Gallant to Knesset: We need more soldiers - from everywhere

Defense Minister Yoav Gallant spoke before the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee today (Monday), where he spoke of the IDF's pressing need for more soldiers.

He said "we need more soldiers. These soldiers need to come from extending regular service, from the reserves, and from the Charedi population which will be drafted at an increasing rate."

Gallant then focused on the failure to pass laws extending the draft period for a full three years and extending the years of mandatory reserve duty, failures he blamed on the government and the legal advisors.

He ended by saying that "the defense establishment and the IDF are not the body of someone else. They don't belong to some party - they are ours, all of ours. We are all partners, from all the parties of the house, from all places and we need the soldiers."