Combatants on Trial - The Legal System of the IDF during the 1948 War, Anat Stern The 1948 War put the Jewish community in Palestine to its utmost test. As the fighting in incredibly hard conditions was at its fiercest, rumors of criminality and ill-conduct reached the Yishuv`s leadership. Appalled by these developments, David Ben Gurion commissioned a special report on the matter. One of the main conclusions of the report that was filed in March 1948, was the necessity of formulating "A clear and effective legal procedure". The story of that procedure and how it evolved to become the legal system of the IDF during the upheaval of war is told in this book. The book analyzes the foundations of military law in Israel while moving between several dimensions: The formal code and its implementation; the process of writing the law and the creation of the legal institutions; addressing criminal offenses within the military and IDF attempts to handle civilian criminality. In addition to telling the story of the composition of the legal code and the establishment of the IDF Judge Advocate General Unit (JAG), the book analyzes hundreds of legal cases from the various IDF Brigades opened for research for the first time since 1948. The combatants` trials bring forth cases of looting, desertion, disobedience, conscientious objection, and draft evasion. Analysis of the procedures portrays the character of the Jewish community in Palestine, its challenges and norms that included practices of social punishments and exclusion, some of which still exist in the IDF today. The book also shows the roots of the close connection between civil society and the military in Israel. Using a combined perspective of history from above and history from below, an examination of these legal dimensions is used to study the norms of the Jewish community in Palestine during its transition to sovereignty, and from an informal militia to a Regular army. The analysis of the continuity from a community to a state alongside the emergence of the legal system of the IDF allows an alternative periodization of the war that is based on a cultural-legal perspective.