Dagan lends support to Camp Sucker protests

Former Mossad chief voices support for campaign to broaden IDF's base of inductees by drafting more minorities.

By JPOST.COM STAFF
Protest against Tal Law 390 (photo credit: Ben Hartman)
Protest against Tal Law 390
(photo credit: Ben Hartman)
Former Mossad chief Meir Dagan visited Camp Sucker ("Frier") in Jerusalem on Monday to lend support to protesters demanding that the IDF broaden its base of inductees by drafting more within minority communities, Army Radio reported.
The Camp Sucker movement is led primarily by the Forum for Military Service Equality (Forum La’shivyon Ba’netel.) The group has led many protests around the country in protest of what they view as discrimination against those who serve in the IDF.
Dagan stated that "the uneven distribution of the societal burden is unsustainable and harms the fabric of Israeli society." He added that "we can not accept the current situation in which there is a different set of rules depending on a person's section of Israeli society."
Dagan called on Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to keep his promise to legislate new laws that would mandate service in the IDF for all Israeli citizens.
On Sunday, former IDF chief of staff Gabi Ashkenazi also arrived at the park in support of the protest.
There are currently approximately 60,000 full-time yeshiva students who are of army service age but who have gained exemptions under the terms of the Tal Law.
The High Court of Justice in February ruled the Tal Law illegal, but the government has been holding meetings with heads of the ultra-orthodox community to discuss possible compromises for its replacement.
The law, approved in 2002, was designed to increase the number of ultra-Orthodox men serving in the army, but has been criticized for failing to bring the rate of haredi recruitment up toward the national average.
At a previous Camp Sucker protest at Tel Aviv's Savidor (Arlozorov) Train Station, a spokesman for the Mitpakdim social reform organization said that “We’re the people who pay taxes, we’re going to the army and we’re not being listened to.”
She added that: “We want everyone to have equal rights; everyone should work, everyone should contribute. If you want to get you have to give too,” said Rechess. It’s not logical that the people who don’t work, who don’t go to the army, get the most support from the government, not us, she continued.