Aron Heller’s look at Israeli military service, and the methods they use to activate reserves, is interesting:
Roy Bass emerged from the Mediterranean waves at noon Friday for a Popsicle break when, surfboard in hand, he heard his cell phone ringing on the beach. It was a recorded message: “An emergency draft has been activated.”
Four hours later, the 27-year-old computer programmer was at an army base, in full uniform, preparing to head to Israel’s northern border, where troops were massing to take on Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon.
…Where once Israelis were drafted to war by air raid sirens, passwords over the radio and recruiters going door to door, today they are summoned by computerized calls to their cell phones.
When Bass got his call-up, he sped home and swapped his bathing suit for an army uniform.
“There was no dilemma, no doubt in my mind because it is something you grow up with, that this is the most important thing there is,” he said. “It’s ingrained deep inside you _ if they call you, you go.”