In an interview with Arutz Sheva, Brigadier General Amir Avivi, Director General of the "Securityist" Movement, refers to the speech by journalist Dan Shilon and to Prof. Mordechai Kremnitzer's statements about the alleged legitimacy of attacks against IDF soldiers.
Kremnitzer believes that the legitimacy of injuring IDF soldiers should be discussed, and Shilon wrote that "when Hamas, or any other organization, hits the military, soldiers, commanders, it's not terror, it's war. It's painful, dirty, and disgusting, but legitimate."
In his remarks, Brigadier General Avivi focuses on Prof. Kremnitzer's words, which he regards as very severe, especially in light of his own activities in the IDF. "Professor Kremnitzer is active in the IDF. He met with senior IDF officials, and co-chairs various workshops by the Israeli Democracy Institute.
"We, the 'Securityist' Movement, have issued a letter to the Chief of Staff asking him to denounce these statements and we of course leave in his discretion what to do with the military's relationship with people who express themselves in such a way," says Avivi.
On the significance of Kremnitzer's words, Avivi says it is an attempt to qualify various activities of a terror organization: "He's trying to say that if they attack civilians it's terror and if they attack military positions it isn't terror. He forgets that beyond this, there's a matter of armies here that take upon themselves principles of ethical conduct. Hamas and terror organizations aren't adopting any ethical rules of combat as military forces do. They operate in unacceptable forms and partly because of that, they are defined as terror organizations."
Avivi adds that Hamas is "a murderous organization that doesn't answer any international treaty and acts in ways that define it as a terror organization and this distinction cannot be made. Remember that in Gaza, Israel has also withdrawn to the last meter from the international point of view, and we continue to absorb missiles in both communities and bases."
Summing up his stance on personalities such as Kremnitzer and Dan Shillon, Avivi says: "I have a very difficult problem with people trying to take murderous organizations and trying to give them another look. A terror organization is a terror organization and they are murderous to us and also to their own people."
Avivi says what leads to such statements is a desire to promote an agenda that sees Israel as holding the Occupied Territories, and therefore "deserves it". "They forget that this is our country, they forget that these are areas that may be under debate but certainly are not occupied territory. We have not taken territory from anyone else, certainly not from the Palestinians and for that matter they are trying to legitimize activity against our military."
At present, according to Avivi, the Chief of Staff's response to his organization's request has not yet been received. Avivi adds, "We have a serious problem of bodies with political agendas working within the military. The army is all of our army and should be completely free from external influences. The army is strong and large enough to manage its internal processes without the help of associations."