The limits of protest: Democracy
We must not forget the two basic fundamentals necessary for the existence of the state of Israel: A strong army and a strong democracy
Citizens have every right to protest against their governments. They have every right to call for the resignation of their prime minister, ministers and military leaders. They have every right to question the cabinet's policies, strategies and tactics.
It is their full right – up to a limit. And the limit is democracy.
Israeli democracy - is a civil democracy. That's how it was defined upon the founding of the state, when Ben Gurion's generation cleansed the IDF of its political influences and subjugated it to the cabinet and the Knesset. According to Israeli democratic norms and values, the fact that a civilian wears a uniform and a rank doesn't entitle him to extra political rights.
The phenomena of soldiers returning from battle and protesting in squares and cities in an attempt to settle accounts with politicians for their alleged vacillation, weakness, missing of the war's objectives, and prevention of the IDF's victory, can easily turn into serious threat to democracy.
In a democracy it is permissible and even mandatory for the elected government to have a broad concept of national interests, even when it opposes the will of a battalion of reserve soldiers to fight.
It is permissible and even mandatory for a cabinet to have budgetary priorities – including the defense budget – even at the cost of further endangering soldiers' lives. Israel's resources are limited, and its broad allocations of funds necessitate the preference of one objective over another. This is a cruel weighing out of probabilities and threats.
On whose back?
Every tank can be armored until it is impenetrable, but at what cost and on whose back? On the backs of the hospitals? On the back of investments in roads and in the prevention of road accidents? On the back of ongoing operations in the territories? On the back of developing weaponry against the Iranian threat? These are the choices and these are the decisions the cabinet has to make every day.
The cabinet won the Knesset's confidence and was elected for this purpose. One need not agree with its policies and can ask for its resignation – however we would do well to remember that when a cabinet makes a choice, it is not betraying its mandate, but rather fulfilling it.
During the days of the second war in Lebanon, logistic and operational failures were revealed, they shouldn’t have happened and there is no excuse for them (lack of water for example), nor those that tend to occur in complex large scale operations (unsuitability of part of the munitions (for example).
Not every reserve soldier who returns from Lebanon is a great military leader who can from his limited viewpoint cast judgment on how operations should have been carried out.
Not betrayal, it’s state policy
Yes, occasionally the IDF will enlist us, and then the government will decide, from a broad national perspective, that we have to wait and even return home without taking an active part in the war. This is not betrayal, it’s state policy.
Did the war achieve all its objectives? Of course not. The war broke out suddenly and its targets were formulated hastily, often arrogantly while in the midst of war. However, this does not imply that the soldiers killed fell in vain or that the government is to blame.
The argument that Olmert's government didn't let the IDF triumph is implicative of an accusation of national treason, of sticking a knife into the army's fighting back.
Therefore such an accusation must be weighed carefully, particularly when it is being sounded by wounded soldiers and bereaved parents, whose statements are legitimate, personal and moral.
Intolerable arrogance
The arguments pertaining to the rift between senior military officers and the soldiers fighting on the ground are not automatically justified. Often such a rift is a necessity, stemming from the hierarchy within the IDF and from different points of view between a senior officer vis-à-vis a junior soldier. Often, it is simply intolerable arrogance.
All the complaints sounded by the front and the home front must be investigated, preferably by a state appointed commission of inquiry (albeit the fact that Israel has a strong state comptrollers' office).
Additionally, we, and the reserve soldiers and their families, should not forget the two basic fundamentals necessary for the existence of the state of Israel: A strong army and a strong democracy.
