The military announced Tuesday that it will commute the sentences of three soldiers of the Nahal Infantry Brigade who were disciplined for insubordination after refusing to return to fight in Gaza.
The soldiers were initially dismissed from duty and given seven to 12 days in military jail for refusing to serve in Gaza due to “a deep internal crisis” they were experiencing after several of their comrades were killed.
A fourth soldier was also dismissed for insubordination but has not yet been sentenced.
The commander of the Nahal Brigade met the three troops Monday evening to “hear their claims,” the IDF said.
The IDF said that during the conversation, “the brigade commander expressed his appreciation to the troops for their work in the war, while emphasizing that troops are expected to maintain military discipline in times of war and fulfill their mission, fighting on the battlefield.”
“In light of the unique circumstances,” the Nahal Brigade commander decided to commute their prison sentences, the military said, and instead, the soldiers will be required to stay on their base for a prolonged period.
The three soldiers will still be dismissed from combat duty.
They are set to be transferred to noncombat roles in the army, and will receive “support and treatment from their commanders and mental health officials,” an IDF official added.
The IDF had initially said that the soldiers met with a mental health officer, “who determined that they were fit to participate in combat.” The army then sentenced them to jail for insubordination, leading to protests against the move.
Ima Era (Wide-Awake Mother), an organization of mothers of IDF soldiers, said in a statement carried by the Haaretz daily that “when soldiers repeatedly cry out that they can no longer continue, this is not a ‘disciplinary issue.’ It is a damning indictment of a system that has pushed its people to the edge of their endurance.”
In an interview with Channel 12, one of the three soldiers said that after several months of combat in Gaza, “I found myself in the battalion without anyone from my squad. Four of them were killed, two were wounded, and the rest were in psychiatric institutions.”
“My soul is wounded, it’s hard for me to sleep at night, I can’t function as a fighter,” he said. “I don’t see myself as qualified to do what I’m supposed to do.”
“They told me: ‘We understand and appreciate you, but you’re going to jail,'” he said. “You don’t have support when you need it, and even when they tell you you have support, in the end they stab you in the back. The commander told me he was backing me, but at the trial I was told that he wrote that I was still fit for combat, and that I was going to jail.”
The military has been facing a growing problem of reservists not showing up for duty, but the four soldiers disciplined by the military Sunday were conscripts, among whom refusal is less common.
The IDF is also facing a mental health crisis, including a rise in the number of suspected suicides in the military since the war in Gaza began.
In just the past few weeks, four soldiers, including an off-duty reservist, have died by suspected suicide, bringing to 19 the total number of such cases since the beginning of the year.
Israel’s toll in the ground offensive against Hamas in Gaza and in military operations along the border with the Strip stands at 459.