Political-Military Partnership in Israel
| Author | Yoram Peri |
| Published date | 01 July 1981 |
| Date | 01 July 1981 |
| DOI | 10.1177/019251218100200306 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
303
POLITICAL-MILITARY
PARTNERSHIP
IN
ISRAEL
YORAM
PERI
Since
the
Six-Day
War
in
1967
a
profound
transformation
has
occurred
in
political-
military
relations
in
Israel.
National
consensus
in
the
security
sphere
has
collapsed.
The
authority
and
legitimacy
of
the
political
leadership
have
been
shaken,
and
the
army
has
acquired
direct
political
roles,
mainly
through
the
establishment
of
a
military
government
in
the
occupied
territories.
These
developments
have
changed
the
early
pattern
of
a
nonpolitical
citizen
army,
subordinate
to
the
civil
authorities,
to
a
new
pattern
of
political-
military
partnership.
The
intense
politicization
of
the
Israel
Defence
Forces
undermined
their
former
elevated
and
sacred
position
and
made
them
a
focus
of
public
controversy.
Thus,
while
Israel
has
remained
a
democracy,
in
spite
of
the
protracted
war,
its
armed
forces
have
taken
over
functions
far
exceeding
those
of
other
professional
armies
in
similar
Western
democracies.
Academic
research
on
civil-military
relations
in
Israel
has
a
surprisingly
short
history
and
is
remarkably
limited
in
scope.
When
it
began
in
the
early
1960s,
scholars
were
influenced
by
current
theories,
and
in
examining
Israeli
Defence
Forces
(IDF)
they
used
terms
taken
from
the
concept
of
the
military
in
developing
countries.
In
the
late
1970s,
research
went
a
step
further.
Analysts
asked
about
the
influence
of
a
continuous
siege
and
a
prolonged
war on
civil-military
relations.
However,
in
spite
of
the
centrality
of
security,
scholars
claimed,
Israel
had
not
turned
into
a
garrison
state.
Whereas
in
the
first
stage
students
of
the
Israeli
case
argued
categorically
that
the
IDF
was
disconnected
from
politics,
in
the
second
stage
they
agreed
that
relations
between
the
army
and
the
policy
were
not
unidimensional.
Gabriel
Ben-Dor
asserted
in
1973
in
his
&dquo;Polity
and
the
Military
in
Israel,&dquo;
that
&dquo;it
may
be
more
appropriate
to
speak
of
the
politicization
of
the
military
rather
than
the
militarization
of
politics.&dquo;
However,
even
later
works
have
ignored
a
very
significant
phenom-
enon
which
has
influenced
civil-military
relations
in
Israel:
the
military
government
established
in
the
territories
occupied
during
the
Six-Day
War
in
June
1967.
The
fact
that
the
event
is
relatively
recent,
coupled
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