National Security Strategy. How Israel, for example, sees its essence
The strategy is the basis for the preparation of all other documents regarding state planning in the areas of national security and defense.
Israel’s national security strategy has never been officially approved, but the country has developed a unique operational strategy that is successfully implemented in practice and constantly improved.
According to experts from the National Institute for Strategic Studies of Ukraine, since its creation, Israel has faced many complex security challenges that have required its leaders to formulate fundamental principles and foundations of the National Security Strategy.
A group of researchers at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, led by former Chief of Staff of the Israel Defense Forces, Lieutenant General Gadi Eisenkot, developed recommendations for the National Security Strategy, summarizing the state’s many years of experience in this area.
According to the authors’ conclusions, in order to formulate measures to ensure national security, it is necessary, first of all, to assess the security environment; identify the main sources of problems; national values and interests that must be protected; identify the main ways to strengthen national security and ways to respond to threats (military, political, economic, social, etc.).
At the regional level, experts from the National Institute of International Relations of Ukraine note, Israel is a kind of “anomaly” in a mostly hostile environment. The state differs from its neighbors culturally and economically and has a completely different type of government. The instability inherent in the region for many years has intensified since the beginning of the Arab Spring – its events undermined the regional order and led to another historically conditioned Shiite-Sunni religious confrontation.
Israel today faces a series of complex and evolving threats. According to a group of researchers at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Israel’s National Security Strategy is based on the concept of an “iron wall.”
This implies that peace is possible only when Israel’s enemies conclude that their efforts are ineffective and only multiply their own losses, suffering, and damage.
Another fundamentally important component of the Strategy is ensuring the interconnections between society, economy, science and technology, military capabilities, international situation, and foreign policy.
The parallels are obvious.
