Katz nixes reserve duty of protest leader who urged refusal to serve over judicial overhaul
Defense minister says Eyal Naveh, a leader of Brothers in Arms and reservist commander in elite unit, is not fit to train soldiers; opposition MKs pan move as politicization of IDF
Stuart Winer is a breaking news editor at The Times of Israel.
Defense Minister Israel Katz said Sunday that he was suspending the army reserve service of a leader of a prominent protest group who had called for reservists not to show up for their military duty in 2023 as the government advanced its controversial judicial overhaul.
Eyal Naveh, a former member of the Sayeret Matkal commando unit, is a leader of the Brothers in Arms movement, which arose to protest the government’s plans for far-reaching changes to the judiciary that critics said would erode the democratic nature of the country.
Brothers in Arms called on army reservists to refuse to volunteer for service if the required legislation was advanced, with Naveh saying in July 2023 that “we’ve tried everything, This is where we draw the line. We pledged to serve the kingdom and not the king. We are determined, we are fighters, we love this country and we will not give up on it.”
At one point the group claimed that 10,000 reservists had committed to not showing up, among them pilots and others in key military roles.
In a statement Katz said: “Anyone who calls for mass absences and refusal to serve is not suitable to train the next generation of IDF fighters.”
“The same law must be applied to all,” he added in an apparent reference to the pausing of reserve duty last month of another Brother in Arms leader, Ron Sharaf, who also served in Sayeret Matkal.
Sharaf was serving in the reserves as commander of the selection test to join elite commando unit Sayeret Matkal and after his suspension, Naveh was installed as his replacement, Channel 12 reported.
Sources told Haaretz that Naveh does not currently have an active call-up for reserve duty, and that the selection tests for the unit were held last week.
Naveh responded in a statement that Katz is a “malleable and cowardly defense minister” and urged that the minister issue call-up orders to tens of thousands of members of the ultra-Orthodox community who do not serve in the army, calling them “the real service refusers.”
Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi of the Likud party congratulated Katz on “stopping the impertinence, the audaciousness, and the contempt of a group that tried to destroy the army and nearly managed to.”
MK Almog Cohen of the far-right Otzma Yehudit party claimed that Naveh “traded in the safety of our children” and that his views “seriously harmed the cohesion and security of the country, and were a catalyst for the events of October 7,” when the Palestinian terror group Hamas led a devastating cross-border attack on Israel, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages.
Head of the opposition Democrats political party Yair Golan slammed Katz’s move, also referring to legislation in the works to preserve the exemptions Haredi men receive from military service.
“Anyone who was appointed to be defense minister to pass the ‘evasion law’ should not preach to those who really serve, and to those who saved the country when the failed government wasn’t functioning,” he said, referring to the action taken by Brothers in Arms on October 7 to save people in the south, and the massive civil society operation it built in the following months.
MK Gilad Kariv, also of the Democrats party, accused Katz of “grossly interfering” in military matters that are not his responsibility.
“This is a dangerous campaign to cleanse and politicize the army,” he said.
The judicial overhaul plan provoked mass demonstrations for months in 2023. It was eventually put on hold, and then dropped from the agenda after the Hamas attack, though coalition members have recently talked of restarting the process.
Katz was recently appointed defense minister after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fired his predecessor Yoav Gallant amid differences over handling the war and the ultra-Orthodox draft bill. Netanyahu had previously fired Gallant in 2023 when the latter called to freeze the judicial overhaul but was forced to reinstate him amid public outcry.
In the wake of the Hamas attack, Brothers in Arms diverted its resources to become a civilian relief and support organization, though its leaders have also participated in protests calling on the government to reach a ceasefire agreement in Gaza that would secure the release of hostages who were abducted during the October 7 assault.
