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Moshe Ya'alon

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Moshe Ya'alon
Nickname(s)Boogie
AllegianceIsrael Defense Forces
RankLieutenant-General
Commands heldGadsar Tzanchanim, Sayeret Matkal, Paratroopers Brigade, West Bank Division, AMAN, Central Command, General Staff
Battles/warsYom Kippur War, Operation Litani, 1982 Lebanon War, 1982-2000 South Lebanon conflict, First Intifada, Second Intifada
AwardsLegion of Merit
Other workShalem Center, Likud

Moshe "Boogie" Ya'alon (Hebrew: משה "בוגי" יעלון; born Moshe Smilansky on 24 June 1950) is an Israeli politician and former Chief of Staff of the Israel Defense Forces. He currently serves as a member of the Knesset for Likud.

Biography

Ya'alon was born as Moshe Smilansky and grew up in Kiryat Haim, a working class suburb of Haifa. He was active in the Labor Zionist youth movement "HaNoar HaOved VeHaLomed" and joined a Nahal group named Ya'alon, a name he later adopted. His military service between 1968 and 1971 was in the nahal, and he later became a member of kibutz Grofit in the Arabah region near Eilat.

Military career

Following the Yom Kippur War in 1973, where Ya'alon served as a reservist, he rejoined the IDF and served in the Paratroopers Brigades and Sayeret Matkal.

Ya'alon was appointed a head of Military Intelligence in 1995 and commanding officer of Israel's Central Command, responsible for the West Bank, in 1998. He was in this position when the Second Intifada was launched in September 2000. He was appointed Chief of Staff on 9 July 2002, and served in that position until 1 June 2005. The major focus throughout his service was the army's effort to quell the Second Intifada.

Ya'alon's public pronouncements have been controversial. For example he told the Haaretz newspaper on 27 August 2002; "The Palestinian threat harbours cancer-like attributes that have to be severed. There are all kinds of solutions to cancer. Some say it's necessary to amputate organs but at the moment I am applying chemotherapy."[1] In January 2004, he publicly stated that the 13 Sayeret Matkal soldiers who refused to serve in the Israeli-occupied territories were taking the unit's name in vain.

In February 2005, Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz decided not to prolong Ya'alon's service as Chief of Staff for another year. This marked the climax of tensions between Mofaz and Ya'alon, which had arisen partly through Ya'alon's objection to the Gaza disengagement plan. On 1 June 2005, Ya'alon ended his military service and Dan Halutz, his successor, oversaw the disengagement.

In December 2005, relatives of the victims of the 1996 shelling of Qana filed suit against Ya'alon in Washington, D.C., for his role in their deaths.[2] In late 2006, Ya'alon was in New Zealand on a private fund-raising trip organised by the Jewish National Fund. An Auckland District Court judge issued a warrant for his arrest for alleged war crimes arising from his role in the 2002 assassination of Hamas leader Salah Shahade in Gaza City, in which at least 14 Palestinian civilians were killed,[3] saying that New Zealand had an obligation to uphold the Geneva Convention. The Attorney-General of New Zealand, Michael Cullen, overruled the warrant after advice from the Crown Law office that there was insufficient evidence.[4] [3]

A widely cited Ya'alon quotation, "The Palestinians must be made to understand in the deepest recesses of their consciousness that they are a defeated people", was reported to be unverifiable by the New York Times, and did not appear in the interview where he is usually attributed to have said it.[5] The quote appears in a May 2003 article by journalist Arnaud de Borchgrave, that does not specify its source.[6]

In January 2008, during a discussion on the Interdisciplinary Center, Ya'alon said "There is no way to stabilize the situation all over the world and especially in the Middle East without confronting Iran."[7]

After leaving his position as Chief of Staff Ya'alon spent some time in the think tank Washington Institute for Near East Policy and became a Senior Fellow at the Adelson Institute for Strategic Studies at the Shalem Center Institute for International and Middle East Studies. Ya'alon also serves as the chairman of the Center for Jewish Identity and Culture at Beit Morasha in Jerusalem.

Political career

Template:MKs On 17 November 2008 Ya'alon announced that he was joining Likud and that he would participate in the primaries which would determine the Likud candidates for the 2009 elections.[8] He won eighth place on the party's list,[9] and entered the Knesset as Likud won 27 seats.

References

  1. ^ The enemy within Ha'aretz
  2. ^ Lawsuit filed against Ya'alon in US court The Jerusalem Post
  3. ^ a b "Ex-Israeli army chief praises NZ for wiping arrest warrant". New Zealand Herald.
  4. ^ "Government overrules war-crimes arrest order". New Zealand Herald.
  5. ^ Rashid Khalidi (2009-01-08). "What You Don't Know About Gaza". New York Times. (see Editor's Note)
  6. ^ Road map or road rage? Washington Times, 27 May 2003
  7. ^ Interview with Former IDF Chief-of-Staff Moshe Yaalon The College Zionist
  8. ^ Meranda, Amnon (2008-11-18). "Yaalon: Withdrawals Must End". Ynetnews. Retrieved 2008-11-19.
  9. ^ "Likud primary results for February 10th national elections". Haaretz. 2008-12-09. Retrieved 2008-12-09.

Bibliography

Moshe Ya'alon on the Knesset website

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