The Ottoman Empire abolished the "jizya" in 1856. It was replaced with a new tax, which non-Muslims paid in lieu of military service. It was called "baddal-askari" (lit. 'military substitution'), a tax exempting Jews and Christians from military service. The Jews of Kurdistan, according to the scholar Mordechai Zaken, preferred to pay the "baddal" tax in order to redeem themselves from military service. Only those incapable of paying the tax were drafted into the army. Zaken says that paying the tax was possible to an extent also during the war and some Jews paid 50 gold liras every year during World War I. According to Zaken, "in spite of the forceful conscription campaigns, some of the Jews were able to buy their exemption from conscription duty." Zaken states that the payment of the "baddal askari" during the war was a form of bribe that bought them at most a one-year deferment."