#IDF /the "topics document" [מסמך הצירים] was drafted in 1988 to regulate the release of sensitive documents from state archives [*]
The criteria according to which the governmental archives (the IDF Archive and the State Archive) decide whether to expose or conceal historical documentation - are not sufficiently transparent to the public. These criteria are also not fixed and have changed over the years.
"The Topics Document" [מסמך הצירים], alongside additional related historical documentation, was itself concealed and closed to review for many years. Only after three years of insistence with the State Archive was it finally transferred to the #Akevot ["footprints"] Institute.
So what are the sensitive issues, pertaining to IDF's image, Israel might like to conceal from scrutiny by researches?
One of those "sensitive topics" defined in the document is material that portrays the IDF as an occupying army devoid of moral foundations, which could harm its image as a moral army. Under this topic, eight concrete issues were listed, including:
Violent conduct against the Arab population and acts of cruelty (killing, murder not necessitated by combat, rape, looting, pillage)
Desecration of holy sites (desecration of churches, mosques and cemeteries)
Criminal acts (theft, looting of property, forgeries and destruction of evidence)
Atrocities committed against Jewish women (rape)
Atrocities committed by IDF divisions [in the War of Independence]: (Hula, Khisas, Eilaboun, Duwayma, etc.).
Another topic is aspects of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict itself, Israel would like to avoid making public due to national security concerns:
Expulsion of Palestinians: Policy of retaliation against infiltrators; orders to harm infiltrators even in case of doubt
Establishing policy against return of Palestinians to their lands
Evacuation of Palestinian settlements and residents (Majdal, today "Ashkelon")
Violent conduct against prisoners contrary to the Geneva Convention (killing); not taking notice of white flags
Bombing of civilian facilities (bombing of hospitals to refugee camps Gaza, El Burj)
[*] Declassification of government papers according to the thirty years limit, by law, led to the emergence of the "New Historians" in Israel [Avi Shlaim, Ilan Pappe, Benny Morris ...], who are known, collectively, to have challenged Israel's Zionist narrative of the Israel-Palestinian conflict
#IDF /on the "topics document" [מסמך הצירים] was drafted in 1988 to regulate the release of sensitive documents from state archives [*]
The criteria according to which the governmental archives (the IDF Archive and the State Archive) decide whether to expose or conceal historical documentation - are not sufficiently transparent to the public. These criteria are also not fixed and have changed over the years.
"The Topics Document" [מסמך הצירים], alongside additional related historical documentation, was itself concealed and closed to review for many years. Only after three years of insistence with the State Archive was it finally transferred to the #Akevot ["footprints"] Institute.
So what are the sensitive issues, pertaining to IDF's image, Israel might like to conceal from scrutiny by researches?
One of those "sensitive topics" defined in the document is material that portrays the IDF as an occupying army devoid of moral foundations, which could harm its image as a moral army. Under this topic, eight concrete issues were listed, including:
Violent conduct against the Arab population and acts of cruelty (killing, murder not necessitated by combat, rape, looting, pillage)
Desecration of holy sites (desecration of churches, mosques and cemeteries)
Criminal acts (theft, looting of property, forgeries and destruction of evidence)
Atrocities committed against Jewish women (rape)
Atrocities committed by IDF divisions [in the War of Independence]: (Hula, Khisas, Eilaboun, Duwayma, etc.).
Another topic is aspects of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict itself, Israel would like to avoid making public due to national security concerns:
Expulsion of Palestinians: Policy of retaliation against infiltrators; orders to harm infiltrators even in case of doubt
Establishing policy against return of Palestinians to their lands
Evacuation of Palestinian settlements and residents (Majdal, today "Ashkelon")
Violent conduct against prisoners contrary to the Geneva Convention (killing); not taking notice of white flags
Bombing of civilian facilities (bombing of hospitals to refugee camps Gaza, El Burj)
[*] Declassification of government papers according to the thirty years limit, by law, led to the emergence of the "New Historians" in Israel [Avi Shlaim, Ilan Pappe, Benny Morris ...], who are known, collectively, to have challenged Israel's Zionist narrative of the Israel-Palestinian conflict
#nakba / Shiblī, ʻAdanīyah, and Elisabeth Jaquette. Minor Detail. New York: New Directions Publishing Corporation, 2020.
The true story of how a Bedouin girl was raped and murdered by Israeli soldiers.
[…] The Negev gang rape at the heart of Minor Detail is a true story, carried out by Israeli soldiers in 1949. Another minor detail: according to declassified documents, the real-life commander answered his superior’s question on whether the girl was eventually returned to her village by reporting that his soldiers killed her because “it was a shame to waste the petrol”.
#media / why are Israelis so indefernt to what IDF is doing in their name in Gaza?
Israeli TV news is accused of an uncritical, one-dimensional war coverage that avoids confronting difficult realities and serves the government's narrative. Critics urge more balanced, responsible journalism.
Ido David Chason identified the shift in the media coverage of the war on Gaza this way:
Israeli TV news coverage of the current Gaza war is criticized for becoming increasingly one-sided, uncritically repeating the Israeli military's version of events, downplaying Palestinian suffering, and engaging in self-censorship.
The news heavily relies on daily briefings by #IDF spokesman Brig. Gen. Ran Kochav, treating him as an unimpeachable source of truth. Critical voices and context from #Gaza are largely missing.
This contrasts with the professional coverage in the initial aftermath of the October 7th terror attack. Since the IDF ground invasion began, TV news has aligned itself with the national mood, avoiding complex debates so as not to demoralize the public.
Experts argue this "rally around the flag" approach ultimately harms journalism's role. The public gets accustomed to dehumanizing the other side and not understanding why the world sympathizes with Palestinian victims.
The uniformly patriotic commentary panels also concern critics. They say more dissenting voices, especially from Israel's Arab community which has been excluded from the discourse, are sorely lacking.
Some see the drive to portray a victory, as the war's stated goal of decisively defeating #Hamas drifts further away, mainly motivated by economic incentives to retain viewers and advertisers. The coverage risks becoming purely propaganda.
It's sad to say, but the media of the "only Democracy in the Middle East" is fully mobilized. Except for #Haaretz, which operates outside the consensus, Israel's news sites and daily newspapers highlight #IDF heroism, while concealing the kidnapped and ignoring or downplaying the killing of thousands of Gazan children.
Israeli readers are getting a daily diet consisting of every food fight on #socialmedia between celebs pro-Israel or pro-Palestine, truly bizarre opinion columns written by an Israeli Palestinian, glorifying #Zionism and admiring Jews, or simplistic and obnoxious opinion pieces like "Gaza minus Israelis = Auschwitz".
From "The massacre brought Jews back to the beginnings of Zionism", penned by Mahmud Abu Raj'ab:
"[...] And before they [the Jews] forget the spirit inspired them when they established the state [of Israel], and before they reach the stage where "blindness blinds their eyes", someone comes who wakes them up from their deep slumber and brings them back to the ground of reality. So do not be frightened or dismayed."
(last expression taken from Joshua, 10:25)
The text on Ynet (which never publishes anything in Arabic) is available in both Hebrew and Arabic, "بعد المذبحة: عودة الى البدايات دولة اليهود لا تزال في صعود."