August 15, 2008

By Cnaan Liphshiz

Local pacifists this week sharply criticized the Israel Scouts movement for recruiting ex-Israelis and Diaspora Jews to enlist into the Israeli military, saying its project "cynically brainwashes children into joining Israel's foreign legion." Over the past five years, the Garin Tzabar project, which the Israel Scouts founded in 1991, has seen a 500-percent spike in participation. This week, the final members of a record-breaking cohort of 160 army-age Jews from the West, predominantly from the U.S., arrived in Israel. They are set to enlist in the coming weeks.

Twenty of the participants of the program, which the movement runs in partnership with the Israel Defense Forces, the Jewish Agency, MASA and the Absorption Ministry, are new immigrants. The remaining 140 are children of ex-Israelis. "The cooperation between the Israeli military and Israel's branch of the Scouts movement, the result of which is 'Garin Tzabar,' is incredibly scandalous," says Russian-born Sergeiy Sandler from New Profile - a movement devoted to countering militarism in Israeli society. Ruth Hiller, New Profile's U.S.-born cofounder, said the organization has been monitoring Garin Tzabar for a long time. New Profile's youth group coordinator, Raanan Forshner, said he was "alarmed" at the growth in the numbers. "Equipped with very little if any information and understanding of the complicated network of conflicts in the Middle East, and with lots of adrenaline, these children are ideal targets for such recruitment efforts," said Sandler. "It is not hard to turn them into enthusiastic 'volunteers' to the army."

Tzabar participants do express enthusiasm about joining the army. But in a conversation on Tuesday with some of the program's recruits, several said they had contacted Garin Tzabar, and not the other way around, after deciding to enlist. "I talked about joining the army for years," Edan Ben-Atar, 20, from Maryland said at the Nordia Guesthouse near Netanya, where some of the recruits currently reside. "But I don't think it would have happened if it weren't for the [Garin Tzabar] program." Ben Atar's family left Sderot almost 10 years ago. Today, his accent and demeanor are indistinguishable from any American his age.

Boasting an impressive knowledge of IDF combat units, which he says he picked up on the internet, Daniel Wolkowitz, 20, came to Garin Tzabar specifically to request facilitation of his enlistment. Wolkowitz, who was born in New York to ex-Israeli parents, said he picked Tzabar after consulting with friends on the best way to enlist.

One Tzabar guide said most recruits are not Scouts graduates or trainees at all, and join Garin Tzabar and the Israel Scouts groups in the U.S. for the sole purpose of entering the IDF through the program. The Garin Tzabar staff, he said, is made up of fewer than 10 individuals.

"We don't indoctrinate or convince any of the recruits," said Idan Ianovici, himself a Tzabar graduate who worked as an emissary of the program in the U.S. Ianovici explained the Israel Scouts abroad started out as a solution for ex-Israeli parents who wanted an Israel-oriented base of support for their children. "We give a social framework and facilitate enlistment issues for the recruits - that's all," he said.

New Profile's Sandler said, "The recruitment effort is here disguised as a seemingly harmless youth activity, backed by the 'brand name' of the Scouts." Calling the use of scout symbols "doubly deplorable," he added, "The Israeli Scouts movement should be disaffiliated from the international one and should not be allowed to use the name or symbols of the Scouts in any future activity, for using this name and these symbols in such a cynical way and for such immoral purposes."

The Geneva-based World Organization of the Scout Movement did not reply to Anglo File's requests for a reaction to these complaints.

According to data compiled by the organizers of Garin Tzabar, 80 percent of the project's graduates immigrate to Israel. The families of more than 30 percent of graduates eventually follow them and move to Israel. Acknowledging this as an achievement, Raanan Forshner, New Profile youth coordinator, said: "Let Israel appeal to young American Jews by boasting a modern, advanced society, instead of brandishing a powerful army. Surely, we have better things to offer."