The Israeli Army Must Act Before Some of Its Soldiers Turn Into Lawless Gangs - Opinion - Haaretz.com
It is possible to consider the videos of soldiers shown at The Hague as anecdotal and accuse the right wing of distributing them. But the truth is that it marks a precedent: soldiers exploiting social media to challenge the senior command and even the political leadership, which the extreme right believes is too restrained.
The challenge is direct, by means of messages opposing a cease-fire, attacking High Court of Justice rulings, objecting to the supply of food to Gazans, criticizing the air force's restraint and deciding that there are no innocents in Gaza.
It is also indirect, with a range of comments that contravene the army's declared values: signs demanding the return to Gush Katif, religious ceremonies such as bringing in Torah scrolls and putting mezuzahs on Gazan houses, demonstrating enthusiasm over the destruction of homes (for example, a female soldier rejoicing in a destroyed children's room), ritual-religious damage to mosques, calls for revenge and reports of carrying it out, such as boasting by a reservist company commander, "Battalion 2908 has entered Beit Hanoun and done what Shimon and Levy did to Nablus."
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We're not just talking about soldiers venting. Field commanders are cooperating and sending messages of vengeance, such as the order of the day by Division 36 commander Brig.-Gen. David Bar Kalifa ("He took revenge upon his adversaries" (Deuteronomy) or a battalion commander at Training Base 1, the officers' training base, who called not to repeat the mistake of King Saul, who was merciful to Amalek.
This reached a peak when 90 reservist battalion commanders petitioned the IDF chief of staff not to stop in Gaza, Lebanon, and the West Bank until victory. Such a public challenge by reservist officers about what they consider to be a restrained approach by the political echelon is unprecedented.
Nor is this mere rhetoric; it is reflected by conduct in the field. It is enough to say that the shooting of the three escaped hostages would not have happened were it not for the open-fire orders disregarding the law, when in practice every Gazan man is considered a legitimate target. And we are not yet talking about the violent conduct in the West Bank, which in practice seeks to ignite an armed uprising in that sector.
These actions should be considered an escalation in processes of the past 20 years, which are centered on challenges by the national-religious camp and an uprising by blue-collar soldiers (following the Elor Azaria affair) against the IDF's supposed restraint. This is an attempt to reshape the army into a pincer movement, an uprising from below backed by the right-wing leadership, and expressed, for example, by the actions taken against the IDF chief of staff when he dared suspend soldiers who desecrated a mosque in Jenin.
More worrying is the collapse of the army hierarchy. The chief of staff hears the calls for revenge, see the breaches of discipline, the disparaging attitude towards the open-fire rules, but he does almost nothing. The right-wing terror has fallen on him.
The army does not even hear the warnings sounded about these acts and their potential for lawsuits against Israel. It is only called out to stop the spreading looting, but is sufficed by a call by the IDF chief education officer in a statement that is not a clear command, and presents the looting as harmful to the army and not a breach of the moral command, "Thou shalt not steal."
It is possible that the IDF is leveraging the passions of the soldiers and their commanders to instill battle spirit, but after the war an effort will have to be made to rehabilitate the ground forces before some of them become gangs.