The vast majority of spouses of reservists who have served in the Israel-Hamas war, and who are members of the IDF Reservists’ Wives Forum reported that they or their families suffered emotional harm due to their partner’s reserve service, a new poll by the forum found.
The forum, which started as a Facebook community of female family members and partners of reservists, is a civil organization that includes over 15,000 active members, the organization said.
The poll, released on Sunday, was conducted among 2621 members of the forum – 2,380 partners (and exes) of reservists who have served in the war, 168 reservists, and 73 people who were both in IDF reserves and the partner of a reservist.
Some 37% of respondents reported that they or members of their families suffered emotional harm from reserve duty (theirs or their partners) to “a very great degree,” 31% reported they suffered this harm “to a great degree,” 22% “to a medium degree,” and 9% said it harmed them “a little.”
Just 2% reported that reserve service did not harm them at all.
Impacting service
This harm has impacted motivation to serve, according to the poll. Of those who said they experienced harm, 16% said this harm hurt their motivation to continue reserves service to “a very great degree,” 22% said it hurt this motivation to “a great degree,” and 28% said it hurt this motivation to “a medium degree.”
The poll also examined the impact of reserve duty on respondents’ work and financial situations.
Some 18% reported that their employment was harmed to “a very great degree,” with 21% saying this harm was to “a great degree” and 26% saying reserves caused “a medium degree” of harm to them professionally.
Touching on the financial impacts of reserves service on their families, 16% of respondents said that reserves caused them “a very great degree” of financial harm, 19% said it caused them “a great degree” of financial harm, and 27%, a moderate degree of financial harm.
Just 18% said that reserve service caused them no financial harm at all.
The poll also looked at the impact of bills that would excuse the ultra-Orthodox population from IDF service on respondents’ motivation for doing reserve service, finding that 77% said this would hurt their motivation to some degree.
Some 38% said these bills would hurt their motivation to a “very great degree,” and 17% said it would hurt their motivation to “a great degree.”
“The troubling data highlights the urgent need to expand support for reservist families and, above all – the critical need for additional recruits to join the security forces,” said forum head Chen Arbel-Marinberg.
“Reservist families are proud to repeatedly answer the call of duty with great honor, but over time, the price of our partners’ absence from home becomes increasingly heavy [and] unbearable.
We must not reach a point where reservists are forced to choose between their personal home and the national home. The government must establish a recruitment framework for all and focus solely on this direction.”