Have you met the men of the Sword Battalion, a small elite wing of the Israeli Defense Force? In the “March with the Druze IDF Battalion,” I thought I would see a serious battalion learning how to get tough and become an official member of the Herev (Sword) Battalion.
What I saw was much different. I saw a group of men excited and joyous to be a part of a brotherhood, one who is proud to protect the borders of their home, ready to serve the battalion, and not forgetting to give Praise to Yahweh. It’s as if they know their strength, and their victory comes from the Lord.
As I dug into who they were, I found some interesting stories. They are part of the elite men and women of The Israeli Defense Force. They were “The Minorities Unit” filled with Druze defectors from the Arab Liberation Army, small numbers of Bedouin men, and Circassian men, who were organized due to difficult language barriers between the Jewish service members and these minority groups at the time.
The Druze men, however, proved to be honorable strong men requesting to be part of the mandatory draft on the same basis as the Jewish men and women. Up until that time, in the mid-1950s, the requirement was that all individuals in the country had to serve except non-Jews. Eventually the Druze “only” Battalion was disbanded with the official announcement from Lt. Gen Gadi Eizenkot on May 18th, 2015. This wasn’t decided because there were no more Druze men but rather because they had increasingly joined regular combat units of the IDF and attained high ranks and commendations for distinguished service. There was no need for segregation of people groups.
