Bereaved Families Challenge IDF Chief of Staff Over October 7th Failure Assessment

Families of fallen soldiers have voiced strong objections to a recent order of the day issued by IDF Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir, in which he stated that the army failed in its defense on October 7th. The bereaved families, part of the "Forum of Valor," wrote to Zamir on Monday, arguing that his assessment unfairly attributes the failure to the entire military.

In their letter, the Forum's management stated, "We read with great sorrow your order of the day in which you wrote that 'the IDF failed in defending the country's borders on October 7th.' We, the families who paid the heaviest price in the war, wish to tell you: the IDF did not fail. Those who managed it from above failed."

The families emphasized that the soldiers and commanders who fought bravely on the ground should not be included in the definition of failure. "The IDF is our sons and daughters who fought heroically until they fell in battle. The IDF is the thousands of fighters and commanders who rose that morning, charged the enemy, stopped them, and saved the State of Israel from an even greater disaster," the letter read. "They were not the failure. They were the ones sent to repair its consequences with their bodies and blood."

The Forum contends that Zamir's wording blurs the distinction between the leadership that made decisions and the forces that fought on the ground. "Turning a failure of the top brass into a failure of the entire IDF is not just a mistake in wording. It is a erasure of the difference between those who made the decisions and bore responsibility, and those who fought to correct their consequences."

They concluded by urging Zamir to place responsibility on the correct parties. "Mr. Chief of Staff, do not cast the stain of failure on an entire army. Responsibility must be placed where it lies. The fighters of October 7th, the living and the fallen, deserve a salute, not a stain of failure."