IDF chief: We must be ‘more prepared than ever’ for an ‘extensive military conflict’

Speaking at an event marking 50 years since the Yom Kippur War, the chief of the Israel Defense Forces says Israel should not underestimate its enemies, warning of a potential large-scale conflict similar to that of 1973.

“We must respond to every declaration of our enemies, in words or actions, not to underestimate them, and not to exalt ourselves,” IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi says, at the Glilot military base near Herzliya.

“We must be more prepared than ever for a multi-front and extensive military conflict, which will include maneuvering in close contact and with high friction with the enemy, will involve losses and casualties, and where the home front is also a front,” Halevi continues.

“Our enemies may be tempted to see an advantage in the multi-front threat to us. It is better for them to know that when Israel is threatened, it knows how to mobilize all its resources, put the differences aside — and attack,” he says.

“As it was in the Yom Kippur War, it will be so today, if we are required to,” Halevi says.

In an apparent reference to national tensions over the government’s controversial judicial overhaul, Halevi says “one cannot but wonder, can such cohesion only exist amid a great threat?”

“The State of Israel has one IDF that protects it from many enemies. It is the responsibility of all of us to protect [the IDF], because it is the basis of our safe existence here, and because our security is above all else,” he adds.