In a statement on Monday, the four-term prime minister said he wanted to keep his current six-party coalition intact.

“I call on all the coalition partners, and chief among them Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman, to remain in the government and continue this partnership in order to ensure security, prosperity and stability for the State of Israel,” he said.

Netanyahu issued the statement minutes before Lieberman, head of the secular Yisrael Beitenu party that opposes the exemption from military service for religious students, was due to comment on a bill backed by ultra-Orthodox factions. It passed a preliminary vote in a parliamentary committee on Monday.

Later in the day Netanyahu was summoned by lawmakers to address parliament about the current crisis and reiterated that there was still time to settle any differences.

“Should there be an election, we will run and we will win. But we are not there yet. The hour is late, but not too late,” he said, above heckles from the opposition. “A supreme effort must be made, one last supreme effort in order to preserve the government in its current composition.”

The next election is not due until November 2019.

Friction

As expected, Lieberman again rejected the legislation but made clear his party, which has five of the coalition’s 66 seats in the 120-member parliament, would stay in the government for now.

“As long as it has not gone through second and third readings we will fight from within (the government). The moment it passes the second and third readings, we will draw our own conclusions,” Lieberman said of the bill.

Those votes in parliament could be months away, a time gap that could leave room for compromise.

For decades the exemption from military service on religious grounds has caused friction inIsrael, where most Jewish men and women are called up for military service when they turn 18.

The ultra-Orthodox say their study of the Torah is vital for the continued survival of the Jewish people and also fear that young men serving in the army would come into contact with women and with less pious elements in society.

Last September, Israel‘s Supreme Court gave parliament a year to pass a new conscription bill after ruling that parts of the existing exemption were unconstitutional.