"I support the Givati soldiers who insisted on their right and duty to serve in the IDF while preserving their values and faith and while adhering to the Joint Service Order," Smotrich said.
Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich on Monday shared a statement in support of religious Givati Brigade soldiers who refused to board a Namer armored personnel carrier with a female paramedic during an operational mission in the Gaza Strip, saying he would demand answers from the IDF over its handling of the incident.
"I support the Givati soldiers who insisted on their right and duty to serve in the IDF while preserving their values and faith and while adhering to the Joint Service Order," Smotrich said.
The soldiers were prosecuted on Sunday by court-martial rather than criminally, an IDF source indirectly told The Jerusalem Post.
A second IDF source indirectly confirmed the disciplinary process to the Post, adding that the military is not pleased that the information was published before the verdicts were handed down.
"The soldiers have the full backing of the rabbis and directors of the Hesder Yeshivot Association, who examined the issue thoroughly and with the appropriate caution and stand behind the decision," Smotrich said following the decision.
"I prayed and hoped with all my heart that the IDF would come to its senses and prevent the need for my intervention, but since that did not happen, as the leader of Religious Zionism, I cannot sit idly by, and I will demand answers from the IDF on the matter," Smotrich said.
"This is not the first time Smotrich has called for soldiers to refuse orders," Yashar party head Gadi Eisenkot wrote on X/Twitter on Monday. "A minister in the Defense Ministry who promoted draft dodging during wartime and continues, all the while, to invest in dismantling the IDF and to act determinedly to harm the command, values, and public trust in the IDF."
"Recklessness," he said. "An abyss yawns between Smotrich and the values of the sons and daughters of religious Zionism, those who serve, are devoted, those who love the people and the land."