Surveys conducted by the Israeli army amongst new recruits shows a drop of 4 percent in motivation to serve in combat units, said Haaretz on Friday, adding that Chief of staff Shaul Mofaz received the report during his visit to the induction base Thursday.
The motivation statistics are not final, said the report, but represent questionnaires given to high school students a few months before being drafted. These will be compared with other information to be gathered during the March induction. Similar trends were detected in the August induction of 2000, but due to a concentrated effort by the Army Manpower Corp, there was no reduction in those eventually entering combat units.
Mofaz was quoted by the paper as saying he was not worried about these reports.
But according to Haarez, this would be the first time in many years that a drop in motivation would be recorded.
More than 60 Israelis, mainly settlers and soldiers were killed by Palestinians during the Intifada which broke out in September – Albawaba.com
