IDF seeking increased military cooperation with Gulf states under CENTCOM
Kohavi, who is in the US, believes that moderate Sunni states such as the UAE and Bahrain can deepen ties with Israel on security arrangements.
By ANNA AHRONHEIMIsraeli Air Force F-15 fighter jets escort two American B-52 bombers through Israeli airspace. March 7, 2021.(photo credit: IDF)
Strengthening military coordination against Iran will be a main topic of IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Aviv Kohavi’s visit to Washington, The Jerusalem Post has learned.
According to a report in Walla News and confirmed to the Post, Kohavi will discuss expanding and increasing military coordination with the forces of CENTCOM – Central Command, responsible for countries in the Middle East – in terms of intelligence sharing and defensive operational activities.
The United States moved Israel out of EUCOM – European Command, which currently focuses on Russia and its threats against Europe and NATO – to CENTCOM’s area of responsibility in January.
The move to CENTCOM is believed to not only simplify the cooperation with American troops in the region but can also create the potential for a regional coalition with Arab countries that have normalized ties with Israel against shared threats posed by Iran.
Both Kohavi and Defense Minister Benny Gantz believe that moderate Sunni states such as the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain – and others who have not yet signed agreements with Israel – can deepen their ties, especially in terms of regional security arrangements.
CENTCOM Commander Marine Gen. Kenneth McKenzie told Defense News that the move would “put an operational perspective” on the Abraham Accords and will set up “further corridors and opportunities to open up between Israel and Arab countries in the region” on a military-to-military level.
“I don’t want to overestimate the speed that this will happen – it’s going to take some time to occur – but it does make it a little easier for them to work together, and I think that is all a good thing,” McKenzie was quoted as saying. “In the future, we would like to see –and you know, for many years it has been an aspiration in US Central Command – a collective approach to security here in the region.”
Prime Minister Naftali Bennett meets this week with IDF Chief of Staff Aviv Kohavi. (AMOS BEN-GERSHOM/GPO)
THE REPORT came as Gantz and Prime Minister Naftali Bennett approved the extension of Kohavi’s term as the IDF's top military officer for another year.
היום אביא לאישור הממשלה בתמיכת ראש הממשלה את הארכת כהונתו של הרמטכ"ל כוכבי בשנה. זו תהיה ההחלטה הראשונה שאעביר כשר הביטחון בממשלה. אביב, אותו אני מכיר עשרות שנים, הוא מהרמטכ"לים הטובים שהיו לצה"ל.
הוא הוביל את הצבא להישגים מבצעיים חסרי תקדים במבצע שומר החומות, ויחד נמשיך לקדם את תוכנית תנופה לשדרוג צה״ל. הרמטכ׳׳ל יגיע היום לארה"ב וייפגש עם בכירים בממשל ובמערכת הביטחונית, כדי לקדם נושאים אסטרטגיים שהתחלתי לעבוד עליהם בפגישותיי בוושינגטון. נמשיך לפעול יחד למען ביטחון ישראל.
“Chief of Staff Kohavi is a valued and professional commander who performs his duties with boldness and responsibility,” Bennett said. “I welcome the government's approval to extend his term for a fourth year. The people of Israel can sleep soundly in light of the fact that Chief of Staff Kohavi will continue to lead the IDF in the face of the operational challenges facing the State of Israel.”
The IDF chief, who will land in Washington on Sunday for a week of meetings with senior American defense officials, will continue “to advance strategic issues that I began working on during my meetings in Washington. We will continue to work together for Israel's security,” Gantz said.
“This will be the first decision that I will pass as defense minister in the new government,” Gantz wrote on Twitter.
“He led the army to unprecedented operational achievements in Operation Guardian of the Walls, and together we will continue to advance the multi-year Momentum plan to upgrade the IDF,” Gantz continued.
When he took over from Gadi Eisenkot in 2019, Kohavi vowed to make the IDF “deadly and efficient.” Shortly thereafter, he began to formulate a new operational victory concept and the Momentum multi-year plan.
The key to improving the military’s combat effectiveness, Kohavi believes, is to increase the IDF’s capabilities of identifying and destroying the enemy with multi-dimensional blows – both offensive, defensive and maneuvering – as well as the ability for IDF troops to be able to maneuver in high numbers.
These three main issues, as well as the changes of the enemy, led to a total revision of operational planning for Israel’s northern borders and the Gaza Strip.Defense Minister Benny Gantz and IDF chief of staff Aviv Kohavi at a operational briefing in the IDFs Southern Command, June 8, 2021. (ARIEL HERMONI/DEFENSE MINISTRY)
KOHAVI ALSO believes it is of the utmost importance to build the military for threats it will face some 30 years in the future and built the new multi-year plan accordingly, with new concepts and methods of warfare which have been adapted to the challenges of the urban battlefield saturated with enemy fire.
And with battlefields changing, he is trying to transform the IDF into a “smart army,” holistic and tech-friendly, using simulators for more and more battalions and using artificial intelligence (AI) to significantly increase its target bank.
Having relied heavily on machine learning, the Israeli military called last month's Operation Guardian of the Walls the first "Artificial Intelligence War."
"For the first time, artificial intelligence was a key component and power multiplier in fighting the enemy,” a senior officer in the IDF said. “This is a first-of-its-kind campaign for the IDF; we implemented new methods of operation and used technological developments that were a force multiplier for the entire IDF.”
While the IDF had gathered thousands of targets in the densely populated coastal enclave over the past two years, hundreds were gathered in real-time, including missile launchers that were aimed at Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.
The military believes that using AI helped shorten the length of the fighting, having been effective and quick in gathering targets using super-cognition.
In 11 days of fighting in the Gaza Strip, the Israeli military carried out intensive strikes against Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad targets, stating that they were hitting key infrastructure and personnel belonging to the two groups.
The IDF also killed over 150 PIJ and Hamas operatives, many of them considered senior commanders or irreplaceable in their roles, especially those who led the R&D of the missile projects.
