"Hezbollah cut the fence, why didn't you shoot?": The answer that left Avigdor Kahalani in shock

Once a year, Avigdor Kahalani takes 40,000 students to the Golan Heights. On a green ridge, facing an ancient landscape, he raises the flag and makes them swear to guard the country for him. "It's a thousand buses of the TikTok generation," he smiles cheerfully, "we are talking about most of the 12th-grade graduates, half a year before enlistment."

"I look at them and compare them to the young people we were. We were called the 'espresso generation' because the coffee machine had just been invented. They said about me, is this youth? These are dregs, the rotten oranges in the orchard, and about today's youth they also said it's a seventh generation, spoiled. And I look at them and think to myself, they have proven themselves much more than we did."

And their commanders? "Commanders need to be detached from the leaders, understand the big picture, and not engage in politics."

Does this explain October 7th? "There are three things beyond my understanding. One is the human body, I am not able to explain it. Here I am raising a hand, moving fingers, and yet I am not connected to electricity. The second is the universe. Where does it begin, where does it end, what does it stand on, who manages it. And the third is October 7th. As someone who commanded three divisions, it is beyond my understanding. I am not able to explain how this happened to us. I can analyze processes, talk about what preceded what, but I am not able to explain on a tactical level what really happened to the army that morning. After all, when I was a brigade commander on the Golan Heights, I would go down at 3:00 AM to the fence and shake it to see how long it would take for the tanks to reach me. They feared me more than the Syrians. I was constantly alert because I had the responsibility of a commander. Therefore, I do not understand where the alertness was on October 7th."

Where really? "The commanders looked up, they didn't look down. They looked for the wind, where it was blowing, and the wind said, silence will be met with silence. The wind said, let's bring thousands of Palestinians to work in Israel. The legal counsel said, don't shoot at those approaching the fence. I asked a gunner from a battalion in the north, when Hezbollah approached the fence and cut it, why didn't you shoot at him, and he said, according to the orders, we are allowed to shoot at terrorists only if they threaten us, and cutting the fence did not threaten me."

What are the commanders to blame for if those were the orders that came from above? "I don't accept that. There is a situation where a commander stands on his two hind legs. I had such situations. I had orders to execute that I knew endangered my soldiers. So I approached the senior commander and asked him to authorize me to carry out the mission in my own way. And he agreed, because he understood that only someone who grew from the tank's grease can understand how this machine works. And because we did things my way, very many soldiers were not killed. A commander has responsibility. How does a cyclist ride? Lifts the head up but pedals downwards. And below are the soldiers."

On the eve of Netanyahu's trip to the White House, "Commanders for Israel's Security" sent an urgent letter to Trump: "Settler terror is destructive, prevent a disaster."

"Turning to Trump with our internal problem does not bring honor to anyone, and also not security. If you can, establish a party and determine the path through the Knesset. We need to guard our country from within. Not to look for a nanny outside."

At the age of 82, Avigdor Kahalani is the busiest man around. Hero of Israel, commander of the 7th Brigade in the Yom Kippur War, recipient of the Medal of Valor and the Medal of Distinguished Service, and someone who was the Minister of Internal Security in Netanyahu's first government - does not stop at red. He is revolutionizing as chairman of the IDF Pensioners Organization, serving as chairman of the Shorr Center for the Study of the Jewish People and as chairman of the 7th Brigade, lecturing in the country and the world "as the Yemenite jewel", educating generations of students on heritage and fulfillment, and he is also a writer and publisher who works every day from dawn until midnight. "When I wake up at 4:00 AM, the organizations I head have a problem, because I bring new ideas," he smiles.

He has no secretary, not even a driver or an accountant. "I am a one-man show," he testifies about himself. "The children are going crazy from me, they say, Dad, rest a little, why do we have to go through the schedule to meet you? I tell them, sorry, I don't have time to waste time. And I don't have time to die now. I am very busy."

Now he is releasing a new book, the seventh in number, "Between the Main and the Trivial! - Insights from a long and winding road" (self-published) which he also wrote without an editor and advisors, on white paper, without lines, with a green pen and in straight and consistent handwriting, wonderfully organized. "For 60 years I have been writing with a green pen, I received such a pen once and fell in love with the color." Sometimes he reaches such a deep concentration in writing that tears fall from his eyes onto the smooth paper and become an integral part of the text. The new book includes a collection of ideas and insights from his experience and worldview for all areas of life, from birth to death. "At my age, I can afford to change position, not only to tell about past experiences but also to give advice for life."

Why specifically now? "Maybe because I reached an age where one feels the need to pass the knowledge on. Not long ago I sat with my two grandchildren, one got married not long ago, the other is about to get married, and I read them the chapter on relationships. I peek from the corner of my eye and see that they are looking at each other with such a look of, Grandpa, what do you want from our lives. I told them, from me you will see and so you will do, because even after 60 years my marriage is steel. They told me, how can that be? I told them, because we got married on a tank."

What is the most significant insight in the book? "That most points of view stem from the cemetery."

Explain. "If you have to make a difficult decision in your life, go to the cemetery, look at the young people who died before they turned 20 and you will understand the meaning of life. Therefore I called the book 'Between the Main and the Trivial', so that a person will know where he is going, what he wants to achieve and especially what he leaves behind. It is impossible not to leave signs that we were here. Life is not a dune that passes in the wind. A person must leave a mark on the basalt rocks for the generation that comes after him, otherwise, he passed with the wind. And therefore the book."

Avigdor Kahalani, the tanker and legend, stood in the Six-Day War at the head of a tank company, and in the heroic battle for the Al-Jirdi complex, he caught fire and was mortally wounded. In the War of Attrition, he was still recovering from his wounds, but at its end, he insisted on returning to the army and fought in the Yom Kippur War. The battle in the Valley of Tears on the Golan Heights turned him into a myth. Kahalani attacked at the head of the force while being outside the turret. In one of the cases, he destroyed three tanks alone and in the whole war destroyed with the force under his command hundreds of Syrian tanks and managed to reconquer the positions. At the end of the war, he was awarded the Medal of Valor which joined the Medal of Distinguished Service he received in the Six-Day War. "It's like a Star of David on the forehead," he said about it in the past. "I don't see, others see."

Since then, the security reality in Israel has changed completely, but Kahalani, who follows closely the ongoing campaign against Iran, believes that the principles of decision remain as they were. "Whoever swims in the ocean does not stop making movements, because he will drown. Iran is the ocean, and it has one mission: to drown us, and therefore we will not stop making movements. Iran has set itself to destroy the State of Israel. It will not change its mind, I understand this literally, no interpretation is needed, I don't believe in statements such as, they don't mean it, one can sit for talks and reach agreements, the people love us. I start from the assumption that I will not be able to convince Iran to love me and connect to me, and therefore the struggle continues and one must prepare for it."

How is it worth preparing? "Before the Six-Day War I sat for two months opposite the Golan Heights, I was a company commander and guarded the border. I remember I would look at the heights and ask myself, who can even conquer this thing? And in the end, we conquered it in one day, the sixth day of the war, and we passed the barrier of fear. Also about Iran, we thought the same thing. Who can handle it, and here came an operation with Kelvia and we passed the barrier of fear. This is the most important thing we did. It not only strengthens us, it is also a message to Iran, which understands that we are in a different place towards it. The achievement in the recent rounds against Iran is phenomenal, and belongs to the Mossad, which brought the intelligence, and to the Israeli pilots. I salute them. If I had the privilege to sit in a plane and do the work against Iran, I would return home and walk around like a peacock."

But we entered an endless round, what is the purpose in repeated sorties under the auspices and based on American decisions and instructions? "I think that in this case, the American involvement gave us the ability to do things. Not only to enable the power of the Air Force, but also assistance with bombs and global backing. I hope that the American support will not tire. Since I know that the Iranians have not changed their agenda in the attempt to destroy me, then the fact that the Americans are with us is a blessing."

But the enriched uranium, the clear and immediate danger, did not go anywhere. "Why am I as the State of Israel accused of not destroying the uranium? I didn't manage to reach it, what to do. At least the Iranians know now that they don't just have the European committee that sits on their head and supervises them, but also Israel has the possibility to reach there. This is also important. Instead, they accuse Israel that it didn't manage to reach the nuclear. Does anyone know how to do it better? I don't think that with the existing data it was possible to reach the enriched uranium. I do think that one must continue to look for the way to do it."

One thing is to admit that we didn't succeed, another thing is to be arrogant that we managed to hit the nuclear facilities and Iran mortally. Do promises without coverage not weaken the spirit of the people and its trust? "Modesty has power. People prefer a modest leader than arrogant leadership. I think that a leader should be careful in his declarations until proven otherwise. The declaration that we destroyed and hit Iran, it is possible that it was intended to express an aspiration or it was a too fast declaration of something that has not yet been checked deeply. A pity. Sometimes a person becomes a pufferfish, inflates himself to justify the actions he did."

How do you predict the continuation of the campaign against Iran? "I predict that in the end, a compromise agreement formula will be found between the Americans and the Iranians, and I am very worried about this. Because the agreement will lead to the cessation of fighting and will not lead to the cessation of the Iranian dream to lay a hand on nuclear weapons that threatens our future. The Iran-Iraq war lasted eight years, and every morning I wished them that both sides would succeed. Whoever knows the Arab mentality knows that within all the interests there is a lot of ego. And even if you destroyed the enemy's house, if he takes out two fingers from under the ruins and signals V, the meaning for him is that he won. Therefore Iran acts from a place of power, and I fear that in the negotiation agreement it will blur the nuclear issue, a thing that will bring us to great danger."

How to deal with such a danger? "Israel needs to become a strong power that scares the environment. There is no other way."

How can one become a strong power, when the American president, who is in charge of ammunition and aid, decides and directs our military conduct? "A power is not buying tomatoes from Turkey. It is producing them alone. A power is not being dependent on the United States but producing weapons ourselves. To become a power not only in the defense industries but in every field, like in the high-tech industries. Then it is not certain that we will manage to deal with the F-35 planes, but we will manage to beat all the rest. Why did we close the ammunition factories? Why did we stop making a thousand tanks operational? Because someone saved money and saw a vision of a small and smart army. Why did we fire hundreds of permanent staff, why in the Ministry of Defense did they not touch one person, but in the army, they fired thousands of fighters and servants? I am ready for a smart army, a quality army, but not small, because today there is not even anyone to take care of the warehouses and ammunition."

So what is the solution? "An orderly program at the state level that touches all areas: treasury, transport, infrastructure, recruitment, training. As chairman of the IDF Pensioners Organization, I propose a decade program. They told me, what decade, let's deal first of all with the current year, and I say, one needs to look forward. And this is only at the local level. A government must look forward, the problem is that it is busy with survival. When I was elected to the Knesset, the prime minister was elected personally and there was an additional ballot for the party. In this way, the prime minister did not have to scrape votes all the time so that they would not oust him. And then they changed the election system, and the government is busy with survival. It is enough that one is sick, the second his mother died, and already there is no committee and no votes, and the weak holds the government by the throat. This is not how you build a solution to the security and social problems that the State of Israel is facing at this time. A government needs to rule, and it doesn't matter which government. It must rule and look far forward."

And on the Lebanon front? "Continue to fight. I tell students at age 18, what to do, you are screwed. You were born here, and on your generation, it is imposed to fight and guard the country. Here also I, the first screwed one, stand before you. Lebanon is a miserable country that was captured by Hezbollah. Hezbollah was established because of us, because we left a vacuum. Should one have stayed in Lebanon? I am the first who said that one should leave. I am also the first who arrived in Beirut. As a minister and as an MK I went to Rabin and Bibi and told them, get out of Lebanon. The platform of the party I established, 'The Third Way', was leaving Lebanon, because I thought that we are losing every year dozens of soldiers and anyway they are shooting at Metula. I said, all this force can be put on the fence. And then we left, and Hezbollah sat on the fence, and today all of Lebanon is captured under it and we need to help the government there to go free."

How exactly? To leave Lebanon again? "No. Today we are dealing with a different reality. Hezbollah reached a state that it is capable of shooting 150,000 missiles at the State of Israel. Their mission has changed. In 2000 the mission was to guard the security, today their mission is to destroy us. Today they also have a financier whose pipes I haven't closed yet. Therefore we need to continue to fight. To reach the huge amounts of ammunition hidden under the ground. To destroy their capabilities and block the routes as a proxy of Iran. Luckily today there is a president in Lebanon who wants this. We need to help him, because he will not be able to uproot this cancer alone. And then, when the Hezbollah fighter will not have for what to wake up in the morning to destroy us, he will go to be a farmer."

And what about the Gaza Strip? "Gaza is like a foreign body that one cannot get rid of. I would be happy if Gaza would be the Paris of the Middle East. If it had a brain, it would have done it. It has a spectacular coastline, palm trees, sea. If they had a vision, the whole world would come to them. The problem is that the public in Gaza, and not only the leadership, does not see the potential like us, it is still captured in the aspiration to return to the homes it left in Jaffa and to eradicate the Jewish people. I grew up with them in Ness Ziona. On the day that Ben-Gurion declared the state I was 4 years old, and I remember that my neighbors shot at our house. And then they took all their equipment, put it in blankets, and said, when we return, we will slaughter you. They went to Gaza, and since then they are there with the keys to the house. When these are the goals that make up the agenda, Gaza will not become a vacation state. Even if a leader comes and says, I am ready to change the concept, the day after he will be hanging in the city square."

So what is the solution? "To bring them to a state that they will change phase. If they understand that there is a world where the butter is spread on the slice, it may be that they will change their aspirations."

At the moment it is exactly the opposite, Hamas is strengthening in Gaza in complete contradiction to the promise of total destruction and full victory. "This war saved the existence of the State of Israel not only because of the great trauma that caused some of us to strengthen the roots, to understand the existential dangers, to struggle and especially to internalize that for many more years we will live by our sword. This war also caused the Gazan people a huge trauma, and therefore if Trump forces on it a government with a park, towers and a casino, it may be that it will understand by itself that it is worth it to choose life. After what they went through in the Iron Swords war, it is not certain that they will want to go through it again. The state can help in this. Not to speak in the language of destruction but to change direction through streets and towers and luxury shops. So that they will have a lot to lose."

Even before the war in Gaza there were shops, towers and parks, its residents went out to work in Israel and earned their bread, and still there was October 7th. "The way of thinking changed following the trauma that also passed on the Gazan people. A person is a life-loving creature. If we manage to create a reality in which the loss is smaller than the profit, his hatred will fade."

After the Yom Kippur War, the IDF went through a deep process of drawing lessons, rebuilding and restoring public trust in the command. In the current period, I tell Kahalani, it seems that the trust in the army commanders has weakened. A significant example of this is the lashing out of MK Aryeh Deri at the Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir, when he said about him that he "lost it". "I think that Deri tried to build himself at the expense of the Chief of Staff," explains Kahalani. "He sent a message to his people that he protects them. He simply hitched a ride on him to scrape votes for the next elections. This is outrageous, because he and his family do not bear the burden of enlistment and fighting. Deri will indeed say, I served in the army, he was a religious sergeant in the Central Command, but his three grandchildren are service refusers."

The Chief of Staff raised dozens of red flags, he keeps shouting that the army desperately needs more soldiers otherwise it will collapse into itself, and in response, the government approves mass evasion and the Basic Law "Torah Study". Should he have resigned? "A Chief of Staff needs to be steel and guard the house. No Chief of Staff resigns unless they close the army for him and take his tanks and planes. Even if a politician makes headlines on him to gain votes, he must continue to say his opinion and continue to guard the army. And if he has ten tanks and he needs 20, let him continue with the ten. He did not come on conditions. A Chief of Staff is subordinate to the government, and the government has its own ways to survive. I expect from a Zionist party to enter the government and fulfill its commitment to the voters from within instead of coming with complaints to the leader. I am not at all interested in what they think about Bibi. If they don't take action and promote the recruitment law from within, they cannot come with complaints from outside."

But people did not give their vote to parties so that their representatives would be a pot that strengthens the policy that contradicts their election promises from within. "There is no such thing as promising. A politician who promises firmly, they will screen these clips again and again when he decides to act differently for the benefit of the country, as they did to Bennett, who said in the past that he would not sit with Lapid. A politician needs to say, I will aspire, and if I have the power, I will act. A politician who decides in a definitive way, does not leave himself an opening for changing the thought. The keys are not in your hand, the house is not yours, and you don't have the power of force to execute what you commit to. Therefore, as soon as a politician committed to guard the country for me, I ask that he will be inside the government. Not in the capacity of a safety belt for the leader, but to find a local solution and exit."

And if the government advocates principles that the party completely opposes? "Then stay at home and don't go into politics. If you are a politician, fight for your principles while you respect the elected prime minister. Fix what you can and then exit. I told Rabin that I cannot vote for withdrawal from Jordan and descent from the Golan. After all, I fought there, and me he sent to stand before the public with the defense of these places and by their power I brought many mandates. I told Rabin, now you are changing your mind, and this is legitimate because you are prime minister, the question is if I stay on the bus, and I cannot stay. So Rabin said, if you vote against me, you will see the Knesset on TV. I said, I didn't come to grab a chair. In politics, sometimes one needs more courage than on the battlefield. Although today, who is a bit more statesmanlike and a bit more hugging, they say about him that he is weak. Politicians think that only who has a knife between the teeth is better, and they are wrong."

Kahalani finished his military service in '89 at the rank of Brigadier General. After his release from the IDF, he was appointed chairman of the Amal school network and chairman of the committee for the commemoration of the Armored Corps. In '92 he was elected to serve as a Knesset member on behalf of the Labor Party. Two years later he established the Third Way party and entered thanks to it into Netanyahu's government as Minister of Internal Security. "I worked with the prime minister for three years in close proximity," he recalls. "And we had full trust in each other. He let me work and appreciated my work."

Also those who ask to replace the prime minister he knows perfectly. "I commanded five military men - Ashkenazi, Gantz, Eisenkot, Dagan and Mofaz. To Eisenkot I awarded the rank of Major. Gantz was my trainee in command and staff, a pleasant person."

And as a politician? "I am small. In the army, they called Gantz 'Bnihuta' (leisurely). Because he did things slowly. He has a kind of leadership that in the jungle doesn't really work."

And Eisenkot? "Was a good trainee, I wondered less about his abilities, he was not one of those who stood out. But he was balanced and a man of thought. Fact that he reached the Chief of Staff position."

Ben Gvir? "Each in his own way. It is not easy to be Minister of Internal Security. It is a role in which you are constantly accused. The problem with Ben Gvir is the style. He changed things in the security prison. In my role as Minister of Internal Security, I would have died to make changes in the food, in the study rights for terrorists, but they blocked me."

Smotrich? "Despite the war, the economy is in excellent condition. Three years since October 7th and we are still traveling in a car and not on a scooter. But sometimes people are hated for their personality and not for the results they brought."

Head of the Shin Bet David Barnea? "It is not clear to me why they attacked him. He needs to be loyal and subordinate to the elected level that manages the country."

And the Supreme Court President Yitzhak Amit? "If the people lose trust in the court, then we have a problem. The people need to believe in the judges. Even Begin said, there are judges in Jerusalem."

How do you explain the lashing out at the Attorney General? "I think that the role needs to be split. It cannot be that one person will have so much power in a democratic country. The majority decides, not the individual. The Attorney General manages all the legal advisors in all government ministries. Instead of helping the ministers to execute their policy, they check where the plan will fail because they are subordinate to the Attorney General."

But the role of the Attorney General is to protect the minister from illegal moves. "No, his role is to help me manage my policy. Why am I accused in advance as soon as I am a minister? Give me legal advice on how to find a solution to achieve my goals in a legal way. The legal advice works with the prosecution. There are two bodies in the world that have no supervision, the Holy One, blessed be He, and the prosecution. Judges have an ombudsman, the government has an inspector, even parking on the street has inspectors, only over the prosecution there is no supervising body."

Whoever was harmed by the prosecution cannot get protection in the courts? "Sometimes it takes years. I want them to protect the small citizen from predatory systems. To finish a trial within a year. To bring more judges, and that there will be independent supervision also over the prosecution. A department that one can reach if one feels that an injustice was done even before things form into an indictment. I am a big believer in the statement that the wheels of justice grind slowly, I just think that sometimes, by the time they finish grinding, the person dies on the way."

What else worries you? "That we are in a period that has tests of being or not being. The whole world hates us, and all fronts are open. To continue our lives in this wonderful place, there needs to be an orderly program to bring 50% of the Jews of the world to Israel within five years, maybe not only from love of Mordechai but also from hatred of Haman. As a country prepares itself for war, it needs to prepare itself to absorb Judaism, also because Judaism in the world will look for a safe place and it doesn't have one at the moment, and also because we need to grow and strengthen."

How will we be able to absorb 50% of the Diaspora Jewry? We are a small country. "The Negev is free. I thought once that it is hot there, until I visited Las Vegas and saw what is heat. And besides, there are air conditioners. I can estimate that this is what will happen, maybe not within five years but within a not long period of time. There are social processes that take place outside of Israel, the peak of which is when a person internalizes that his family is no longer safe. I see people sending their children to Israel. I see whole families uprooting from their place and immigrating here, or returning anew. I think that this is part of the aspiration to turn Israel into a power. And if the country knows how to read what is written on the wall, it owes it to itself. A power is treated with respect, they salute it. Maybe it will not be loved and popular, but it will achieve appreciation out of might and power."

And how can all this exist when within the borders of the country there is division and rift? "Everything starts from the head. Whoever stands at the head is responsible for the conflicts and can also fix and connect. Judge Gideon said, from me you will see and so you will do. There is no leadership without a personal example. There is no leadership without the leader suffering more than the people under his command, and there is no leadership that can lead without guarding values. In the current political situation, the rift caused the leadership to speak the language of the street, and this norm drips to the public. We don't feel shame to use it. The leaders think, if you are nice, maybe they will give you respect but won't recognize you, but if you use the language of the gutter, they will know of your existence. And so we reached a state that they empower people who throw garbage on the street and not those who act modestly behind the scenes. One needs to change the culture of discourse and division. I head an organization that had a lot of slandering of one another. I stopped some people and said to them, continue like this, and I will kick you out. Leaders cannot base their agenda through harming others. They are the ones responsible for the internal order and they are the first who need to understand that if they speak in a language of hatred and exclusion, their value drops in the eyes of the public."

The ethos of heroism in your generation was a cornerstone. Also today a young generation of fighters arises who experienced heroic battles, loss and severe injuries. What insights could you give them? "If they had appointed me to be in the committee for decorations of this generation, I would have a very big problem deciding who deserves to receive signs of excellence and appreciation, because there are thousands of such in the current war. I want to tell them that when I see them attacking, I have tears in my eyes, of pride and happiness. They make my heart flutter. Since I have been engaged all my life in educating the next generation, I say, you did not disappoint me."