Senior defense officials who arrived this week for a meeting on the 14th floor of the Defense Ministry tower at the Kirya in Tel Aviv looked down just before entering the office. They are well acquainted with the view from the tall tower - Kaplan Junction, which in recent months has become a symbol of protest against the legislation, and the Ayalon Highway that has been blocked many times.
The discussion was critical to the future of the country – what to do with the phenomenon of rejectionism, what is its true scope, and how to preserve the IDF's ability to counter threats in the face of growing protests. The atmosphere, one can only guess, was gloomy, because both the right and the left, both among the opponents of the coup and among the reform supporters, know very well that polarization is permeating the IDF and is liable to tear it apart too.
How many people have decided not to volunteer for the reserves, as of today? No one outside the circle of decision-makers knows. The leaders of the protest, especially the Brothers in Arms movement, claim that there are many thousands, and even announced this week that they have 20,<> signatures. But in the absence of accurate information, it is difficult to assess the reliability and quality of these numbers.
Thousands at the Red Line Event for Volunteering for the Reserves at the Tel Aviv Museum | Brothers in Arms
Quite a few are officially defined as reservists, even though they have not actually served for many years, and it is also claimed that some of those who declare a refusal actually appear for service. In response to the declaration of opponents of the reform, nearly 70,<> former soldiers signed a petition condemning all forms of insubordination.
There is no doubt about one thing: the gun of refusal is on the table, and the storm is tearing the IDF apart from within. This week, the phenomenon expanded, with a strong letter against the government's measures signed by 161 Air Force personnel (including 100 pilots) and a joint announcement by dozens of field unit soldiers to stop reporting for reserve duty. Every reservist who arrived in the past six months for training or operational activity participated in talks and debates on the subject; Every battalion commander or brigade commander who made a call to his fighters was required to address the burning issue.
"We have no privilege"
This rift was visible this week in the form of two opposing petitions circulated in Sayeret Matkal. "In honor of Col. Y., commander of Sayeret Matkal," reads the first letter, which bears the signatures of some 400 reservists. "If the current legislative processes are not shelved, we will not be able to continue volunteering for reserve duty in the unit." The second letter opens in exactly the same way, signed by about 150 fighters. "Our service in the IDF and in the unit does not depend on the political situation and the moves of one government or another," they wrote, suggesting that fighters who would not report to the army come instead.
This week I spoke with M., the first fighter from the Ethiopian community in the Sayeret Matkal. There are quite a few classified operational activities on his resume. He has passed the age of 40 and is still active in the reserves - the last time just two weeks ago. In recent days, together with many of his friends, he signed a letter against refusal.
"The idea of people in the unit not volunteering created some kind of internal crisis. I never believed in my life that there would ever be talk of refusal in the unit," he says. "I know these people, and I have no doubt that some of them are afraid, but refusal is not something that is talked about. Even if I support the reform or oppose it, whether I am on the right or on the left, there is no such situation in which the reserves are not reached. Call it a volunteer break, call it whatever you want, it's unlikely not to come."
M. says that he definitely feels that there is some attempt to take advantage of the unit's status. "We have no privilege compared to other fighters. So what if you are in the General Staff Patrol or a pilot? I have no doubt that people are really afraid and feel that something must be done, but in my eyes we have no right to refuse. In the end, I look at the role we play vis-à-vis our families, vis-à-vis the citizens of the State of Israel, and I can't understand how people's security can be used. In the end, security is above all.
"It is necessary to compare it to the protests of the community a few years ago. I told some of my friends, to paraphrase what they were doing, that if there was a protest by Ethiopians, I wouldn't refuse. That sounds unlikely to me. I don't make that context. People have things that hurt them, but from here to refusing to go to the reserves, the distance is huge. So there's racism, is that a reason to refuse?"
M. says that even within the unit there are discussions these days to try to bridge the gaps and convince people, eventually, to join the reserves. "I really hope that most of them won't refuse in the end, but unfortunately I believe that some of them won't come. It makes me very sad, with all the understanding of their fears and concerns."
"Coup colors"
Last week, Ronen Itzik, 52, decided to take action. He wrote a particularly harsh post on his Facebook account against the pilots who announced their refusal to serve in the reserves. "If there is a refuser or a supporter of refusal here, it's time to say goodbye. I have no tolerance for this." And this is not a trivial matter. Itzik, a colonel in the reserves, is a former commander of the Harel Brigade and deputy commander of the 7th Armored Brigade, and it can be assumed that his blunt remarks angered some of his comrades. In the days that followed, about 20 of his friends left or were removed from his personal account.
"You made a commitment – you will be; Don't want to - don't be. Remove the ranks and go fight as much as you want. You are not officers. You're a rebel. You are using ranks and units for political struggle," he addressed his fellow officers, "you are acting as a junta, and you are painting yourselves in coup colors for all intents and purposes... I, too, have reservations and want constitutional changes in dialogue, but I will never think of causing damage to the IDF."
Pioneers of ideological rejectionism. Eli Geva with Shimon Peres, Photo: Yehoshua Yosef
"All my adult life, I've commanded people. From the age of 19 I became a father, an officer," Itzik explains what was behind his frontal attack, "I have friends who are angry at me because I only talk about officers, but for me it's a sergeant, something on a completely different level than officers. When you take on the ranks and the commitment, you can't play with it. These guys are taking their military status, the responsibility that the state has given them, and putting it as an ultimatum to the Knesset, which expresses democracy.
Who are you working on? You do volunteer when you sign, but once you do, you're part of the combat assignment. When a squadron commander builds his assignment, he asks himself who will come and who will not? This is an absurd and incomprehensible situation, and it trickles down to the permanent officers as well. This is an elite group that puts before decision makers the fait accompli that they cannot legislate. Are you the one arguing for a coup? You are using your military power to prevent an elected official from making decisions."
Raising a Black Flag
The fighters and officers who decided to refuse to go to the reserves, of course, see the picture in the exact opposite. They are careful to define their service as voluntary rather than compulsory, explaining that the struggle is for the image of the state.
Lieutenant Colonel (res.) Oren Shvil (52), battalion commander in the 214th Brigade, a special fire brigade that operates veterans of classified units such as Moran and Meitar, is one of the leaders of the "Brothers in Arms" movement. Last March, the leader and one of the 160 senior signatories from these units was a letter declaring that they would suspend their volunteering for reserve duty, a letter that has now been put on the table again in light of the new legislation.
"We are looking forward with our eyes open. It is clear to us that the government is striving to establish a dictatorship here. We reject the initiative out of hand, and that's why we say – the people's army exists only in democracy."
Shavil, 52, has been serving in special units for 34 years. He grew up in Kiryat Arba, deep in Judea and Samaria, and does not define himself as a leftist. The state and the army, according to him, are important, which is why he is fighting now. "I continue my reserve service even though I'm no longer supposed to, because the state and the army are important to me. But I also do this act of stopping volunteering because I care. I hope it will save the country and the IDF. If we had let the previous move happen and sat on the sidelines, we would have already been after the destruction of the Third Temple. I'm doing it now out of love.
"It's equivalent to a father who has a child who needs to undergo life-saving surgery. Yes, the operation is painful, includes a long recovery, and there is definitely a risk to the patient, but if you do not go for surgery the child will lose his life. We go into surgery hoping to save the child, the IDF, the State of Israel from itself. I call on anyone who criticizes us and calls us all kinds of names - it's time to roll up our sleeves, go to the hospital and help the country save itself. We are raising a black flag to warn the country of the abyss it lies ahead."
In case of a true alarm
The crisis of rejectionism erupts at the height of a challenging security period, and those who are watching us from the sidelines in the meantime are the Arab countries. "The rebellion is escalating within the occupation army," the Al-Quds newspaper described it a few days ago. "In recent days, officers and members of various reserve divisions have decided that they do not obey orders and that they do not serve in the army. Doctors and officers in the occupation army, as well as members of cyber units and pilots, announced their refusal to serve.
"Reservist pilots volunteer for military service on a weekly basis, and their insurgency will affect their readiness to launch attacks, whether in Syria or Gaza, or their readiness for any imminent military operation or war, especially since Israel considers it one of the most powerful aerial weapons in the world."
The British Arabic-language website The Independent also dealt with the phenomenon, and the reporter noted that "the army believes that the pilots' non-compliance and participation in the training (according to unnamed sources) 'will affect their readiness to launch attacks in Syria or Gaza, or to prepare for a future war.'"
The article also quoted the National Security Research Institute, which warns of "an erosion of Israeli deterrence vis-à-vis Hezbollah," and interviewed experts on Israeli affairs who dealt with the military significance of rejectionism in the IDF. One of the interviewees, Arab-Israeli journalist Antoine Shalat, explained that in his opinion, if a war or military operation is launched, the fighters and pilots will stabilize.
Demonstrations against insubordination, photo: Coco
The question that arises between the lines is what is the red line of opponents of the legal reform, who have declared their intention to refuse. In an extreme emergency scenario, will they stabilize? And are there ethical doubts in case their failure to show up puts their comrades in danger?
Captain (res.) Dr. Ronit Bar-Haim (43) is a doctor at a large hospital in central Israel. She did her regular service in the Northern Command as a medic, and then began studying medicine. In 2008, she was retired due to a surplus of paramedics, so five years ago she fought to return to her profession in the reserves as a brigade physician and mentor to elite unit doctors who need to perform field surgery. Recently, she informed her commanders, like about 300 other doctors in the reserves, that she was suspending her reserve service due to her opposition to government legislation.
"It was a very difficult decision," she admits, "but with all the importance, the IDF is the people's army, which should be under democratic rule. If it's not, then what's the purpose? I do quite a few things voluntarily, donate a lot of my time and enjoy it, but there is a limit ethically and morally. Just as I will not volunteer in certain organizations because their agenda is wrong, so too in the IDF." As far as I'm concerned, in this matter, the IDF is not a cow
Sacred. It should remain of the people. If he serves a government that only cares about maintaining its power, he will no longer be the people's. If the legislation and the coup attempt are stopped, I will come back."
When I ask how she would feel if she was not in the field during action and a combatant was killed in the absence of a doctor, she says that just because she is not in reserve duty does not mean that she does not save lives. "Instead of serving in the army, I'll be in the hospital. I am a trauma surgeon and save lives every day. During Operation Guardian of the Walls, I was part of the team that treated the wounded who had been hit by a rocket in Holon, and every time a mass casualty incident is declared, we are the ones who treat it. I contribute in other ways and don't abandon the campaign. If there is a war, I will not flee abroad, but will be in the hospital. There are other ways to help, it's just not the right way now." A., Sayeret Matkal man,
A man who lives in Samaria says he doesn't know what he will do in case of war. He enlisted in the unit, but after he was wounded he moved to support positions in the operational envelope, a position he defines as "very unique, active throughout the year, for dozens of reserve days."
In the first months of the protests, he did not support refusal, but recently informed his commanders that he would not be in the reserves. "I didn't believe that reality would reach a point where I would have to hurt almost everything dearest to me. I make a very dear sacrifice to my heart to cry out this cry. I say this and it hurts. I fought last year to extend my reserve duty because they wanted the veterans to give way to the young, I begged to carry out one more operational activity, and now I'm leaving.
"אני חייב לומר עם יד על הלב שבסיטואציה של מלחמה אני לא יודע מה אעשה, אבל ככל שמדובר בשירות המילואים הסדיר והיומיומי אני משעה את התנדבותי. אני לא מבין את הטענה של אלו שאומרים לי שאני עובר את הגבול. אני לא קיבלתי החלטה כי יאיר לפיד אמר לי לעשות אותה, זו החלטה אישית שקיבלתי על בסיס ההבנה שהמדינה הולכת לתהום. לך לראש הממשלה ותשאל למה הוא לא עוצר את העסק הזה. למה במקום זאת מצפים מהאזרחים לשבת בצד, בזמן שהמדינה מתמוטטת סביבם?"
וכמובן - עניין של פוזיציה
The wave of refusal now seems more dramatic than ever, but this is not the first time that the State of Israel has dealt with the phenomenon. Just nine days after the establishment of the state, Joseph Prokopiec, a 36-year-old man, was sentenced to three days in prison for refusing to enlist for reasons of conscience. The Israeli press reported that the man, a father of two, is an avowed pacifist, one who, even if they attack his own children, will not try to protect them.
A., Sayeret Matkal: "I didn't make a decision to stop volunteering because Yair Lapid told me to do it, it's a personal decision based on the understanding that the country is going into the abyss. Go to the prime minister and ask why he's not stopping this business."
At the same time, the trial took place of Jeremiah and Naomi Stein, aged 22 and 21, a brother and sister who evaded conscription into the IDF on the grounds that they refused to accept the order of the national institutions because they did not share Zionist ideology. The verdict was harsh: "While to our shame the defendants make these claims, bitter battles continue in Israel and besieged Jerusalem. They, who grew up in Israel and enjoyed the freedom of community life, betray the soldiers who protect them. There is no evasion of conscience here, and it is inconceivable that a small group will decide not to involve itself in the war for existence." The two men, it was ruled, would be drafted within 48 hours, and after the war they would be sentenced to two months' imprisonment.
One of the most significant chapters in the history of rejectionism occurred during the First Lebanon War, when the phenomenon took on a broad social dimension, led among other things by the Yesh Border movement. 168 soldiers were tried and imprisoned for their insubordination, headed by Eli Geva, commander of an armored brigade who refused to break into Beirut because he thought it would cost the lives of civilians and fighters. Geva was required to retire from the IDF as a result of this decision, and the IDF refused to return him to reserve duty. "Geva has no place in the reserves," Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin said in 1986.
Opposition to refusal is sometimes also a question of position. Some opponents of the disengagement plan themselves called for refusal – and now claim that it is an action with a black flag flying over it, while some of the prominent voices against the legal reform have in the past expressed strong opposition to refusal when it came from the other direction.
In 2003, 27 pilots, most of them former pilots, signed a petition refusing to operate in Judea and Samaria at the height of the second intifada, and then-Air Force Commander Dan Halutz lashed out unequivocally: "Political refusal is the forefather of danger to this people. I don't see how it is possible to refuse orders that were not given in advance." Last week, Halutz was among the signatories of a letter stating that "we will unreservedly support any protest action, including the suspension of volunteering."
Prof. Udi Lebel of the Begin-Sadat Center and School of Communication at Bar-Ilan University has been working for many years in the field of political psychology and military-social relations, and has written extensively on the phenomenon of rejectionism. Years ago, he published a study titled "Military Blackmailing," a phrase he says still fits the phenomenon we see today.
"For many years, groups have employed a discourse of insubordination, not necessarily its use, in order to shape security policy," he says, explaining that it is the militaristic nature of the state, which sanctifies senior military officials, that gives them the power to use the leverage of pressure at the moment of truth. "To be a senior officer is to be a potential objector, so I don't know where anyone who was surprised by the refusal lives.
"A senior military man converts his position to a senior managerial position into a civilian one, signs petitions and uses his 'capital' to legalize and cancel reforms, legitimize or disqualify governments. That's part of his definition. This government may have cooked up this reform politically and media-wise, but not sociologically. It's a script for beginners."
The fact that the IDF and state institutions are intertwined, adds Prof. Lebel, is also what led to the fact that any refusal proved itself and triumphed over the government. "Every phenomenon of politically organized refusal, as opposed to individual activity, has succeeded. Governments on the left and right do not allow themselves to take the risk behind this discourse, to reach the moment when the event materializes, because you will know what operational activity it will paralyze. This is the IDF's biggest fear, that there will be no state army left. A situation has been created in Israel in which the only Israeli supplier functioning is the IDF, and this causes everyone to back down."
Prof. Lebel explains, for example, that during the Lebanon War, then-Defense Minister Moshe Arens opposed withdrawing to the security zone, because doing so would convey weakness. "He sat in a cabinet meeting, and IDF Chief of Staff Moshe Levy told him that soon there would be no fighters left to serve in Lebanon, so Arens ordered a withdrawal."
The refusal during the first intifada, he recalls, led to Prof. Asa being brought into the IDF as a minister in order to create the code of ethics. "Ariel Sharon did not dare to launch Operation Defensive Shield without preparing the people for war, because he learned the lessons of the Shalag War, and in the disengagement sent the policemen and officers to the first circle in order to neutralize the challenge."
In the face of the violation of morality
Over the past six months, supporters of the reform have repeatedly presented the struggle against the disengagement and the institutional attitude toward it as a mirror image of the current protests, especially around the institutional attitude of law enforcement officials. The threat of political rejection from the right also arises in this context.
Ahead of the disengagement plan, many rabbis called for refusing to serve in the IDF, and as the day of the evacuation approached, so did these calls. In February 2005, Noam Livnat, Chief of Staff of Defensive Shield, held a press conference and presented a petition signed by some 10,000 regular and reserve soldiers, who declared that they would refuse orders if called upon to evacuate Jews. "We will not give our hands to the disengagement plan. Jews don't expel Jews," they said. In the prospect, by the way, the soldiers were called not to organize collectively. "Organized refusal - no, personal refusal - yes," it said.
Ronit Bar-Haim: "The IDF is the people's army, which should be under democratic rule. If it's not, then what's the purpose? If the army serves a government that only cares about maintaining its power, it will no longer belong to the people."
In the end, some 13,63 signatures were collected as part of the petition, but at the moment of truth, the vast majority of soldiers did not refuse an order. Dan Halutz, then chief of staff, came forward after the disengagement and said that <> soldiers refused to participate in the disengagement and were prosecuted.
Among those soldiers was Amital Bareli, a young military rabbi in the northern brigade in Gaza, who today serves as the executive director of the Hotem organization. Six months before the disengagement, he says, he approached his commanders and told them that he could not take part in the event, but in the end, when they asked to move him to another position, then-Southern Command Chief Dan Harel refused to do so because he felt it would be a message that officers were being removed from service in the national mission.
In protest, Barali arrived at the Kissufim checkpoint, got out of the car and began calling out to the fighters: "Our job is to defend the State of Israel, not to expel Jews. Don't cooperate." He was arrested and sentenced to four and a half months in prison. He was later dismissed from the army and demoted to private.
"I knew in advance that I would pay a heavy price for my refusal, and that is what it really was," he tells us 18 years later, rejecting the parallels between his actions then and the current wave of refusal. "The disengagement was a completely different world, the expulsion of people who grew up in their homes for years, the removal of the dead from their graves, the surrender of parts of the country to the enemy, security lawlessness, the dismantling of communities, the burning of synagogues and the list goes on. Things that offend the most basic morality.
"I don't see refusal itself as a flag or a means of changing legislative policy. When there is a specific illegal order, you have to refuse, which I did, but the doomsday weapon is not used as a means of blackmail to change public policy. That's why we have elections."
Deviation from the Israeli scenario
Where is this going, I ask Prof. Lebel, with a "hold me" atmosphere on both sides outside. "This super-mass refusal was convinced that it would bring the goods long ago, and all sides were sure that this story would be stopped long ago," he analyzes. "The recalcitrant reservists will cry out for there to be an address in the government that will listen to them, that will say at the cabinet meeting that everything must be stopped and that they think that the IDF is above everything.
"In my opinion, the government would only benefit if there were such a figure in it, because it would send the message that the IDF's stateliness is above advancing policy, which would have moderated the event. From the moment when there is no such voice, not only does the refusal syndrome not calm down, but it receives fuel to overcome.
"This incident is unusual because this government, which according to every historical precedent should have been arrested, is not stopping. Its alienated response to the rejectionists' cries allowed the protesters to speak not only in the name of democracy, but in the name of Israeliness. The expectation was that the prime minister and defense minister would say that they were willing to moderate the gallop in order to keep the IDF above any argument, but when they did not do so, they lost supporters of state reform, who are far from sympathetic to the High Court of Justice but expect to preserve united Israeli state symbols, of which the IDF is the leader. This is the victory of the refuseniks in this protest. The insistence branded the government as alienated from the army and from Israeliness.
"There are things you don't play with. The IDF is not an institution, it has psychological and operational value. There is a deviation from the Israeli scenario here. This incident exposes what has been happening for years, and which the public from all state streams insists on not seeing – that there are many populations here that do not belong to a common core, that there is a cry for an Israeli identity that will connect them."
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