MONTREAL — Three active members of the Israel Defence Forces recently spoke at McGill University about the ethical rules that guide their behaviour within the IDF.
Noam, Oren and Daphna, who aren’t allowed to reveal their real names for security reasons, spoke in a nondescript upstairs room at McGill’s law faculty.
Israeli Apartheid Week, which took place the first week of March, had just finished at McGill and other universities. In the law faculty’s library, downstairs from the meeting room, there were a slick series of photographs, supposedly depicting Israeli human rights abuses, part of a Palestinian Human Rights week that followed on the heels of Israeli Apartheid Week.
The IDF soldiers were under strict orders not to say anything “political,” they informed the relatively small number of students and other attendees.
They emphasized that like any military personnel serving within a democratic society, they are bound by rules of conduct and behaviour.
“One of the first things I learned after getting drafted were the ethical rules – a sort of ‘Ten Commandments’ for the IDF,” said Oren, 22, a paratrooper.
Noam, 23, added: “The IDF is obligated to obey the law. We are even obligated to disobey an illegal order.”
Ethical considerations are strictly guided by a code that is drilled into each and every member of the IDF.
The Israel Defence Forces’ Code of Conduct, drafted in 1992, integrated its traditional ethical code with international law, Israeli law and Jewish heritage principles.
This was elaborated on in 2004 by a Code of Conduct specifically geared to deal with militants and Palestinians.
The “Ten Commandments” (there are actually 11) include not attacking anyone who surrenders, according dignity and respect to the Palestinian population, and obliging IDF members to report any violation of the code.
“The code is a public document,” Oren said. “We are not robots, but thinking human beings, and know the difference between right and wrong.”
At the same time, Israeli soldiers now have to deal less with the Palestinian population in the West Bank as the Palestinian Authority takes over.
“They are doing a better and better job,” he said. “We are obligated to be gentle and respectful with civilians.”
The three couldn’t recollect ever witnessing any incident that could be considered untoward in terms of military behaviour toward civilians, but they indicated they would have reported it, had that been necessary.
Although IDF members have a right to refuse an order they consider illegal, they could be held fully accountable if the order was ultimately decided to be within the bounds of the code.
The conversation with the three soldiers did not revolve exclusively around moral issues.
Daphna, 24, said that the IDF has made some of its greatest strides in how women serve. Women serve two years and men, three.
“For the past 10, 15 years, there have been women serving as combat pilots and in the infantry,” she said. “It is a progressive society that does not discriminate based on gender.”
The IDF members’ visit to Montreal was part of a program co-ordinated by the United Israel Appeal of Canada’s Israel Experience department.
