“Purity of Arms”

The Israeli Defense Force (IDF) Study Kit is called Purity of Arms, a unique Israeli term translating "Tohar HaNeshek". The pressing issue was how to respond to the Arab guerilla attacks and to the British Mandate government and its military, which closed the ports of Israel to Jewish refugees fleeing Hitler. The primary ethical value of the study unit of the IDF on Purity of Arms is human dignity, both as a universal philosophical concept and as a cultural value associated with the soldier's group identity. Several army educators have explained to me that discipline and responsibility are the first countermeasures to releasing evil impulses—vengeance, cruelty, and abuse of power. The study unit begins with a biblical law requiring that a Jewish army maintain purity in its camp. Appealing to biblical authority, sacred purity, and Zionist calling, the terminology of purity of weapons is absorbed into the honor code of a modern Israeli army.