A group of Israeli military reservists and activists from the Im Tirzu (If You Will It) demonstrated Tuesday outside the home of former Prime Minister Ehud Barak in Tel Aviv.
Im Tirzu is a nonprofit Zionist organization with some 6,000 volunteer activists.
The activists and reservists declared “enough incitement” and demanded that Barak stop calling for a fratricidal war, Israel’s Channel 14 News reported.
Matan Jerufi, a reserve fighter in the IDF Golani Brigade, said, “The people denounced Ehud Barak and showed him the way out of politics. His attempts to incite his way back into the anarchists’ fold will not succeed! The police must act and arrest him.”
Barak has been at the forefront of the ongoing protests against the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Two days ago, he told a crowd of thousands in Tel Aviv that the government’s judicial reform program is an “assassination of the declaration of independence, which will turn Israel into a dictatorship.”
But it was Barak’s next words that raised concerns: “When there is a gun to your temple, you first eliminate it,” he said, adding that Israelis “will have to walk the path of nonviolent civil disobedience.”
As part of that “disobedience,” Barak advocated for Israeli soldiers to refuse an order they don’t agree with, and to block roads to enforce their demands.
Israel Navy Captain Shay Rosengarten said Barak is undermining the foundations of democracy and accused him of trying to degenerate Israelis into a fratricidal war. “The police must enforce the law and stop him,” he said.
“I came from France to Israel to witness the unity and building of the country. Ehud Barak will not be allowed to destroy the state of the Jewish people,” Border Police reserve fighter Clara Ben Shushan added.
