Outgoing Air Force chief says judicial overhaul protests were ‘a step away’ from damaging force

Outgoing Israeli Air Force chief Maj. Gen. Tomer Bar says the IAF was “only a step away” from its foundations being undermined amid the protests over the judicial overhaul nearly three years ago.

“At the beginning of my tenure, we were in the eye of the storm, with the outbreak of the protests against the judicial reform,” Bar says in his parting speech at the Tel Nof Airbase. “We drew the clear boundary line between politics and influence and the IDF.”

“This was not easy, but we fought to preserve the competence and cohesion of the Air Force, and its designation as the defender of Israel, under all conditions, so that no opinion or stance not directly related to the mission of safeguarding the security of the state would enter within its walls,” Bar says.

He says that today he still stands by this decision to not allow protests to enter the IAF.

“We were only a step away from undermining the foundations of the Air Force. And nevertheless, when the war broke out, all the servicemen and women proved devotion and resilience on the day of command, on October 7, and also when we faced the challenges of the war in seven arenas simultaneously,” Bar says.