Outgoing Defense Minister Yoav Gallant met on Wednesday with the IDF General Staff, his office said, after he was fired by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday.
"We have shifted the balance of power in the Middle East—from Gaza to Tehran, from Hodeidah to the Dahiyeh. In all these places, things have happened that never happened before, and we have pushed our enemies back by decades," Gallant noted.
"The loyalty of the IDF, of its commanders, of its officers, and of the recruits' oath from day one is to the State of Israel and its laws," Gallant further stated in his address to the officers.
'The cause itself'
"This commitment is reflected in the spirit of the IDF and its values. This is what we are committed to—the cause itself, which is greater than any of us and has been the aspiration of millions of Jews for 2,000 years," Gallant affirmed.
He said Israel needed a broad enlistment of additional troops, stating, "I believe that the security challenges will increase significantly, which means we will need more resources. The first of these is that we will need more people—people who bear the burden, thousands of them."
On Tuesday, Netanyahu announced he had fired Gallant, replacing him with Foreign Minister Israel Katz.
“In the midst of a war, more than ever, full trust is required between the prime minister and the defense minister,” Netanyahu stated of his move, noting that a "crisis of trust" had ensued between him and the defense minister.
Gallant, however, argued in his Tuesday speech that he was being fired due to his opposition to the daycare bill, Netanyahu's disinclination to achieve a hostage deal, and form a National Commission of Inquiry into the events of October 7.
Eliav Breuer and Tovah Lazaroff contributed to this report.