Gadi Eisenkot

As army chief, six months after the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, he told a security conference that the deal held many dangers but also opportunities, and that Iran would keep it for five years and return to seeking a bomb within fifteen.

“The deal is a significant change in the vector Iran is going toward.”

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Not clear either way

He saw both danger and gain in a deal with Tehran and neither backed nor opposed it, so the words do not settle the measure.

Speaking about a possible new confrontation with Iran, he welcomed the American build-up of force and said Israel must be ready to carry out operations itself.

“We need to support, ensure and prepare to carry out operations ourselves both for defense and for offense.”

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Supporting American action against Iran and preparing Israeli strikes is backing military pressure on the regime.

He said that during Iran's first missile attack on Israel in April 2024 he advised the prime minister to strike Iran while the missiles were still in the air.

“I recommended a simultaneous strike while the missiles were still on their way here.”

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Urging a military strike on the Islamic Republic is backing military action against the regime.

Three months into Russia's invasion of Ukraine he pointed to the war as an example of what international support can do for the weaker army, without saying what Israel should do.

“you can see what international perception and support can do to a country's prowess”

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Not clear either way

An observation about the war that takes no side on helping Ukraine does not settle the measure.

He said he would invest in the relationship with the United States, which he called crucial under both Biden and Trump.

“These are special relations that are a necessity for Israel.”

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Backing the alliance with the United States is standing with the free world.

He said military or national service must apply to everyone, Haredim included, and that he would rather face another election than give that up.

“My approach has not changed: service for everyone. Even at the cost of additional elections”

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Insisting on conscription for all supplies the manpower the armed forces depend on.

He said the army's urgent funding request should be met at once and accused the finance minister of lying about why the money could not be moved.

“It is possible and necessary to provide an immediate response to the IDF's urgent needs, without abandoning responsibility for the public coffers and without reopening the budget for three readings.”

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Calling for the armed forces to be funded without delay is funding and equipping them.

Asked in June about Arab parties, he ruled none out by name and said he would sit with any party that accepts three principles.

“I will sit with anyone who accepts three principles - Israel as a Jewish and democratic state, the values of the Declaration of Independence and mandatory military or national service.”

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The answer neither accepts nor refuses the Islamic party Ra'am as a partner.

He said the two Arab-led lists, among them the Islamic party Ra'am, cannot be coalition partners, because the next government's guidelines will require every partner to accept that Hamas is a terrorist organisation.

“it will be written that whoever does not accept that Hamas is a terrorist organization, that it needs to be dismantled and destroyed, will not be a partner in the next government.”

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Keeping parties that will not call Hamas terrorist out of government is acting against Hamas and those who will not disown it.

He said every school, religious ones included, would have to be inside the state education system and teach the core subjects or lose its state funding.

“Whoever is not in state education - secular, religious, Haredi, Arab - will not receive funding from the state”

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Ending state money for religious schools that stay outside the common system removes an exemption given to religious bodies.

He said his draft plan would still let 3 percent of each year's Haredi age group, about 2,200 people, be exempted from service to study Torah.

“Today, an annual cohort is approximately 70,000 people, so 3% is about 2,200.... Israel can permit that.”

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Not clear either way

He would end the blanket religious exemption but keep a small one in law, so the line does not settle the measure.

Yashar candidate Orit Farkash-Hacohen, setting out the party's economic plan, said it would close ministries it sees as unnecessary, cut spending tied to coalition deals, review subsidies that discourage work and open markets to import competition.

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Less state spending, fewer subsidies and freer imports are on the market side of the measure.

He said his four-year reform of the schools would mean putting a lot of public money into the education system.

“a lot of money into the education system in order to improve it.”

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Not clear either way

Spending more on schools is not a tax rise, a price control or state ownership, so the line does not settle the measure.

His party's plan for young adults promises protection mechanisms for renters, which the newspaper's headline calls rent caps, along with higher pay for conscripts.

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Rent control would be against the measure, but the plan's own wording on the page does not say what the protection is.

He opposed the defence minister's decision to shut Army Radio, a station he had earlier wanted moved out of the army and kept as a public broadcaster.

“Army Radio is a cornerstone asset of Israeli life. Closing it is an attack on freedom of the press and a dishonest political step.”

In Hebrew: גלי צה"ל היא נכס צאן ברזל בישראליות. סגירתה היא פגיעה בחופש העיתונות וצעד פוליטי לא ישר.

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Opposing a government decision to close a broadcaster is the side against shutting down media.