and in the absence of opposition figures, as well as his mistreatment of the committee’s legal adviser, Shlomit Erlich.
Jeremy Sharon contributed to this report.
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