NATO Backs Plans to Establish New Military Commands to Protect Europe

Workers adjust a NATO emblem at the foyer of Prague's Congress Centre November 17, 2002. REUTERS/Petr Josek
Workers adjust a NATO emblem at the foyer of Prague's Congress Centre November 17, 2002. REUTERS/Petr Josek
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NATO Backs Plans to Establish New Military Commands to Protect Europe

Workers adjust a NATO emblem at the foyer of Prague's Congress Centre November 17, 2002. REUTERS/Petr Josek
Workers adjust a NATO emblem at the foyer of Prague's Congress Centre November 17, 2002. REUTERS/Petr Josek

NATO allies announced on Wednesday backing plans for two new military headquarters to help protect Europe in the event of a conflict with Russia, laying the ground for the US-led alliance’s biggest expansion in decades.

Hoping to add to its deterrent factor against Russia, NATO defense ministers agreed to create an Atlantic command and a logistics command to help respond more quickly to threats in Europe, officials said.

“This is vital for our transatlantic alliance,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told a news conference. “It is about how to move forces across the Atlantic and how to move forces across Europe.”

Costs will not be discussed until 2018 but the two new regional bases have broad support and show NATO’s focus on its traditional task of defending its territory after out-of-area campaigns in the Balkans, Libya and Afghanistan in recent years.

Germany is eager to host the logistics command, diplomats said, given its strategic location straddling central Europe, allowing for swift movement of equipment and personnel across borders in the event of a conflict.

Maritime nations such as Portugal, Spain, France and the United States could host the Atlantic command, diplomats said, stressing that no decision had yet been taken.

In a staggered response to Russia’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea peninsula, NATO has already put troops on rotation in the Baltic states and Poland, strengthened its presence in the Black Sea and sought to modernize its forces.

The Kremlin, which denies harboring any aggressive intentions toward Europe, has condemned the moves as an attempt to encircle Russia.

NATO says Russia’s war games in September, which massed tens of thousands of troops on the alliance’s eastern flank, are another reason for it to be better prepared to deter Moscow.



Israeli Ultra-Orthodox Party Leaves Government over Conscription Bill

 Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, surrounded by ministers from the government attends a session of the Knesset, Israel's parliament, in Jerusalem, Monday, July 14, 2025. (AP)
Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, surrounded by ministers from the government attends a session of the Knesset, Israel's parliament, in Jerusalem, Monday, July 14, 2025. (AP)
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Israeli Ultra-Orthodox Party Leaves Government over Conscription Bill

 Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, surrounded by ministers from the government attends a session of the Knesset, Israel's parliament, in Jerusalem, Monday, July 14, 2025. (AP)
Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, surrounded by ministers from the government attends a session of the Knesset, Israel's parliament, in Jerusalem, Monday, July 14, 2025. (AP)

One of Israel's ultra-Orthodox parties, United Torah Judaism, said it was quitting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's ruling coalition due to a long-running dispute over failure to draft a bill to exempt yeshiva students from military service.

Six of the remaining seven members of UTJ, which is comprised of the Degel Hatorah and Agudat Yisrael factions, wrote letters of resignation. Yitzhak Goldknopf, chairman of UTJ, had resigned a month ago.

That would leave Netanyahu with a razor thin majority of 61 seats in the 120 seat Knesset, or parliament.

It was not clear whether Shas, another ultra-Orthodox party, would follow suit.

Degel Hatorah said in a statement that after conferring with its head rabbis, "and following repeated violations by the government to its commitments to ensure the status of holy yeshiva students who diligently engage in their studies ... (its MKs) have announced their resignation from the coalition and the government."

Ultra-Orthodox parties have argued that a bill to exempt yeshiva students was a key promise in their agreement to join the coalition in late 2022.

A spokesperson for Goldknopf confirmed that in all, seven UTJ Knesset members are leaving the government.

Ultra-Orthodox lawmakers have long threatened to leave the coalition over the conscription bill.

Some religious parties in Netanyahu's coalition are seeking exemptions for ultra-Orthodox Jewish seminary students from military service that is mandatory in Israel, while other lawmakers want to scrap any such exemptions altogether.

The ultra-Orthodox have long been exempt from military service, which applies to most other young Israelis, but last year the Supreme Court ordered the defense ministry to end that practice and start conscripting seminary students.

Netanyahu had been pushing hard to resolve a deadlock in his coalition over a new military conscription bill, which has led to the present crisis.

The exemption, in place for decades and which over the years has spared an increasingly large number of people, has become a heated topic in Israel with the military still embroiled in a war in Gaza.