Yaalon: I expect resignations without committee
Courage is rightly esteemed the first of human qualities because it is the quality which guarantees all others.” —Winston Churchill ht CPO
And so it is with General Ya'alon.
Allan Roth of One Jerusalem.Org put together another extraordinary opportunity to speak with an important figure on the world stage. Mere Rhetoric, IsraPundit, Boker Tov Boulder, Jewish Current Issues, Tel Chai Nation, and
Publius Pundit joined me in asking the General the questions that tear to heart of geopolitcs and world affairs.
General Ya'alon is, IMAO, Israel's best shot for the right leadership. While we wait for Olmert to do the right thing (is he capable?) and resign, Ya'alon represents Israel's best hope for navigating that country through an foreboding future
Continuing on the last conversation we had here, Yaalon is the voice of reason and strength, a rare quality in today's geopolitical landscape of appeasement.
Yaalon's editorial THE RULES OF WAR is a must read - a primer to where Israel has gone wrong.
Here is the audio on the Q&A, Download Yaalon830.wav
the full audio (briefing included) will be up at One Jerusalem shortly.
When I asked Yaalon how long Israel would have to live with the current leadership, Yaalon told me that it is "up to the Israeli democracy now to deal with the challenge." He said "the last war in Lebanon was a failure in terms of mismanagement at the political level and the senior military level. The best way for those that are responsible is to resign and not go through a long process-- it might be a longer process using the democratic means to deal with this kind of failure and responsibility. But Israel should be strong, Actually one of the positive outcomes of this conflict is the perseverance and endurance of Israeli society."
Question: A unilateral retreat here from Judea and Samaria, that would be harmful, wouldn't it? It could lead to the Hamas setting up mortar attacks within Judea and Samaria, just like in Gaza too, right?
Yaalon: It is another example of our culture of ... The Israel public was manipulated and deceived by calling the disengagement from Gaza something, we have to take our destiny in our hands because we don't have a Palestinian partner, and to take the initiative and disengage from the Palestinians, and it seems like creating a new hope from the Israeli public, and I call it many times, that by using ... we create hawks which at the end appears to be illusion, and it's very clear like it was very clear to myself that the disengagement from Gaza would be perceived by the terrorists as a victory for them. I wasn't surprised by the Hamas victory in the elections, and I said from the very beginning that the outcome of the disengagement should be Hamasstan and Al-Qaidastan and Hezbollahstan, and today it is not just Hezbollahstan, it is Hezbollahstan with Iranian influence because of the Hamas government's decision to cooperate with the Iranian regime in the Gaza Strip. So to think now that this kind of ... regarding the West Bank is like to be blind, not to see the outcome of this kind of decision in the Gaza Strip.
[...]
Pamela: Sure. Okay, yes. It's Pamela from Atlas Shrugs. I wanted to ask how long the Israelis would have to live with the current leadership and how long General Ayalon thought he would have between now and the next onset of hostilities, because frankly this is a hudna, having delegated its sovereignty over to the UN, and I'm sure you saw Kofi Annan, everything that's come out of his mouth is a refutation of 1701, and also today I'm sure you saw that Siniora, the Lebanese Prime Minister said he refused to have direct contact with Israel, and Lebanon would be the country to ever sign a peace deal with the Jewish state. My question is, I know there's a lot of things here but, what can the Israeli people do? Do they have a choice? It's not one man, one state, one man, one vote. What can they do? Must they live with the current leadership, because there will be another onset of hostilities?
Yaalon: It is up to the Israeli democracy now to deal with the challenge, and as I said I see the last war in Lebanon as a failure in terms of mismanagement in the political level and the senior military level. The best way for those who are responsible is to resign and not to go to a long process, but it might be a longer process using the democratic means to deal with this kind of failure and responsibility, but Israel should be strong. Israel should be able to stand, and we are able to stand. Actually, one of the positive outcomes of this conflict is the civilians and the endurance of the Israeli society. Although the Israeli people in the North were attacked for about 33 days, in the end Israel is flourishing ..., economically. You can go now to the north. There is a lot of reconstruction, but the damage is not so significant like in Lebanon and we will be able to deal with it and to go now with our economical and civilian life, but at the end our ability to stand should consist of what I said in terms of what I said in term of understanding the situation, I call it clarity. In the last decade, I believe that we were confused, we were deluded by our leadership, by our media. We were deceived, we were manipulated, and we should understand, this is a challenge, we shouldn't be afraid of it, but in order to have the right solution we should agree about what is a problem and we need some clarity regarding understanding this challenge, and I believe that at the end-- we are actually-- At the end, we are a healthy, democratic society, and we will find a way to cope with it, to deal with it. I might be a longer process because of the political difficulties, but I believe in our strength and our ability to cope with it.
Question: Can I just follow up on one of the points that Pamela made? Do you feel that there's an inevitability that there is going to be a round two with Hezbollah, in terms of military action, or military ...?
Yaalon: I believe that the Iranian regime's interest is to initiate any kind of armed conflict as soon as possible. For them now if they have the capability to do it with the Palestinians, probably we would have been facing it already. The problem with the Palestinian-- the problem, it's to our benefit-- is that they are not able to do it in the West Bank, because we control the West Bank in terms of security, and they might decide to do it from the Gaza Strip, but as I said we have intensified our activities and we are doing it quite well. So in the Palestinian society, it's a problem of capability. Of course they can exploit the current situation to rearm themselves, to get more armaments, and this a fact that Yuval Diskin warned about yesterday, and we have to deal with it. Regarding Hezbollah, now it depends on the Iranian and Syrian ability to rearm Hezbollah. Hezbollah suffered from a lot of damage in term of casualties. We are not sure about the numbers, but it is between 500-600 Hezbollah terrorists, but the best of the best. We fought the special unit of Hezbollah and the best terrorists of Hezbollah in southern Lebanon. It's a huge amount for an organization which is based on 1,000 of the best of the best, and ..., and of course they lost almost all of their long-rang and medium-range rockets. The Zelzals, the Fajrs. What they have, they have some more thousands of Katyushas, and now they are trying to be rearmed by the Syrians and the Palestinians and the Iranians, and now the question is the effectiveness of any kind of this deployment of the Lebanese armed forces or the international force not to allow them to be rearmed. I would say that I am skeptical about the implementation of Resolution 1701 and we should be ready to deal with it, but so far Hassan Nasrallah said that he doesn't have interest to renew the hostilities because he doesn't have the capability, actually, to renew it. Otherwise he is going to lose all his Katyushas. So it will take time for them to be ready for a second round of hostilities. When they are ready, of course they will do it.
Question: Hi I'm in a noisy public place but I'll be brief. I also think that the search for moderates, it's probably a bit amiss, in that I think that the core of what ... is not a moderate thing. I think that the moderate ... understand that ... But what we aren't doing is explaining tot he general population and to the people what ... that they're facing, and even Israelis don't ... much about the land, and certainly in Europe, I'm sitting here outside the new Scotland Yard ..., it's a tiny minority of people who understand what we're facing. What can be done to educate our side, which we know they've ... to educate their side?
Allen: Can I just jump in and very quickly a make a point that is slightly different from your assessment. There have two recent polls actually in Great Britain that show that the British people have moved from not understanding to understanding that a majority now understands about the threat of the radical Muslims. I'm not sure that's true in other European countries, although I'm told that in
France there's polling information along the same lines, but still you have an important point. How do we educate, both in Europe and in the United States I think as well. Do you have any thoughts on that?
Pamela: Allen, can I just add one thing to that question of yours? Does General Yaalon see the West's reluctance to even name the enemy as a problem? I mean, did he see Van Susteren's show last night with Centanni and Wiig who were kidnapped? They never mentioned the forced conversion at gunpoint. They never mentioned Islamic Jihad, but this is indicative of a bigger picture. Does he see this as a problem, the fear of even naming the enemy?
Yaalon: Yes, this is the main challenge I believe, to create what I call an awakening in the West. The West is sleeping. In many terms it reminds of the situation before World War II. It's very clear, the threat is very clear. You just have to listen to them. You have just to read the textbooks, and Westerners prefer to ignore it because of many reasons, to postpone for tomorrow, for the next week, for the next year, for the next generation, not to confront it. So we need an awakening. Yes, it is part of what I call the need for educating our people, ... case in Israel, and I believe that in Israel we are in the process of awakening. You can find it in the Israeli ..., but it is needed in Europe as well as in the United States. Regarding to Arab and Muslim moderates, I do not agree with it. There are few of them, but there are. They don't have the political power. I can't say that at the end they are going to win. I am not sure about it, but I am sure that there are, and we should approach them, and we should encourage them, we should support them, and not to be afraid, not in Iran, not in Iraq, not in Syria, not in Lebanon, not in the Palestinian Authority, not even in Egypt. There are. I met many of them. They do not sanctify death, they appreciate Western values, and they should be empowered.
Question: Okay. General Yaalon, you have repeated throughout this Q-and-A and your presentation about the bedrock issue of political and military mismanagement. There a number of observers on the Israeli scene that say that it's even more fundamental, and the word in English is corruption. What is it that you as a long-term observer, both of the military scene, and also presumably the political scene, have to say about, one, its existence, and two, how you eliminate it?
Yaalon: Yeah, it's another conference call to deal with it. (laughter) But I would take it this way. I worry from this phenomenon more than from the Iranian threat, and we have to deal with it. We have to deal with it. That's what I found and I wrote about it. I believe that the decision to go to the disengagement plan was because of corruption, and understanding that by going to this kind of plan our prime minister would save himself from the investigations and unfortunately it still exists, and I would say this is the most important challenge to deal with, because I believe that the mismanagement of the leadership and the incompetence of the leadership is the outcome of the corruption
Click below for the comlete Q & A, it's fascinating.
OneJerusalem.Org summed up Yaalon's main points in his briefing;
The General made the following powerful points:
1. The war in Lebanon was mismanaged by the political and senior military leadership of Israel, and was perceived as a victory for Hezbollah, Iran, and Syria.
2. The committee set up by Olmert is moot, as it is clear to that the war was mishandled by Israel's top leadership. Those responsible should resign and avoid a long political process.
3. A two-state solution is irrelevant at this time. No territorial compromise will settle the Palestinian-Israeli conflict in this generation, and probably not in the foreseeable 50 to 100 years! In the meantime, Israel needs to maintain its security operations and keep control of the West Bank, as it currently does.
4. Disengagement was created by "a culture of spin." The Israeli public was manipulated and deceived into believing that since they had no "partner," they needed to act unilaterally. In the last decade, the Israeli public was confused, deceived and manipulated by the media and political leadership. The public needs to gain clarity to understand the challenges they are facing.
5. During the Lebanon war, Israel foiled NINE major attempted attacks from the West Bank. All were encouraged by Hezbollah.
6. Yesterday, the head of the Shabak (Israel's Internal Security Service) briefed members of Knesset and warned them that Palestinians are smuggling large amounts of weapons into Gaza, and that the current situation is bound to lead to another Lebanon. The only way to avoid this course is for Israel to intensify its Gaza operations, and take control of the Philadelphi corridor.
7. Regarding the IDF - "I commanded the IDF until 15 moths ago... it is the army that stopped Palestinian terrorists, was ready to deal with all charges regarding conventional forces like Syria and the Iranian threat. It didn't suffer from a logistical problem... more soldiers were called up for Disengagement than the Lebanon war. The war didn't even use 10% of the IDF. Again, mismanagement of political and senior military leadership... Politicians will try to blame the military but this was a case of mis-management, not capabilities."8. On Syria - "I didn't understand the declarations telling Assad not to be afraid. He should have been scared!" Again, mismanagement...
9. On Corruption within Israel's Leadership - "I worry about this phenomenon more than the Iranian threat, and we have to deal with it. Disengagement was because of corruption... the PM (Sharon) saved himself from investigations and unfortunately this still exists and is the most important challenge to deal with. Mismanagement...and incompetence of leadership is an outcome of corruption.
10. On personal plans - "My plan is to live in Israel, to be a part of the Shalem Center, to come out with clear ideas about what should be done... to save the State... in security, strategy, education... So far I am not going to join any political party. I am going to do what is needed for the State in the future, like I did in the past, and like I am doing today.
Click here to listen to the one-hour call.
Question and Answer:
Allen: ... and there has to be a long-term solution and pointing to the education system, the indoctrination of the young, that that has to be eradicated, that indoctrination, that the radical Islamic fundamentalist type of indoctrination, but in any event. I am going to stop talking for the moment, and is there anyone who would like to ask a question of General Yaalon.
Question: Okay, this is Avi Green from Tel-Chai Nation. I have two questions. First, did the Foreign Minister and Prime Minister make diplomatic decisions that were .. more decisive and clear cut victory against the Hezbollah.
Yaalon: Avi, I'm not sure if I understand your question. The Prime Minister and the Foreign Minister declared
Allen: Was there a ... plan, if I may just try to clarify, and Avi please correct me. Was there a military plan that didn't go in a sense all the way, because of political decisions. .
Question: Yeah, the Prime Minister, if anyone, undermined the military..
Yaalon: We are still engaged in this kind of-- might be, I hope, there will be a investigation, and now it is a political dispute regarding the last campaign in Lebanon. I don't need this investigation or any kind of commission to come out with the conclusion that it was a political and senior-level military leadership failure. It was mismanagement of military operation to have or to reach any kind of political conclusion, and the intelligence was blamed in the very beginning, which is ridiculous. I know what we knew about the Hezbollah, and it was published already. The only failure or surprise was of course the sea missiles, the C-802, and this is the only surprise. They knew the Zelzals, they knew about the Fajrs, they knew about the Katyushas, they knew about the Hezbollah modus operandi and deployment, and we knew about it in a very detailed way. So it was not an intelligence failure. Now of course the political leadership tries to blame the military, but I would say that at the tactical level the soldier, the officers, the company commanders, the tank commanders, the pilots, they were performing very well, but they were confused because of the high-level mismanagement, which is the accountability of the political and the very high senior military leadership. I don't have to investigate in order to conclude it and now we probably will witness this kind of .... Unfortunately we have become the ... state, state of ..., dominating our decision making and our agenda, and to myself it is very clear. This a failure, this is mismanagement of the political leadership and the very senior military leadership.
Allen: Avi do you have another question?
Question: Yes. A unilateral retreat here from Judea and Samaria, that would be harmful, wouldn't it? It could lead to the Hamas setting up mortar attacks within Judea and Samaria, just like in Gaza too, right?
Yaalon: It is another example of our culture of ... The Israel public was manipulated and deceived by calling the disengagement from Gaza something, we have to take our destiny in our hands because we don't have a Palestinian partner, and to take the initiative and disengage from the Palestinians, and it seems like creating a new hope from the Israeli public, and I call it many times, that by using ... we create hawks which at the end appears to be illusion, and it's very clear like it was very clear to myself that the disengagement from Gaza would be perceived by the terrorists as a victory for them. I wasn't surprised by the Hamas victory in the elections, and I said from the very beginning that the outcome of the disengagement should be Hamasstan and Al-Qaidastan and Hezbollahstan, and today it is not just Hezbollahstan, it is Hezbollahstan with Iranian influence because of the Hamas government's decision to cooperate with the Iranian regime in the Gaza Strip. So to think now that this kind of ... regarding the West Bank is like to be blind, not to see the outcome of this kind of decision in the Gaza Strip.
Question: I have a question, Ted Belman.
Question: Okay, I'll have to almost yell. I'm calling from Toronto.
Allen: Okay, go ahead.
Question: In any event, General, you made reference to the hope with respect to the moderates in the region, and there are some, as you said. I have some difficulty with this. To pin our hopes on the moderates ultimately becoming more powerful, the turn of events I think is another false idea. Now I hear that you don't want to give up the West Bank, and I'm fully in accord with that, but the question comes, and I hope you can answer, can Israel simply sit on the present status quo and fight the terrorists, albeit more aggressively, or is there a solution such as annexation and expelling of the Arabs that is something Israel should devote itself to.
Yaalon: I've said many times that the two-state solution paradigm is irrelevant in the current situation, and I don't see any kind of supplement or conclusion to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in terms of territorial compromise based on the two-state solution in my generation. I am not sure what will happen in 50 years' time or 100, but in the time being we should be responsible for our security regarding the West Bank, and that is what we're doing now actually. The Palestinians are running their civil affairs and we have the freedom of operation and movement in Nablus, in Jenin, like it happened last night, or two days ago in Jenin, ... of killing, he was wounded and he died in the last couple of hours, Hussam Jaradat, the head of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. We enjoy the freedom of operation, and this the only way to secure today Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Kfar Saba, and Afula. Actually, we tried to allow the Palestinians to be responsible for our security. It was the case until the ... operation, and we had the bad experience of relying on them. So we can go on with this kind of status quo in the West Bank for a long time because we don't have any choice. I don't see a reliable, effective Palestinian leadership in the horizon. I'm not talking about Hamas, of course, and I'm actually not talking about Fatah leadership. There are a couple of Palestinian moderates that I've had the opportunity to meet with that might be an option in the future. They lack the political power, and I'm not sure whether they will succeed in taking over at all, so for the meanwhile it might be a long meanwhile, we have to go on with this kind of status quo, and we are doing it quite successfully. Actually, in the last war in Lebanon, Hezbollah and the Iranian elements encouraged Palestinian terrorists to execute devastating attacks, and the Israeli security agency with Israel Defense Forces succeeded in foiling nine attacks, nine devastating attacks, from the West Bank, so we are doing it quite well. It is more difficult regarding the Gaza Strip, and I believe that we should intensify our military operations in the Gaza Strip, and we should take control on Philadelphi, like Yuval Diskin the head of the Israel Security Agency said, in the current situation, in the end we will face something like Lebanon and the Gaza Strip. We should avoid it, and the only way to avoid it is to intensify our military operations in the Gaza Strip, to reach this kind of freedom of operation, like we enjoy in the West Bank, and for reaching it we should control the Philadelphi route, not to allow the weaponry systems to flow from Sinai to Gaza Strip. Thank you.
Pamela: General Ayalon, hi, I'm sorry I was late, it's Pamela from Atlas Shrugs. I want to ask you--
Allen: .. can you speak up as well?
Pamela: Sure. Okay, yes. It's Pamela from Atlas Shrugs. I wanted to ask how long the Israelis would have to live with the current leadership and how long General Ayalon thought he would have between now and the next onset of hostilities, because frankly this is a hudna, having delegated its sovereignty over to the UN, and I'm sure you saw Kofi Annan, everything that's come out of his mouth is a refutation of 1701, and also today I'm sure you saw that Siniora, the Lebanese Prime Minister said he refused to have direct contact with Israel, and Lebanon would be the country to ever sign a peace deal with the Jewish state. My question is, I know there's a lot of things here but, what can the Israeli people do? Do they have a choice? It's not one man, one state, one man, one vote. What can they do? Must they live with the current leadership, because there will be another onset of hostilities?
Yaalon: It is up to the Israeli democracy now to deal with the challenge, and as I said I see the last war in Lebanon as a failure in terms of mismanagement in the political level and the senior military level. The best way for those who are responsible is to resign and not to go to a long process, but it might be a longer process using the democratic means to deal with this kind of failure and responsibility, but Israel should be strong. Israel should be able to stand, and we are able to stand. Actually, one of the positive outcomes of this conflict is the civilians and the endurance of the Israeli society. Although the Israeli people in the North were attacked for about 33 days, in the end Israel is flourishing ..., economically. You can go now to the north. There is a lot of reconstruction, but the damage is not so significant like in Lebanon and we will be able to deal with it and to go now with our economical and civilian life, but at the end our ability to stand should consist of what I said in terms of what I said in term of understanding the situation, I call it clarity. In the last decade, I believe that we were confused, we were deluded by our leadership, by our media. We were deceived, we were manipulated, and we should understand, this is a challenge, we shouldn't be afraid of it, but in order to have the right solution we should agree about what is a problem and we need some clarity regarding understanding this challenge, and I believe that at the end-- we are actually-- At the end, we are a healthy, democratic society, and we will find a way to cope with it, to deal with it. I might be a longer process because of the political difficulties, but I believe in our strength and our ability to cope with it.
Question: Can I just follow up on one of the points that Pamela made? Do you feel that there's an inevitability that there is going to be a round two with Hezbollah, in terms of military action, or military ...?
Yaalon: I believe that the Iranian regime's interest is to initiate any kind of armed conflict as soon as possible. For them now if they have the capability to do it with the Palestinians, probably we would have been facing it already. The problem with the Palestinian-- the problem, it's to our benefit-- is that they are not able to do it in the West Bank, because we control the West Bank in terms of security, and they might decide to do it from the Gaza Strip, but as I said we have intensified our activities and we are doing it quite well. So in the Palestinian society, it's a problem of capability. Of course they can exploit the current situation to rearm themselves, to get more armaments, and this a fact that Yuval Diskin warned about yesterday, and we have to deal with it. Regarding Hezbollah, now it depends on the Iranian and Syrian ability to rearm Hezbollah. Hezbollah suffered from a lot of damage in term of casualties. We are not sure about the numbers, but it is between 500-600 Hezbollah terrorists, but the best of the best. We fought the special unit of Hezbollah and the best terrorists of Hezbollah in southern Lebanon. It's a huge amount for an organization which is based on 1,000 of the best of the best, and ..., and of course they lost almost all of their long-rang and medium-range rockets. The Zelzals, the Fajrs. What they have, they have some more thousands of Katyushas, and now they are trying to be rearmed by the Syrians and the Palestinians and the Iranians, and now the question is the effectiveness of any kind of this deployment of the Lebanese armed forces or the international force not to allow them to be rearmed. I would say that I am skeptical about the implementation of Resolution 1701 and we should be ready to deal with it, but so far Hassan Nasrallah said that he doesn't have interest to renew the hostilities because he doesn't have the capability, actually, to renew it. Otherwise he is going to lose all his Katyushas. So it will take time for them to be ready for a second round of hostilities. When they are ready, of course they will do it.
Question: Ted Belman here. Just a little added question there. Why isn't Israel--
Allen: Can you speak up again?
Question: Why isn't Israel preventing the resupply? Why are they standing by allowing it to happen? Why don't they insist on maintaining the blockade and bombing the resupply until such time as the international community does it and the captives are returned.
Yaalon: So far we keep the blockade. It has been discussed in the visit of the Secretary General of the United Nations. He asked to stop with the blockade, and our prime minister insisted on going on with it until we will see an effective regime.
Question: Do you trust that? Do you trust that?
Yaalon: Pardon?
Question: Do you trust Olmert to stick to that?
Yaalon: I don't know. I don't know. But according to Israeli declarations we should be allowed even to attack militarily this kind of violations of 1701, and according to the declarations we are going to do it. Let's wait and see.
Allen: Is there someone...
Question: Hello this is ... ... London.
Allen: Go ahead.
Question: Hi I'm in a noisy public place but I'll be brief. I also think that the search for moderates, it's probably a bit amiss, in that I think that the core of what ... is not a moderate thing. I think that the moderate ... understand that ... But what we aren't doing is explaining tot he general population and to the people what ... that they're facing, and even Israelis don't ... much about the land, and certainly in Europe, I'm sitting here outside the new Scotland Yard ..., it's a tiny minority of people who understand what we're facing. What can be done to educate our side, which we know they've ... to educate their side?
Allen: Can I just jump in and very quickly a make a point that is slightly different from your assessment. There have two recent polls actually in Great Britain that show that the British people have moved from not understanding to understanding that a majority now understands about the threat of the radical Muslims. I'm not sure that's true in other European countries, although I'm told that in
France there's polling information along the same lines, but still you have an important point. How do we educate, both in Europe and in the United States I think as well. Do you have any thoughts on that?
Pamela: Allen, can I just add one thing to that question of yours? Does General Yaalon see the West's reluctance to even name the enemy as a problem? I mean, did he see Van Susteren's show last night with Centanni and Wiig who were kidnapped? They never mentioned the forced conversion at gunpoint. They never mentioned Islamic Jihad, but this is indicative of a bigger picture. Does he see this as a problem, the fear of even naming the enemy?
Question: ... actually a public ... I ... shouting at my laptop. (laughter)
Allen: General, we're taking up you time in terms of, let's hear from you.
Yaalon: Yes, this is the main challenge I believe, to create what I call an awakening in the West. The West is sleeping. In many terms it reminds of the situation before World War II. It's very clear, the threat is very clear. You just have to listen to them. You have just to read the textbooks, and Westerners prefer to ignore it because of many reasons, to postpone for tomorrow, for the next week, for the next year, for the next generation, not to confront it. So we need an awakening. Yes, it is part of what I call the need for educating our people, ... case in Israel, and I believe that in Israel we are in the process of awakening. You can find it in the Israeli ..., but it is needed in Europe as well as in the United States. Regarding to Arab and Muslim moderates, I do not agree with it. There are few of them, but there are. They don't have the political power. I can't say that at the end they are going to win. I am not sure about it, but I am sure that there are, and we should approach them, and we should encourage them, we should support them, and not to be afraid, not in Iran, not in Iraq, not in Syria, not in Lebanon, not in the Palestinian Authority, not even in Egypt. There are. I met many of them. They do not sanctify death, they appreciate Western values, and they should be empowered.
Question: Sure. My name is Omri Ceren from Mere Rhetoric. I actually have two questions. They both involve the IDF military capabilities. There was talk this morning, I think the Jerusalem Post reported it, that Syria is now preparing to kidnap soldiers in the same way that Hamas and Hezbollah did, and of course military confrontation with Iran is always a potential. There is talk in the world that the IDF has become a hollow army. Could you asses that, whether or not the IDF would be able to respond either to an act of war or to an Iranian military confrontation?
Question: Allen, can I add a couple questions on that regarding the IDF?
Allen: ... right after the response,
Question: On the IDF, okay.
Yaalon: Yes, please.
Question: The IDF's military capabilities.
Yaalon: So, I will respond to this question. Okay. We witness a lot of confusion regarding the lessons that we should learn from the last conflict. Part of it will be because of political reasons. Part of it because of IDF interests regarding the budget or something like that. I was commanding the IDF until 15 months ago or so, and it was not a hollow army. It was an army that fought successfully the Palestinian terrorists, and the army was ready to deal with all the challenges, either with the conventional challenge regarding the Syrian armed forces or other challenges like the Iranian threat. So it wasn't a hollow army. We didn't suffer from logistic problems. It was not the case in the ... operation, it wasn't the case even in the implementation of the disengagement plan in which we actually called on more soldiers than we called on in the war in Lebanon, and in the war in Lebanon we didn't use even 10% of the IDF's capabilities, so for me it's very clear the problem is mismanagement in the political level and the military senior level. This is the case. Now we hear about many excuses either to get more money, which is needed, no doubt that it is needed, and we need some other excuses. This is not the case. The IDF is strong, is well-equipped, adopting very good high technology capabilities of all means in the intelligence in the precise munitions, for the Air Force, for the ground forces, for the Navy. There were a lot of tactical problems here and there, like the example of the warship. The warship didn't use the defensive measures. This is not a case of money, and this is not a case of capability. Yes, this is a case of the level of alert, and so generally speaking this is mismanagement and a a problem of capabilities.
Allen: What about the question about, are there any indications that there are Syrian, or any other enemies' plans to abduct more soldiers.
Yaalon: I don't understand why the Syrians might abduct soldiers. I could understand why Hamas, why Hezbollah might do it, but I don't understand. No doubt that we should pay attention to the Syrian voices which is again an outcome of our mismanagement. I did not understand our declaration during the military campaign to tell Bashar al-Assad, don't be afraid, we're going to deal with it. I don't understand it. They should be scared, and we had the-- Objectively, he knows our superiority, so again it's mismanagement. It's not lack of capabilities, so I don't believe that the Syrian regime will decide abduct soldiers, he might provoke us, even there, but why to provoke it in the Golan Heights when you have the proxies in Lebanon. Bashar al-Assad is ready to sacrifice all the Lebanese but to keep the Golan Heights, it isn't right. We should pay attention to the Golan Heights, because some ideas might cross his mind, but not in terms of abducting soldiers, I don't believe that this is the case. Some other ideas might cross his mind. Allen: Okay, thank you. We have about ten more minutes. Aaron, not just Aaron, but anyone else who to ask questions, if we can keep them to questions and less editorializing so if we have some quick questions that would be appreciated.
Question: Thanks, just to follow up on the IDF, General, is there some kind of doctrinal reticence now about committing ground troops and if so does it stem from that there's now an Air Force general as the chief of the General Staff, or is there some kind of doctrinal shift throughout the General Staff? And I was wondering also if you could comment whether you perceive any long-term harm to the IDF from the inadequacies and the mixed messages that the troops got in this campaign.
Yaalon: The problem is not the doctrine. Actually, I prepared the IDF for this kind of war, and we are trying at the tactical levels to implement it, and we run exercises in the operational level, and the strategic level to deal with it. So ... the troops for this kind of conflict. But I thought about other options, and I have another contingency plan to deal with this kind of challenge, and it's not a question of doctrine. It might be that the current leadership prefers ...-- also, myself, I empowered the IAF, the Israel Air Force, because of their technological capabilities regarding intelligence, targeting, precise munitions. This kind of capability we didn't have in the past, but it doesn't mean that we shouldn't have the ground forces capabilities and we have. I, for example, didn't think about deploying tanks in this kind of operation. I thought about infantry and paratroopers operation to deal with Hezbollah, and not to deploy the tanks. And we exercise, we had exercises, we were trying to do it, so I believe that at the end the conclusions that will be drawn from this conflict will be the same conclusions that ... in the last couple of years, preparing the troops to deal with this kind of threat, and when I say mismanagement I mean that we had the capabilities, we had the good contingency plans to do it, but the political leadership and the senior military leadership didn't use it.
Allen: Is there anyone else who hasn't asked questions?
Question: Okay. General Yaalon, you have repeated throughout this Q-and-A and your presentation about the bedrock issue of political and military mismanagement. There a number of observers on the Israeli scene that say that it's even more fundamental, and the word in English is corruption. What is it that you as a long-term observer, both of the military scene, and also presumably the political scene, have to say about, one, its existence, and two, how you eliminate it?
Yaalon: Yeah, it's another conference call to deal with it. (laughter) But I would take it this way. I worry from this phenomenon more than from the Iranian threat, and we have to deal with it. We have to deal with it. That's what I found and I wrote about it. I believe that the decision to go to the disengagement plan was because of corruption, and understanding that by going to this kind of plan our prime minister would save himself from the investigations and unfortunately it still exists, and I would say this is the most important challenge to deal with, because I believe that the mismanagement of the leadership and the incompetence of the leadership is the outcome of the corruption.
Allen: Is there someone else again who has not asked a question and would like to?
Question: This is Avi again. ...
Allen: Ann?
Question: Yeah, I have a question. General, I don't even know how to ask this except, what happened to Sharon? Because the Israeli people were clear and they elected him to fight, and then he turns around and gives away Gaza, and I only ask it because, what's to say that any more conservative government that would replace Olmert would not do the same thing. What happened? Yaalon: You can read it in my article which was written in Hebrew, but it has been translated to English, I can give it to you, about my perspective regarding the decision making process of the disengagement plan, and as I said, part of it is corruption. It's not because of a strategic decision, it was a ... decision to save people from investigation.
Allen: Any other question from someone who has not asked a question.
Question: Allen, this is Rick Richman, Jewish Current Issues. I want to thank General Yaalon for such a clear-headed presentation today, and ask if he could confirm for us what his own political plans are for the future, or what role he intends to play in the coming year.
Yaalon: My plan is to live in Israel, now to be part of the .... To come out with clear ideas about what should be done ..., to serve the State of Israel in security, in strategy, in education, in other fields. So far, I'm not going to join any political party, but I'm ready to do what is needed for State of Israel in the future, like I did in the past and like I'm trying to do today.
Allen: One more question. Anyone?
Question: Hi, Robert Mayer from Publius Pundit. General, I would like to ask what you think about the European multinational force being deployed in southern Lebanon, and what you think the strategic implications are for actually getting rid of Hezbollah.
Yaalon: Although I'm not satisfied from Resolution 1701, this is so far a hollow resolution, because the most important parts of it are declarative and not operational, and we should insist to implement it, and again we should ask for a determination from the international community to implement it. Now the question, what will be the rules of engagement of the international force, if it's going to be an observer-type force like UNIFIL, it not just will be useless, it will interrupt us to secure the State of Israel, and because Hezbollah used in the past UNIFIL as human shields. They used the UNIFIL positions as cover to launch Katyushas and we of course were restrained to react because of UNIFIL, and in other cases, according to our bad experience with these kind of forces, which are not fighting forces, just observers, it is very easy to observe our activities, and it is difficult to observe Hezbollah, civilians, you know, most of them are not using uniforms, are not wearing uniforms, and it's something that's invisible. So most the reports are about us and not about them, so at the end it depends what will be the rules of engagement, what will be the mandate of this multinational force. Without being a fighting force, I'm skeptical of their ability to do something significant, and it might be even-- for us it will be an obstacle to secure ourselves in any kind of deterioration.
Allen: I'm going to bring this to a close. We've run about an hour, actually, a little over than an hour. Once again, shortly we will have the tape of the interview up at onejerusalem.org. I want to thank General Yaalon for giving what I thought was not only an insightful, but also very honest, and very straightforward and very clear messages that I feel that we should promulgate, and send out as far and wide as we can. I would also ask General Yaalon that you made mention in response to Ann's question, that you have an English version of a Hebrew article of your take on why the decision to disengage was taken. If you can send it to me, I will send it to everyone on the call, so that we can all read it and benefit from it.
Pamela: What's the name of it?
Allen: Once again, I want to thank all the bloggers for participating with questions, and I want to thank General Yaalon for taking the time to help educate us, and we may just take you up on that offer to spend some more time with us. You don't have to limit it to corruption. (laughter) But thank you very much, General Yaalon.
Yaalon: Thank you Allen, and thank you all of you, and I would like to emphasize that I'm optimistic in the long-run.
Allen: Thank you.
Pamela: Thank you.
