Report: Reserve Soldiers' Children Are Falling Through the Cracks
As the war began on October 7, Shani Maklev’s reserve-officer husband was immediately called up, leaving her at home with two children who needed support. She said she had to seek private emotional help because schools did not provide enough assistance, and that after more than 450 days of reserve duty, he is now in his eighth deployment. Their children are now 8 and 11.
Maklev said her school asked which pupils had reserve-duty parents and briefly offered a one-hour session with a counselor, but it was not tailored to reserve families. She said she repeatedly updated the school before each new call-up, yet, “there is no response from the school.” She added that teachers even joked, “What, he is in reserve again?”, while she sees the issue as one requiring long-term support, not a one-off intervention.
Her account sits at the center of a Knesset Research Center report on support for students whose parents serve in the reserves or in the regular army. The report says there are gaps between the data held on such students and how schools actually use it for identification, follow-up and support. It also says most clauses in Education Ministry guidelines are written as recommendations rather than binding orders, leaving wide discretion to principals and staff. According to Defense Ministry figures, more than 320,000 children under 18 have reserve-service parents, 37% of reservists are parents, and 68,531 reservists who served more than 55 days in the past year are parents of tens of thousands of students.
The report warns that prolonged absence of a parent can cause emotional and learning difficulties that vary by age, from distress in infancy to behavioral risks in high school. A 2025 Central Bureau of Statistics survey found 52% of reservists’ spouses reported a worsening in their children’s mental state. In a December 2025 forum survey, 90% of parents saw a negative emotional trend and 44% sought therapy for their children; another survey found 95% said schools provided no fixed dedicated support during the war. The Education Ministry said it had already adopted a structured policy in early 2024 for identification, mapping and support, and that schools have a dedicated data system and professional backing.
