Katz says he won’t okay promotion of 2 officers from IDF Southern Command until after Oct. 7 probe

Defense Minister Israel Katz will not approve the promotion of two officers from the IDF Southern Command until their role in the failures of October 7 are investigated, his office says.

On Friday, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi announced a new round of senior appointments in the military, including 11 new brigadier generals and four new colonels, as well as six brigadier generals and 19 colonels who are moving to new positions at the same rank.

In a statement, Katz says that he has approved the list of appointments apart from two officers from the Southern Command: Col. Ephraim Avni, who was head of operations at the Southern Command, and Col. Almog Dadon, the head of combat engineering at the Southern Command.

Katz says their promotion will be on hold until their “connection to the events of October 7 and their performance during the war is thoroughly examined.”

Avni was appointed as the next head of the Paratroopers Brigade, and Dadon was appointed to head the elite Yahalom combat engineering unit.

The ministry also says that as part of examining the issue, Katz intends to meet with the families of the surveillance soldiers from the Nahal Oz outpost, “to allow them to voice their position on the issue.”

The father of Cpl. Noa Marciano, killed by Hamas in Gaza at some point in November, after she was taken hostage on October 7, came out against the promotion of Brig. Gen. Eliad Moatti, the commander of the Border Defense Corps, which oversees the Combat Intelligence Collection Array. Moatti was appointed to be the commander of the Tzeelim training base.