An umbrella group of Israeli Arab Muslim mayoralties wants to set parameters for integrating its draft age population into national service projects, in lieu of military conscription.

The Council of Arab Mayors recommendations, adopted earlier this month in Nazareth, come in response to a Knesset (parliament) committee's initiative to replace a decade-old law, struck down by the Supreme Court in February, which allowed ultra-orthodox Jewish students to indefinitely defer army service.

The Tal Law, named after its originator, jurist Tzvi Tal, is due to expire on Aug. 1, and backers hope to get a version of the new legislation passed by the July Knesset recess.

However, ultra-orthodox lawmakers are frustrated by one of the proposal's versions that would enforce army conscription of yeshiva seminary students, but exclude Israeli Arabs.

"We adamantly oppose national or civilian service in its current format, as a program created in the Defense Ministry that represents an alternative to military service, and reject any attempt to legislate mandatory universal service, because civil rights cannot be linked to what are defined as the duties of Israel's Arab citizens," Nazareth Mayor and council chairman Ramez Jerayssi told the Ha'aretz daily on Sunday.

"That violates the foundations of democracy," he added, "which is why we are proposing an alternative that will be acceptable to everyone."

In April, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised that the new law would include national service for the Arab population, but would do so, "without setting one sector of the public against the other."

He added that, "the change will include expanding the framework and an enlarged budget. This is a high priority goal for the security of the state," in a statement sent to Xinhua.

While the political Higher Arab Monitoring Committee sharply opposes such service for the country's 1.5 million Arab citizens - some 20 percent of Israel's 7.8 million residents - and says some 80 percent of them oppose taking part in such programs, national service officials say there's been a sharp rise in volunteerism by Arabs in recent years.