Parents of northern border surveillance soldiers to petition High Court if troops not moved further back – report

The parents of a number of surveillance soldiers serving on a base close to the northern border say they will petition the High Court if their demand is not met that the troops be moved to a safer position, further from the frontier, the Kan public broadcaster reports.

According to the outlet, the parents want to know why the soldiers have not been moved further back from the border, and whether there is a plan to ensure their evacuation or protection if there is a more severe outbreak of fighting.

The parents have long expressed concern that the soldiers were not equipped or trained to deal with the potential risks of being so close to the border.

According to the parents, the soldiers are in “daily danger to their lives, with anxieties and fears, burnout and fatigue, which impair their functioning.”

The parents reportedly say that it is unclear why some soldiers have been evacuated from the border, while others were not.

“My daughter asks why they are waiting to evacuate them. If a soldier asks such a question, we must act. They can do the work from anywhere, even from Tel Aviv,” one of the mothers tells Kan.

In response, the IDF spokesperson tells the broadcaster: “We are aware of the feelings of the observers and their parents and are at their disposal in order to provide them with the best ways to carry out their duties professionally while maintaining their safety.”

In February, a number of the parents said they would rather see their children sent to military prison for defying orders than have them placed in unnecessary danger at the base near the border with Lebanon. At the time, some of the parents said their fears were dismissed.

The Hezbollah terror group has launched near-daily attacks on communities and military posts in the north.

The IDF’s treatment of the surveillance soldiers, the vast majority of whom are women, has been heavily criticized since the war began, when Hamas launched an unprecedented surprise attack on Israel from the Gaza Strip.

When the attack began, surveillance soldiers near the Gaza border were unarmed and did not have sufficient protection from the terrorists who overran the Nahal Oz base, where they killed 52 soldiers, including 15 female surveillance officers, and kidnapped a further seven female surveillance officers.

Following the October 7 onslaught, surveillance soldiers who served along the border with Gaza said they had raised alerts prior to that day of suspicious activity, but were ignored.