Agriculture Minister Uri Ariel has called for B'Tselem to be barred from receiving national service slots after the left-wing organization launched an advertising campaign calling on IDF soldiers to disobey orders to shoot "unarmed protesters" in the Gaza Strip.
Israel's national service program provides an alternative framework for young people who do not enlist in the Israel Defense Forces as part of the mandatory draft. Ariel ordered the agency's director Sar-Shalom Gerbi to summon B'Tselem head Hagai El-Ad to a hearing and move to immediately bar the controversial organization from being allotted national service slots.
Ariel, who oversees the program, called B'Tselem's actions encouraging insubordination "a clear violation of the penal code that forbids calls to insubordination.
"We will not lend a hand to deliberate sedition that harms the image of the IDF and IDF soldiers and distorts the reality" that he said IDF soldiers face. "No organization will issue orders to the IDF. When the National Civil Service Law [aimed at increasing the conscription of ultra-Orthodox men into the IDF] takes effect in about a year, organizations like B'Tselem will not receive benefits from the state. Until then, we will work to deny benefits to organizations that incite [against the military].
"It is unthinkable for an organization that calls for breaking the law and incites rebellion and sedition against the IDF to enjoy assistance from the state. We will act in accordance with the guidelines of the attorney general [Avichai Mendelblit] to cancel the national service with a body that calls to break the law."
According to Gerby, "National service is a state institution in which over 18,000 volunteers from all sectors serve on behalf of the State of Israel. It cannot be that the State of Israel allocates [national service] slots for bodies that act against it and encourage insubordination, an act forbidden by law. The basis of conduct in a democratic state is the maintenance of law, and that is why we insist on the preservation of the legality of the activities of national civic service volunteers."
B'Tselem has never before called on soldiers to refuse orders, but believes firing on Palestinians who pose no imminent threat to the lives of Israeli forces is "manifestly illegal," said spokesman Amit Gilutz.
"As long as soldiers in the field continue to receive orders to use live fire against unarmed civilians, they are duty-bound to refuse to comply," the group said.
Last Friday, on Passover eve, tens of thousands of Palestinian demonstrators gathered on the Gaza border with Israel in a mass march organized by Hamas. Violence erupted and Israeli forces killed 17 Palestinians, including 10 known terrorists, and wounded more than a thousand in an effort to prevent them from breaching the fence and entering sovereign Israeli territory.
The Israeli military has said its response is justified because the protests were organized by Hamas, the Islamic militant group that controls the Gaza Strip and is sworn to Israel's destruction.
The IDF said soldiers targeted only "instigators" who burned tires or threw stones and firebombs toward the border fence. The IDF accused Hamas of using the large crowds as cover to carry out terrorist attacks.
