State Comptroller Matanyahu Englman issued a sharply critical special report on Tuesday, warning that Israel’s systems for compensating, protecting, and academically supporting reservists during the war were fundamentally ill-equipped for the unprecedented scale and duration of reserve mobilization.
Englman’s eighth in the audit series covering the Israel-Hamas war, the report exposes a cycle of insufficient planning, inconsistent oversight, and outdated frameworks that failed to meet the needs of hundreds of thousands of Israelis who served on extended wartime call-ups.
“Reservists stepped up for the state – and the state must be there for them, both in safeguarding their employment security and in supporting their studies and well-being,” Englman said.
He emphasized that long months of reserve duty placed a heavy personal, financial, and academic burden on a relatively small segment of the population – one that the state relies on disproportionately for its security.
The report notes that only a small part of Israel’s eligible population bore the vast majority of the wartime reserve load, serving for unusually prolonged periods and often at sensitive stages in their lives.
Many were young adults at the outset of their careers or university studies, and many were supporting young families.
Several peripheral regions saw significantly higher rates of reserve service than the national average. As reserve duty is expected to expand further in the coming years, Englman warned that the pressure on this already overstretched population will only intensify.
System for compensating reservists not designed to withstand long-term demands
The audit’s assessment is clear: The systems responsible for compensating reservists were not designed to withstand long-term wartime demands.
Compensation formulas were built for short call-ups rather than months on end. The supplement intended to reward extended service – added to law in 2008 – proved ineffective when service stretched far beyond those intended lengths.
Many reservists were left with the minimum compensation, which remains tied to temporary legislative provisions set to expire, creating uncertainty about future income protections.
Self-employed reservists suffered acute financial harm when their businesses could not operate during long stretches of service.
Because their annual income ultimately fell below the pre-war levels on which their compensation had been calculated, many found themselves unexpectedly indebted to the National Insurance Institute (NII).
The Finance Ministry moved to correct this only at the end of 2024. Employers, too, faced significant costs: Temporary wartime measures reimbursed only a fraction of the contributions required during a worker’s reserve service and are soon set to expire.
Englman warns that without further intervention, employers may face strong incentives to avoid hiring reservists altogether.
“The Defense Ministry and the Finance Ministry, together with the NII and the IDF, must review the arrangements for reserve-duty compensation, including anchoring in legislation the distinction between combat and non-combat reservists, as already reflected in government decisions on grants,” Englman said, adding that structural reform was overdue.
OVERSIGHT OF compensation was also found to be deeply deficient.
Despite a dramatic surge in reserve-pay expenditures during the war, the IDF and the NII still operate on unlinked systems: The IDF does not receive income data, and the NII does not receive precise reserve-service data.
Employers report one combined figure for wages and reserve pay, preventing any meaningful monitoring.
The Comptroller’s Report found that the state cannot reliably verify accuracy, prevent misuse, or ensure efficient use of public funds. Although a partial legislative fix was introduced earlier this year, Englman called for a comprehensive joint oversight mechanism connecting the military, the NII, and the Finance Ministry.
Workplace-rights violations against reservists
The report also identifies a sharp rise in workplace rights violations.
Requests to dismiss employees on reserve duty grew significantly, as did complaints of discrimination against reservists and their partners or co-parents.
Protections against such harms vary widely, are scattered across multiple laws and temporary regulations, and, in many cases, apply only for limited time periods. Oversight is split between several authorities, creating legal confusion and making it difficult for reservists or their families to understand their rights.
“Providing fair compensation for reserve service – especially when it comes to lost wages or income – and protecting reservists’ labor rights, as well as those of their immediate families, is a moral obligation owed by the state to this small group that carries its security on their shoulders,” Englman said. “Beyond that, it is essential to ensure the continued viability of the reserve-service model.”
The gaps were equally stark in higher education. Tens of thousands of student reservists were called up in the midst of the academic year, many serving for months with little ability to study during their service.
A significant share reported that they were dissatisfied with the academic support they received, and many said they felt uncertain about their ability to complete the semester or year.
Although students consistently said they needed tools such as recorded lectures, written summaries, concentrated make-up courses, and personalized academic adjustments, many institutions failed to provide these at sufficient scale. Meanwhile, universities and colleges significantly overestimated how satisfied reservist students were with the support they had received.
The Council for Higher Education’s oversight, the report found, was minimal.
The CHE had not conducted system-wide monitoring of student-rights implementation for more than a decade before the war and continued to lack a structured oversight framework, even as mobilization intensified.
Its emergency forum, intended to support academic continuity during wartime, met only twice throughout the entire academic year.
DESPITE LARGE sums allocated to support reservist students, institutions used only part of the budget, with wide and unexplained discrepancies in spending between institutions. Some institutions also failed to refund tuition or registration fees to students who were forced to withdraw because of reserve duty. Data on dropouts were incomplete, definitions varied across campuses, and little analysis was conducted to understand why students discontinued or reduced their studies.
“The CHE and academic institutions must ensure that all rights owed to reservist students, and the resources required to guarantee them, are fully upheld,” Englman said.
“This is necessary to prevent harm to their academic, professional, and career advancement. Support mechanisms must allow student-reservists to devote themselves fully to their security duties, with the assurance that the assistance available to them will enable them to complete their academic studies once they return to campus.”
The CHE said in response that the data showed reservist students persisted in their studies at higher rates than the general student body and that the system mobilized quickly to provide wide-ranging academic, financial, and emotional support. It pledged to study the comptroller’s findings, correct shortcomings, and continue long-term preparations to ensure all rights and accommodations for reservist students are fully upheld.
The National Union of Israeli Students welcomed the report, saying it confirms significant gaps in institutional support and a lack of proper oversight by the CHE. The union highlighted a major satisfaction gap: While most institutions believed students were content, only a quarter of students reported high satisfaction.
The union also condemned cases in which universities failed to provide full refunds to reservists forced to cancel studies, calling this an unacceptable “redline.” It urged immediate, permanent reforms to enshrine reservist students’ rights in legislation and vowed to work with the CHE and budgeting authorities to ensure that no reservist student is left behind.
The backdrop to the report’s release is fraught.
Shortly after October 7, Englman began visiting evacuated communities nationwide in preparation for the wide-ranging audits he would later launch. A rift quickly formed between his office and the IDF’s public-defense unit.
Englman accused the military and political leadership of withholding key documents necessary for examining failures surrounding the attack, while the IDF argued that he was overstepping his authority by investigating operational and intelligence matters better suited to a state commission of inquiry.
This standoff contributed to the prolonged timeline of the audits.
At the same time, bereaved families continue demanding the establishment of a formal commission, while the government resists, citing tensions with the judiciary over who would appoint its members – a position critics contend is politically motivated and aimed at shaping the historical narrative of the worst assault on Israel since the Holocaust.
Englman stated that the country must now commit to sweeping structural reforms: updated legislation distinguishing combat from non-combat service; a compensation system built for extended wartime duty; unified mechanisms for oversight and enforcement; robust workplace protections; and comprehensive, long-term accommodations for student reservists.
He framed the issue as a moral imperative and a matter of national resilience. Reservists, he stressed, stepped forward when the country needed them most, and now, Israel must fully meet its obligations to them once they return home.