Abandonment of permanent personnel:
no fewer than 613 permanent personnel at the rank of major left the IDF on their own initiative during 2022, an increase of about 70% since 2020 - Israel Hayom learned this.
Also, in the past year, no less than 12 officers at the rank of lieutenant colonel decided to leave the army, even though they are on a safe permanent track.
And if that's not enough - now we announce that, contrary to what has been claimed so far, the problem is not only among the technological workforce.
Of the 613 majors who left the IDF in 2022 - 145 were fighters.
For a long time, the IDF chose to sweep the manpower crisis under the rug. But already about a year ago, we revealed in "Israel Today" that there was a 30% increase in the number of permanent personnel who retired from the IDF on their own initiative.
"Why would people stay?" asked major-rank officers with whom we spoke recently. "The feeling is that no one cares about you.
If you walk around with the uniform on the weekend or in the evening, you are looked at as if you stole something.
The salaries are shameful.
The future is uncertain.
They just cut more of the pensions.
When there are so many opportunities and offers outside, who stays?".
Quite a few permanent staff with whom we spoke in recent months explained that quality people do not want to stay in a system where the "salary is disgraceful" and the workload is "simply unreasonable".
"There are regulars who simply live in poverty," said an officer with the rank of major. "For one of my opponents, a 40-year-old father of two, we took care of a grant, because he didn't close the month and they started cutting him off from electricity and gas.
This is a man who was in the army all his life, and is unable to make a decent living."
Indeed, a brief look at the payslips of young officers - who are required to work around the clock - should worry every citizen in Israel.
According to IDF data, approximately 64% of permanent personnel receive salaries of less than NIS 12,000 gross. Young permanent personnel, who work 24/7 and are also required to work on weekends, earn approximately 6,000 or 7,000 NIS per month, and are sometimes even required to supplement income due to the fact that they receive less than the minimum wage.
Quality people don't want to stay in the system, cadets at the end of an officer course (for illustration), photo: Dodo Greenspan
In some of the formations, especially in the human resources and administrative formations and the technical formations, the officers report that "anyone who has a pulse is promoted."
Army officers warn that the army has become a "mediocre place with islands of excellence", but that these islands of excellence are getting smaller.
And when this is the reality, quite a few online groups publish ads that the army is looking for officers in the ranks of captain and major in various positions. "It's just embarrassing," another officer told Israel Hayom.
An uproarious atmosphere
Beyond the issue of the non-rewarding salary, because the reasons why permanent personnel leave the army are also the inability to live a reasonable family life while serving in the military, and the fact that since the change of the permanent model - the permanent service is not permanent at all, and the army can decide not to extend their service at age 28 and require them to To leave even at the age of 35, unless they are promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel (except in exceptional cases).
Another explanation for the departure of the officers lies in the fact that the IDF switched from a budgetary pension model to an accumulated pension model, under which the permanent personnel are set aside each month the pension funds. As a result, the officers do enjoy fewer benefits upon their release, but at any age the officer can retire from the army and take with him the pension he has accumulated up to for that moment
In the IDF, the departure of the permanent personnel is attributed both to the public atmosphere which is angry towards them and towards their pension conditions, and also to the fact that there has not been a major war in recent years.
The trend has awakened the top of the IDF to realize that there is a problem, but the heads of the army rarely talk about it openly - both out of a reluctance to enter into a confrontation with the Treasury, and also out of a goal to avoid a public conversation that would cause a more widespread departure.
Unlike the police, who declare a severe manpower crisis, the army also tried to delay and postpone this article, apparently out of a desire to avoid a confrontation with the Treasury on the issue, and out of what is defined as "unpleasantness" to talk about salaries.
The temporary solutions found by the IDF to keep people in its ranks do not provide the goods (for illustration), photo: Ami Shoman
Meanwhile, the temporary solutions found by the IDF to keep people in its ranks fail to deliver the goods. Last year grants of tens of millions of shekels were distributed to thousands of officers, with the aim of signing them for another permanent period.
Also, the educational activities in the units were increased to strengthen the identification of the servants with the system and their sense of meaning.
But these solutions fail to stop the drift, and in the best case - it is only "Paracetamol".
In exchange for grants, officers were required to sign for limited periods only.
What's more, unit commanders report that in many cases, precisely the outstanding officers, ranked in the first and second places, preferred not to sign for another period of service, because they want to check options outside and not be bound to military service.
The IDF stated in response: "The source of the IDF's strength lies in the quality of its people and the avenue of command.
The changes in the labor market and the demand for high-quality personnel also affect the IDF, which invests efforts so that the good and high-quality remain in its ranks. In the past year, the personnel department formulated a strategic plan to improve the conditions of the servants, regularly and permanently."
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