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PDF FormatAlthough the General Staff singled out “Tenacity” for emphasis, there is little doubt that the key concept in the remainder of the list of values is “Loyalty,” which appears as follows:
The soldier will act with utter devotion to the defense of the State of Israel and all its citizens, in accordance with IDF orders, within the framework of the laws of the state and the principles of democracy. The loyalty of IDF soldiers lies in their devotion, in all their deeds, to their homeland the State of Israel, to all its citizens, and to its army, and in their continual readiness to fight, to devote all their strength, and even to sacrifice their lives in defense of the lives of its residents and their well-being, and in defense of the sovereign State of Israel, in accordance with the values of the IDF and its orders, and while upholding the laws of the state and its democratic principles.
If one examines these words carefully, it is evident that they do not mandate specific behaviors, but offer instead an ethical underpinning for every deed of commission or omission by IDF troops. Indeed, the value of loyalty is the very basis for the functioning of the entire military framework, and is a necessary precondition for its success. A soldier who fails in one of the other values—one who is not tenacious in the pursuit of certain military aims; or who does not display responsibility, integrity or professionalism; or who does not serve as a fitting personal example—can nevertheless function as a soldier most of the time. It is reasonable to assume that he would be considered a substandard soldier, and it is doubtful whether he could command troops, but he could still find himself a useful niche at the periphery of the system. But the soldier who is not loyal to the state cannot serve in the military. Here there simply can be no compromise.
The value of loyalty was meant to serve as a more universal alternative to the Zionist values such as “love of the land” or “love of the homeland.” The code’s authors apparently believed that the ideas encapsulated in the value of loyalty include the notions implied in love of the land of Israel, and even exceed them—and it is for this reason that soldiers questioning the absence of a patriotic or Zionist facet from the code are directed to the loyalty clause.
But upon closer examination, the deficiencies of the loyalty clause become clear. According to Spirit of the IDF, a soldier’s loyalty is not only to the state as it is currently constituted, but rather to a state with democratic principles. The democratic system is thus entrenched in the loyalty clause governing the soldier’s most fundamental obligations, and this is a positive step. But this, the core clause in the code, lacks even a nod to the Zionist or Jewish-national principles—as they appear, for example, in the Declaration of Independence and in basic constitutional legislation—which are no less the basis of the State of Israel than are its democratic principles.
The purging of the Jewish character of the state is rendered complete in the handbook distributed to the officers to help them teach Spirit of the IDF to their troops. Regarding the loyalty clause, it reads:
The intention regarding this value is that every action that we take within the military framework will be carried out with absolute loyalty to the democratic State of Israel. The army is an arm of the state, which is meant to provide it with security and defense. It is incumbent on the soldiers serving within it to be loyal to the state, to its laws, and to the fundamental values of the professional military. There is here an obligation to the democratic principles of the state and to the professional principles of the army. [emphasis added]
This is the official commentary given to the loyalty clause, and it is the most widely held interpretation among the troops. But it immediately conjures up an absurd hypothetical scenario: On the one hand, IDF soldiers are sworn to loyalty to the state even if an elected government decides to close the gates of Israel to future Jewish immigration and to erase every trace of the Jewish and Zionist character of the country. On the other hand, they would not be sworn to loyalty if the same government were to decide, for example, to reimpose military government in Arab portions of the Galilee as prevailed up until the mid-1960s—an act that could hardly meet the test of Israel’s democratic principles.
It is clear that the above examples represent extreme and hypothetical cases, which do not negate the validity of the loyalty clause. Nonetheless, the fact that IDF troops are not sworn to loyalty to the Zionist-Jewish aspect of the State of Israel is an error whose consequences in the field are potentially quite serious. There are more than a few missions imposed on the IDF which are of a Jewish-national character, and the only justification for their execution is loyalty to the Zionist idea upon which the state and the Israel Defense Forces were built. It is this Zionist idea alone which justifies asking IDF soldiers to devote their resources and even risk their lives in large-scale military operations on land, air and sea to gather Jews in distress into Israel, as happened again in recent years in the case of Ethiopian Jewry—operations which involved neither the defense of Israeli sovereignty nor that of Israeli citizens. It is also the justification for less dramatic IDF activities, such as the establishment of Nahal settlements in regions which are dangerous or not sufficiently attractive to civilians; for the thousands of soldiers working as teachers in immigrant absorption centers and development towns; for the assistance the military provides to farming communities in situations of natural disaster; and so on.
VI
The decision by the defense establishment to redefine the State of Israel and its armed forces based exclusively upon humanistic and democratic principles, without reference to Zionism or Judaism, is completely unprecedented. In every official document or declaration mentioning the character of the State of Israel, one has traditionally found the Jewish-Zionist character of the state and its democratic nature invoked side-by-side. Jewish nationalism and democratic humanism—these two pillars have supported Israel since its inception. To eliminate one is to create imbalance and distortion in the self-conception of Israeli society. This was understood by the members of the assembly that declared the independence of the State of Israel; it has also been clear to the country’s judiciary in interpreting the law of the land in years past.5 But it was not understood, apparently, by the committee that drafted Spirit of the IDF. Without question, the IDF code of ethics represents an important victory for Post-Zionist ideology, which sees Israel as a democratic country belonging equally and exclusively to its citizens, and not as a Jewish-democratic country with important responsibilities to the Jewish people in Israel and abroad.
It is doubtful whether every one of the code’s authors actively sought to transform Spirit of the IDF into the first official document of a Post-Zionist Israel, and it is not clear that each of them was aware of the harsh consequences that are likely to stem from their decisions. Nevertheless, one cannot ignore the severe deficiencies of Spirit of the IDF. If necessary adjustments are made quickly—before the code becomes widely known and its implications internalized—it is still possible that this effort will have resulted in creating an important tool for building a stronger and more moral armed forces.
Tzvi Hauser is an attorney, and an instructor in the Command Ethics Division of the IDF’s Leadership Development Institute.
