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Update from the IDF; message posts so you know i'm still here
Topic Started: Oct 8 2004, 07:03 AM (887 Views)
Yo-Yo
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Captain
Hey all! Thank god its warmed up a bit. I've spent this past week gaurding settlements in the west bank near Bethlehem. It was an amazing ad important experience.

With regards to ammo above it wanted to take used ammo (empty shells) and not live. Ammo is like water in israel. They dont check you for it buit if your caught your in trouble and if your caught playing with ammo like taking apart a bullet you go straight to jail. But since it is a civilian army and especially in combat ammo is hard to keep track of people take all the time as momentos or just because. Israel even has an amnesty day every couple of years to let people return ammunition they took without any reprecutions. Its crazy what some people give back. Things like chains of heavy machine gun. a few smoke grenades/flash bangs. LAWs. Mortars.

There was a funny commercial one where you see a guy waiting at the back of a line with some bullets. Some other person come up behind with a smoke grenade they start talking about how they feel it was the right thing to do to return the stuff to the IDF as it costs the army money and is not safe and etc. Mean while and old granny joins the line with a heavy machine gun slung over her shoulder. They talk some more abotu returning ammo when then you hear a beeping sound you hear from truck backing up. The camera zooms out and someone is backing a tank into the parking lot! :rotfl:

With regaurds to actual weapons there is pretty much no chance of someine stealing one. They are very well monitored and tracked. But there are some idiots who think it fun to point their weapons at each other; even pull the trigger. Needless to say the army has a absolute zero tollerance for such things. There is an idea of the 'imaginary bullet' you could say. We were shown video before we got our guns to make sure everyone understood why NOT to play with the weapons. Most normal people dont pull the trigger on a freind as a joke of there is a bullet in the chamber. They shouldn't even do it if there is 'not' but they do and too many tradgic times for some reason there was a bullet in the chamber...

A good exmaple is what happened this past week in the base i had dome basic training. THere trainees were shooting at the firing range and a gun of a trainee jammed. The officer incharge couldn't fix it and so put the gun to the side and let the trainee us his. Many time through the day especially when spent at a firing range we clearo ur guns to make sure there is no bullet in the chamber. Some how they missed clearing his gun that day and the day after. That means a trainee was sleeping and walking aorund with al oaded weapon for two days without knowing! On the third day there was a drill of an attack on the base. People do manevors nad shoot at tragets without any magazine in the gun (guns being cleared before and after of course and any ammunition being kept far away from the excercise). This poor trainee did the exercise thinking his gun was clean. When he pulled the trigger it fired the bullet and it whizzed between the legs of a fellow trainee! :jawdrop: Imagine if the gun was pointed a little but higher!

Mistakes unfortunately happen as much as we try to prevent them. in a firing range if there is a problem you lift up your leg to signal the range officer. The gun NEVER leaves the direction of the target ahead. I remember when i was a trainee some guy in a different company had a problem with his gun and he TURNED around with it to call the range officer ( :doh: ). And of course the gun fired but luckily it flew btweeen the range officer adn the sergent!

The army is dangerous especially when you learn something knew and especially with tanks. That is why the discipline inthe tank corp is the highest in the army. I'll save the stories fro some other time.

Anyway enough about that. Things are going swell and aside from my slight lanuage short comings my platoon commander says i am an excellent soldier and is asking if i would consider command school after advanced training! I told him that is something i'm not going to put into serious considuration until closer to hte end of adv. training.
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Minuet
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Glad to hear things are going well Yo-Yo.

Wow - guarding the West Bank near Bethlehem at Christmastime must have been quite interesting. I hear that there has been very little tourism, however.

Keep in touch.
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Yo-Yo
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hi everyone! Sorry i haven't been in touch for a while instead of geeting a weekend off every two weeks we've been getting off every three or four :( . But here i am off base and warming up!

IT IS FREEZING IN THE GOLAN HEIGHTS!

Just so people know where the golan heights is it is a mountainout and highly stratergic area between israel and syria (in northern isreal).
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It droppee to -3 celcius with high winds and rain. What luck that this was the last week of training so it was "war week" where we spent the entire week out in the field knee deep in freezing mud. It was cold cold and miserable but it is over and all the remains are two weeks of maitnance on the tank to return them to good condition for the next batch of advanced trainees and they we are sent to combat.

Wednsday night i did my first big goof-up and boy did i pay for it. We were sleeping in th tank at night and it was my turn to guard. The turret is usually at the 12 o'clock position or one o'clock.
Here is a pic of a merkava 2 which is not my tank (mine is much much better :brow: )
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I usually climb out of the turrent and walk onto the body of the tank on the left side of the main cannon (front this point of view it would be hte right). The problem was that in my exaughstion i forgot we a rotated the turret to the a ten o'clock position andi couldn't see in the the night because ther was little moon or star light. So i walked of the turrent when it was in a postion like this:
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So to my surprise i fell over six feet in the dark onto some bumby frozen mud :doh: . It was not pleasant and i injured my leg but not to badly :blush: .

If anyone is wondering this is my tank: the Merkava 3 Baz
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As you can see i am in a picturey mood. But i picture is worth a thousand words and my posts tend to be long so maybe this will make it shorter!

I still haven't decided whether to continue on to command school or go straight to combat as a regular soldier. I'll keep you posted i'll know in two weeks whne the training is over. On the side my grandparent are visting Israel to see me. The army will most likely give my time off to see them since i am an "lone soldier" :woohoo: .

Anyways gotta go and eat 2 dozen falafels! :drool:
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Minuet
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Yo-Yo it is always great to hear from you.

What do you think of the peace talks? Have you seen a real difference in the number of attacks? I hope you have.

I am interested to hear about the political situation from someone in the middle of it.

Be well and safe.
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Dandandat
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Time to put something here
what is a "lone soldier"?
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Minuet
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^^^His family lives in Canada, not Israel so he gets extra leave when a relative visits. He is "alone" in Israel family wise.
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Yo-Yo
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The Israeli army is try to be optomistic but not holding their breath. A few days after the 'cease-fire' over 30 mortars and kassam rockets were fires into israeli town in a single day. Instead of responding the IDF held off responding to give Abbas one more chance to reign terrorists and attacks as expected of a cease-fire. The army beleives Abbas has done some good destroying tunnels and making arrests but now where as much as he could do. The army said it will stand down as a jesture of faith but if things continue they will have to go in themselves to prevent attacks.

Personally i am not sure about the talks i am still waiting to see before making a strong opinion. I am highly against permitting 1000 Jordanian soldiers into the westbank to help keep the peace. I know it will lead to MAJOR trouble. Also with the egyptianarmy taking control of gaza and being responsible for security inplace of Israel will also end in disaster.

To Dandandat a lone soldier is just as Minuet explained. I am a soldier alone in israel and the IDF highly respects us and makes sure we are taken care of. I have extra leave days especially when relatives visit. I am offered grants for appartment rentals. I also get doulbe the pay :woohoo: but double of nothing is still nothing :shrug: . (A regular soldier gets about $150 US a month.) I get gift packages and coupons for shopping. To have a lone soldier in a unit is often a source of pride for the unit. When brass visit our unit and want to interview a soldier i am many times picked becuase of my status.
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Deleted User
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Hey, I know we have never conversed on here before, but I do look forward to reading your updates.

Thanks for making the time!

Take care!
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Yo-Yo
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Hi everyone i just got the week end off because i finished advanced training! :woohoo:

In the ceremony i was named the mos exemplary soldier in the company. :bow:

Due to that they have decidied to only give me the weekend off. Sunday i am being sent straight to te Gaza strip to the their hardest zone, the Philidalphi road. :ermm:

It may be a few very difficult weeks before i can post again.
Wish me luck!
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Sophie
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Keeper of the spider-cats
good luck yo-yo. :yes:
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Deleted User
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What she said!
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Minuet
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Keep safe
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24thcenstfan
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Something Wicked This Fae Comes
Best of luck Yo-Yo and safe keeping. :yes:
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Yo-Yo
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Hey guys i'm out of Gaza. I have finished a shortened tou there gaurding the israeli village of Morag. It was a tough tohugh short time there. Every now and then mortars fell in the area and we had to respond to several infiltrations. In the morning i escorted a d9 bulldozer with my tank ad it blew up all the mines and explosives planted around the village during the night. One of my last nights in the tank was summed up with some action. We were doing the usual overnight watch. This involves the tank upto half a kilometer away from the village and scanning with heat vision and night vison from terrorists trying to infiltrate the security fences. One of the watch towers spotted three terrorists on the heat vision other watch points were co-ordinated to confirm. Our tank was close buy eingine off and scanning. The trio was heading our way. However the ginius infantry commander that had temporary command over us ordered us to move 50 meters to get a better view. We protested but he didn't budge. so we turned on the eingine and moved the tank. Of course the terrorists heard the tank from far away. And started running. We fired flares from the tanks internal mortar cannon and herded them towards the miltary sharp shooter who i am told took them out. Thats my time in gaza. Now i am doing two months of excersies testing new technologies for the tanks. The heat is off for me for now but my compnay is first in line for an emergancy mobilization.

Thats all for now!
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Minuet
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I'm glad you got out of the area safely!

Take care Yo-Yo
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