We Are The IDF

This is not a book that glorifies war. It does not celebrate victories with triumphal imagery or reduce complex tragedies to simple narratives of heroes and villains.
Instead, it is a sober journey through the military history of the State of Israel from the moment of its birth in 1948 to the present day. It tells the story of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) not as an abstract institution but as the collective expression of a people who, after two thousand years of exile and persecution, resolved that they would never again be defenseless.
"We are the IDF" is the phrase many Israelis use when defending their soldiers against distant criticism. It means these are our sons, daughters, neighbors, and friends, ordinary citizens called to extraordinary duty. This book honors their service while confronting the immense human cost on all sides: Israeli and Arab, soldier and civilian, Jew and Palestinian.
War is hell. For Israel, it has been a repeated necessity born of existential threat. This is the story of how a tiny nation fought and continues to fight for its right to exist.
This book is written with deep respect for every soldier who has worn the uniform of the IDF and with sorrow for all the lives lost in these conflicts, Israeli, Arab, and non-Jew alike.
It does not claim moral perfection. No army in history has achieved that. But it tells the truth of a nation that built a military not for conquest, but so that Jews would never again face annihilation without the means to defend themselves.

We Are the IDF.
We defend so that we may one day live in peace.