One of the Israel Defense Forces' greatest sources of pride in the past few years is an environmental project - not a military one. Soldiers have been "drafted" to the cause of taking wild animals that cannot be placed in the country's zoos and introducing them to open areas on military bases. Over time the grazing of these animals has helped control the spread of vegetation and thus prevented brush fires and helped restoration of natural growth. But the project faces possible closure now, due to new directives from the Agriculture Ministry's Veterinary Services.

Military sources say it will be expensive and difficult to implement the services' new guidelines - which mandate immunizations and blood tests for the animals - and add that unless something is done about them, the project will have to be suspended. They claim that carrying out the new regulations could result in the death of many animals due to the difficulty involved in capturing them and doing the tests. There is a real danger that the Israel Nature and National Parks Protection Authority will be forced to put hundreds of animals to death because they will no longer have places like the army bases to which they can be transfered. Currently about 1,000 wild animals are living on the property of army bases, mainly in the North.

The project began about 20 years ago as a way to help the authorities solve the problem of burgeoning populations of wild animals at local zoos and petting corners. By taking in the animals, the army, in return, found a means to protect large swathes of territory at a several of its bases.

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"The introduction of the animals was aimed at controlling brush and thus preventing fires within army installations," an Israel Defense Forces source explained. "It was an alternative to the widespread use of herbicides that polluted the environment and the groundwater supplies. The reduction of the brush eventually created the conditions for the return of a natural vegetative environment and of birds to areas where herbicides had been used in the past."

At first the project included only Eland antelopes, but in the past three years it has expanded: The army has brought wild sheep and deer and has even begun to take in ibex. Until recently the Veterinary Services had the same policy concerning the animals involved in this project - known as "Wild Ruminants on IDF Bases" - as it did at zoos, including the Zoological Center Tel Aviv-Ramat Gan (known as the Safari): no regular immunizations or blood testing was required for the wild animals.

A few months ago, however, the services changed its position and sent the army the new regulations, which support the use of domesticated animals for grazing, but oppose the use of wild animals for this purpose. The services claimed that on one base, the character of the terrain and the large number of Elands make it impossible to monitor the animals and to carry out neutering and immunization. The new rules call for immunizing every individual animal against Hoof and Mouth Disease, rabies and sheep plague as well as taking blood samples from each animal.

The demands were greeted with astonishment in the army. According to a senior military official involved in the project, compliance would be prohibitively expensive and injurious to the animals. "These aren't animals you can line up like cows in a cowshed to immunize and take blood from them. You have to trap them, which would result in many deaths."

Army officials also reject the option of using domesticated animals for grazing on bases, claiming this would not achieve the same result and could create a security issue because of the need to employ a shepherd.

"We're already violating our authority by not carrying out the new guidelines," a military source said. "We've requested an extension to consider the issue, but if the rules don't change we'll have to stop the project."

Veterinary Services officials stress the danger of uncontrolled reproduction among the wild animals, which could increase the spread of disease. That could endanger the domestic food supply as well as exports of food.