How long will it be before the government decides to act. I hate to labour the point and to be honest, two blogs on the same subject in less than a month could get a little tedious. However this is too important to ignore and I'm really pissed off.
So another bunch of young soldiers decide to make a political statement in uniform. The fact that the statement is right wing is besides the point. A left wing statement would have been just as bad (see my previous blog). It seems pretty clear to me that such activities are not isolated incidents by individuals, rather they are instigated by a well organised network both within and outwith the IDF with its own agenda and a willful disregard for the true security of this country.
Ehud Barak has been swift to condemn the demonstration by the soldiers and so has Bibi. The soldiers themselves have been punished with between one month and two weeks in jail. While our Defense Minister makes light of these incidents suggesting they are isolated incidents a disturbing pattern is emerging within the IDF.
This week , the Chief Rabbi of the IDF Brigadier General Rontzki stated that "soldiers who show mercy to the enemy during wartime, will be damned". he was referring to a passage in the book of Jeremiah which says, "Cursed be he that doeth the work of the Lord with a slack hand, and cursed be he that keepeth back his sword from blood." Apparently he also referred to the qualities of the ideal combat soldier. "In Israel's wars, warriors are God-fearing people, righteous people, people who don't have sins on their hands," he said. "One needs to fight with an understanding of what one is fighting for."
Now I don't know about you, but I reckon these statements would be more at home within the Iranian Republican Guard, rather than the IDF. The IDF is not God's army, it belongs to the country, the whole country. Soldiers act in the government's name not in God's. Whether religious or secular right wing or left, these soldiers are there to perform the tasks allocated to them by the democratically elected government of the day, not by some religious nut advocating behaviour which belongs in biblical times and should stay there.
It is the IDF's determination to minimise civilian casualties on the battlefield which sets it apart. When British Colonel Richard Kemp testifies to the UN that "The IDF did more to safeguard the rights of civilians in a combat zone than any other army in the history of warfare.", it is something of which we can be proud. Ehud Barak is keen to point out that Israel is the "most moral" army in the world. It is a pretty hard statement to defend when the army's Chief Rabbi is running around advocating biblical cruelty on the battlefield.
At the very least the Rabbi, a senior officer in the IDF should be seriously reprimanded for such statements. Allowing such behaviour only encourages and emboldens other soldiers such as those who demonstrated and their Rabbis who support and advocate such behaviour. They represent a clear and present danger to Israel's security, not to mention to the moral fibre of the country. The IDF and the government must take a zero tolerance approach to such behaviour. Soldiers who behave in such a manner should be thrown out of their units and the Rabbis behind their behaviour prosecuted to the full extent of the law.
Failure to act swiftly and decisively will have dire consequences for the IDF and for the country as a whole.
No comments:
Post a Comment