Protests over Netanyahu’s judicial reform have extended to the Israeli military

TEL AVIV, Israel – A plan from the premier Benjamin Netanyahu Slashing the powers of Israel’s Supreme Court has sparked weeks of protests, rocked the country’s tech sector and raised fears of political violence.

Now, protests are breaking out too inside the army of the nation

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Hundreds of soldiers in the military reserves have signed letters expressing their reluctance to participate in non-essential missions or have already withdrawn from training missions, according to authorities.

Affected units include the 8200 Division, a reporting and cyber intelligence division whose graduates have helped boost the country’s tech industry, as well as elite combat units.

The military leadership fears that rising rank-and-file anger over the government’s plans will affect the operational readiness of the Israeli military, according to senior military commanders.

Of greater concern are the unrest in the air force, where reserve pilots are increasingly unhinged by government plans, according to officials.

They also fear that he could be asked to participate in illegal operations and that the restrictions placed on the Israeli judiciary could strengthen foreign requests to be prosecuted in the International Criminal Court, the officers said.

Reserve service pilots often direct regular air strikes against Israel Syria and the Gaza Stripand would participate in any major Israeli attack on nuclear facilities in Iran.

The unrest within the military is the latest outburst of opposition to government plans to reform the judiciary following protests that brought hundreds of thousands of Israelis to the streets of cities including Tel Aviv.

Prominent American Jews also criticized the plans and, on Sunday, the former mayor of New York Michael Bloomberg wrote in a guest essay on The New York Times that Netanyahu was”courtship disaster”.

But for many Israelis, anger within the military is perhaps the most worrying and significant reaction to the government’s plans, which would increase its control over the choice of justices and limit the Supreme Court’s ability to strike down new laws.

Almost 50 foremen representing hundreds of reserve pilots met with the Israeli Air Force chief on Friday to express their doubts about the government’s judicial review efforts, according to five Israeli military officers who attended or were briefed on the meeting and who said insisted on anonymity because they were not allowed to speak publicly.

The Air Force is overwhelmingly made up of reservists who typically report for duty three or four times a month.

Thirty-seven pilots from a key F-15 fighter squadron later wrote to the air force chief saying they were leaving training for part of this week, stressing that they were still available for combat missions, according to three officials briefed on the letter. .

Many Israelis believe the government’s plan to reform the judicial system, which would make it easier for parliament to override the courthouse, will undermine the country’s democracy.

This view is shared by many military officials, some of whom have engaged in regular protests, although an analysis of polling data from the November general election suggested that the ruling coalition also received strong support from the rank and file of soldiers

For supporters of the government, the judicial changes it is pushing through Parliament are an essential means of giving the majority of elected lawmakers primacy over unelected judges.

But for critics, they would remove one of the few checks on government overreach, in a country that lacks a formal constitution, threatening the rights of Israeli minorities.

Both sides have accused each other of attempting a coup, and a recent poll suggested that more than a third of Israelis fear a coup. civil war due to the crisis.

Israelis have participated in mass demonstrations every week against the proposals since the beginning of the year, in one of the largest and longest-running waves of protests in Israel’s history.

These tensions are shaking the military, which was previously seen as a social leveler uniting otherwise fragmented parts of society and which remains essential to the security of a country mired in various low intensity conflicts, between them with Iran.

Friday’s meeting between the nearly 50 Reserve Pilot Corps officers and Air Force Commander Major General Tomer Bar was held at Air Force Headquarters and was tense and emotional, according to attendees.

According to several military officials, the reservists’ concerns included concerns about judicial oversight itself, as well as fears that the government, led in part by far-right political leaders, would order them to do something they deemed illegal.

Annihilate

Last week, a far-right defense minister, Bezalel Smotrich, who is also finance minister, called on the state to “annihilate” a Palestinian city at the center of recent violence in the occupied West Bank.

One of the meeting attendees asked how a pilot could know for sure that once given coordinates to bomb a particular target, he would not serve that target, according to three officials.

Since the reform would undermine judicial independence in Israel, it could strengthen the argument that Israel’s judicial system is unfit to try alleged crimes committed by Israelis, according to Roy Schondorf, assistant attorney general for international legal affairs recently retired.

In turn, that could increase pressure on prosecutors at the International Criminal Court in The Hague to indict Israeli officials, according to Schondorf, who has overseen efforts to protect Israeli officials from international persecution.

“If the perception in the world is that there is no effective judicial oversight in Israel and that legal oversight is not as professional and independent as it is today,” then international prosecutors “can stop believing that investigative procedures in Israel are adequate and impartial,” Schondorf said.

Although no formal threats were made at the meeting itself to avoid reserve duty, all but three of the 40 members of 69 Squadron, a key strike force that flies F-16 fighters, subsequently wrote to Bar to withdraw from training for part of this week, but are still available for combat missions.

In a joint letter to Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on Monday, the 10 surviving former air force chiefs expressed “great concern” about “the ongoing processes in the state of Israel and the air force”.

The letter added:

“We fear the consequences of these trials and the grave and palpable threat that could be perceived to the State of Israel.”

The government has largely dismissed the reservists’ concerns and warnings as a whim privileged elite fear of losing their dominant role in society.

The wavering reservists “are not patriotic,” Galit Distel Atbaryan, information minister, said in a social media post on Sunday evening.

“They are not the salt of the earth. They are not Zionists. They are not the best of our kind. They are not wonderful people. They are not the people of Israel.”

On Monday evening, Netanyahu, who served as an officer in a commando unit, gave a speech in which he warned that the reservists’ actions “threaten the very foundations of our existence.”

“There is room for protest; there is no room for refusal” of military service, Netanyahu said, standing next to the far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben Gvir, who was barred from military service in the 1990s due to concerns about his extremist views.

But some members of the government have been more conciliatory. “The situation demands that we talk, and fast,” Gallant said in a video.

Discussion

There is also a debate among the reservists themselves as to whether or not politics should be introduced into military service.

As news of reservist discontent spread over the weekend, an Air Force Reserve general, Ori Seiffert, wrote an open letter to his fellow reservists, asking them to continue serving as pilots despite their opposition to the overhaul. judicial. .

“Like many of us, I am too upset and scared from the direction” of the government, Seiffert wrote in the letter, obtained by the Times.

But, he added, “we have to keep the power of the air force and the power of the Israel Defense Forces.”

“To my reservist brothers I say: protest and serve, serve and protestSeiffert wrote.

Reservists who have already opted to limit their volunteer service said the decision was extremely difficult. A reserve colonel from Unit 8200—one of more than 500 computer division reservists who signed a letter criticizing the overhaul—said the decision had kept him up at night and that he would quickly return to duty if it erupted. war.

“If we get to a situation where there is an offensive attack on Israel,” said the officer, who declined to be named out of fear of security threats from Israel’s foreign enemies, “we would all be there to protect citizens. From Israel”. .

c.2023 The New York Times Society