Shavua Imun

Thankfully, after 19 days regilah from Liora’s wedding and the gdud’s 10 day regilah, I was eased back into the army with a week of drills and exercises. The Gdud decided to take the opportunity in between our former posting and our future one to spend time on bonding activities, preparation of our equipment, and a gdud-wide exercise.

On Sunday, we came back to the Sportek at Netivot for a “Yom Sport’ a day of athletic competitions between all the palgot in the gdud. Rope pulls, races, soccer, basketball, swimming. I wasn’t signed up for anything and spent the day spectating, cheering on the palga.

It’s always weird coming back to the army after a break. It’s only intensified when the break is longer. With the 19 day break, I felt free again in Israel. Like a regular citizen. Hanging out with friends, going on dates, hikes and trips around the country. It’s obviously hard coming back to a life of strict routine and restricted freedoms. That, coupled with the evergreen reality of my advanced age on the rest of the tzevet and pluga and the unceasing advancement of my friends careers and lives outside the army, makes the return difficult. But it’s what I signed up for and I’ll always be happy I have this opportunity to play my part. I will say though that now that I’ve passed the one year mark, I’ve started the count to the end. 5 months left…

We went to bed late around 2 AM because we were looking for mattresses to sleep on. And even though there wasnt anything to do in the morning, we still woke up at 7:30. Sorry let me rephrase that. From 8 AM till Noon we were supposed to work on our equipment. “Where are the supplies to work on the equipment,” we asked the commanders. “Not here”. (Basically the army in a nutshell). We sat around all morning.

In the afternoon, we started having classes to prepare us for the new Kav: Ayosh aka the West Bank. There are different rules of engagement than Gaza. Everything happens much faster. You don’t have 10 minutes after someone crosses the yellow line to go and apprehend them.  You can be standing at a guardpost and suddenly a terrorist runs at you with a knife. A very different reality.

We went to bed at 9:30 ( 11:30 after waiting for everyone to stop talking) and woke up at 4:30 for the run evaluation. Since we’ve been in Gaza as a Pluga for two months now, no one’s run in a while. All our times were the worst we’ve gotten.

We spent time in a classroom with Ben Ami going over Tachkirim – reports of events armywide of all types. They’re meant to teach us about how to properly operate in every situation. Well spend time going through what happened (sometimes as far back as 25 or 30 years – taking out a terrorist, an operational vehicle, a soldier falling asleep on duty and missing something important, etc. and speak about takeaways.

Another point Ben Ami (the מ”פ) always emphasizes is that before everything else, we’re Bnei Adam, human beings. That carries a lot of weight. You wouldn’t steal money from a terrorist you apprehend, you’d bandage and treat a terrorist you neutralized non lethally, you wouldn’t bash the windows of cars.  It doesn’t even enter his consciousness to act without the decency of a human being before everything else. No matter the political or intersocial climate between us and those who wish to harm us. He expects the same of his soldiers.

We had an erev gdudi: food, gifts, music and a very relaxed day the next day before an overnight Targad (targil gdudi, a gdud-wide drill). We were told we would be walking 3 kilometers and then capturing a couple of structures. We were excited; it’s been a long time since we drilled.

We started the march, expecting to get to the structures within an hour or two maximum. We walked on incredibly rocky, unstable terrain. Through forest and brush, without light or night vision equipment. We stumbled around, trying to keep pace with the people in front of us, while also trying to not be too close which poses the danger of mass casualties in a real march. After about two hours, army DJI drones outfitted with speakers flew overhead and played the sounds of rockets falling “גשם סגול”. We scattered, finding cover behind boulders before getting up and continuing the march. This happened 7 times.

We ended up marching for 8 hours to cover only 3 kilometers. Ridiculous. At the final stop before conquering the first structure, at 4 AM, we heard “סוף תרגיל יבש”: end of the drill. And that was that. After all that, marching through forest and brush only in the hopes the drill would get more interesting and we’d do what we “set out to do”, it was over.

We had a tekes afterwards with the new Magad. He spoke about his faith and trust in us and how he also believes in the importance of our experience during our service. For that reason, he also was letting us go home Thursday instead of Friday. We had a celebratory breakfast, went back to Bach Tzanchanim to prepare all we needed to before departure and before the ascension to a new Kav and then went home. Overall, a very relaxed, easy week before the start of a new Kav in the west bank.