Olmert deals blow to IDF battle morale

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By Stan Goodenough
December 05, 2006

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert dealt a blow to IDF morale Monday when he let it be known that as far as this Israeli leadership is concerned, it is better for kidnapped troops to be left in captivity than for soldiers to be killed trying to rescue them.

Olmert was trying to explain to a hall full of Israeli high school students why Israel had agreed to a ceasefire in its war against the Hizb?allah last July without realizing the primary aim of that war ? the release of kidnapped soldiers Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev.

They have now been in captivity for 147 days, and there is no sign that they are alive or that negotiations are making any headway towards their release, or that they will ever be seen again.

Israel?s Arab enemies are notorious for the cruelty with which they treat captured Jewish soldiers. Over 400 IDF troops have been declared missing in action since the rebirth of Israel in 1948. Some, like Ron Arad, an IAF navigator shot down in Lebanon in 1986, are thought to be still alive but hidden deep in Arab territory.

Before Olmert?s statement this week, IDF soldiers went into battle believing that no effort would be spared to bring them home if they were captured, wounded or killed. It was a doctrine that undergirded soldier morale in war.

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