Hundreds of IDF reservists swear off service in protest of judicial reforms

The IDF reservist protest movement was back in full swing on Tuesday following the Knesset’s Monday night approval of a first reading of the government’s repeal of the judiciary’s reasonableness doctrine, with IDF intelligence Unit 8200 and the air force leading the way.

300 members of the IDF’s various cyber and technology arms signed a letter saying that they were no longer bluffing and that they would now refuse to show up for reserve duty when called.

This could be the furthest that these officials have gone to date since the last battle over the government’s judicial reform policy in March stopped at a point before the reservists’ self-declared line had been crossed.

Defense Minister Yoav Gallant late Tuesday night again went on the attack against protesting reservists calling for refusal to serve saying they were “giving a prize to our enemies.” He added that only an “unqualified showing up to accomplish any assigned mission,” could maintain the IDF and guarantee Israel’s security.

IDF Air Force Chief met with dozens of senior IDF air force reservists

Alongside the above developments, IDF Air Force Chief Maj. Gen. Tomer Bar late Monday night met with dozens of senior IDF air force reservists to try to quell or mitigate their call to avoid showing up for duty as a group.

Bar thanked them for participating in recent operations in the West Bank and Gaza, Syria and elsewhere and implored them not to publicly call for refusing duty.

Rather, he told them that he hoped they would bite their lips, feel free to protest the government out of uniform, but still all show up for duty because Israel’s enemies and its national security could never go on strike.

In addition, the air force chief requested that if anyone felt a need to reuse duty, that he do so quietly, individually and directly with his commander.  

Bar did not say that refusal would be ignored, and implied there could be penalties in terms of continued service, but did suggest that especially temporary refusals handled quietly might be handled with more patience.

Maariv reported late Tuesday that a Brig. Gen. air force reservist who had threatened to end his service in late June, was actually following through on his threat.

In late June, the IDF was dismissive of the officer as an outlier in the overall picture of threats not being actualized. 

The Jerusalem Post learned on Tuesday of new developments regarding two IDF reservists who were being court-martialed for having refused to show up for duty.

One of the reservists, upon being given a last chance to avoid expulsion, returned to serving and the charges against him were mostly dropped.

The other reservist’s case is still pending, but will likely eventually be expelled from the IDF. Still, the IDF may delay his expulsion until a quieter political moment and will likely not announce it in order to avoid any unnecessary heightened conflict with those who might support the reservist.

In terms of numbers, reports still have the number of actual reservists much lower than the public letters would imply.

Part of the discrepancy seems to be that the protest leaders consider someone as refusing to serve as soon as they sign a letter, whereas the IDF now disregards letters and even disregards individual messages from a specific reservist refusing to continue to serve, unless that message comes at a specific time when they have been called up.

For example, if a reservist’s next call up is not for two weeks or two months, then the IDF will ignore their message that they have quit the reserves, and offer them their call up two weeks or two months later with the hope that the reservist will take the second chance and recant the threat.

Along with the specific groups of reservists, some larger names have now called for reservists to quit their service.

Late Monday night, former Shin Bet chief Yuval Diskin said that it was everyone’s duty to refuse to serve the current government, alleging the government is dismantling democracy.

Hundreds of past defense officials from Commanders for Israel’s Security, including: Chairman and former IDF Maj. Gen. Matan Vilnai, former IDF Col. (res.) and deputy national security council chief Itamar Yaar, former IDF Maj, Gen, Eyal Ben Reuven and former IDF Maj. Gen. Uri Sagi, called on all reservists to cease volunteering.

“We support reservists to decide that, due to questions of values, they will not volunteer to serve a government which is pulverizing Israel as a Zionist democracy and which endangers the security of Israel,” they said in a statement.

Despite the rising waive, IDF chief-of-staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi and Gallant appear to continue to support the government this time, unlike in March, even if it goes through with a final second and third reading of the judiciary’s reasonableness doctrine.

Although opponents believe Prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu will use the repealed law to fire the Attorney-General, end his trial and take a variety of other extreme actions, others believe that Netanyahu will limit himself to actions such as returning Shas party leader Arye Deri to the cabinet – a sort of override of a prior High Court of Justice ruling. 

JPost