The Generals ' Revolt Prior to the establishment of the state of Israel the leader of the Yeshuv , David Ben - Gurion , made several attempts to reorganise the main underground militia , the Haganah , and its elite force , the Palmach . In 1948 this led to a series of confrontations between Ben - Gurion and leaders of the newly formed Israeli army , which became known as " The Generals ' Revolt " . Prelude . Ben - Gurion had three objectives : In 1946 Ben - Gurion tried to appoint loyal supporters into the upper echelons of the Haganah but was unsuccessful . The following year , there was a debate within the defence establishment about what form of armed forces the Yeshuv should have in the anticipated conflict . Ben - Gurion proposed an entirely new organisation to replace the Haganah , modelled on the British Army . These new ideas shocked the Haganah leadership . The Haganah had not been active since withdrawing from direct action against the British authorities in July 1946 , and the crisis threatened morale within Haganah units . Rather than damage the existing structures , Ben - Gurion allowed his ideas to be dropped . The first round . In April 1948 , while Chief of Staff , Yaakov Dori , was absent due to ill health , Ben - Gurion came to the decision to abolish the post of Head of National Command , and give himself , as Minister of Defence , direct control over the General Staff . This post was held by Israel Galili , one of the leaders of Mapam , the pro - Soviet rivals to Ben - Gurion ' s Mapai party . On 26 April Ben - Gurion notified Galili of the decision . After Galili raised objections , on 3 May , Ben - Gurion issued an official letter : " . . . The post of head of the national command is hereby abolished , and Israel Galili ' s appointment to the post is terminated . The staff of the security forces will henceforth receive its instructions exclusively from the director of security [ Ben - Gurion himself ] or his representative . " A majority of senior IDF officers at that time were from Mapam , and the response from several of them was to threaten to resign . Mapam ' s newspaper , Al Hamishmar , predicted the result would be " a personal dictatorship . " On 6 May the Haganah leadership presented Ben - Gurion with an ultimatum : " " The heads of departments consider it essential to restore [ Israel Galili ] to his post until final arrangements are made . If this matter is not settled within the next 12 hours , the heads of departments will cease to consider themselves responsible for the conduct of affairs . " Ben - Gurion refused to reinstate Galili , but accepted a compromise whereby Galili was a member of the General Staff , but with unspecified duties and the threatened resignations were withdrawn . The second round . In June 1948 , Ben - Gurion tried again . He proposed reorganising the Haganah to give the IDF a unified command built on four battle zones . An underlying motive for the changes was to purge the IDF HQ of Mapam officers . In response , on 24 June , the acting Chief of Staff , Yigael Yadin and a group of staff officers put forward a plan for the restructuring , which included their suggestions as to who should be in command of each of the four Commands . Yadin was not from Mapam , but three of the four suggested appointments were . Ben - Gurion put forward counter - suggestions , with three British Army veterans to be department heads in the General Staff , with 28 - year - old Mordechai Maklef f as commander of the Eastern Command and Moshe Dayan as commander of Jerusalem . Yadin joined Mapam members in accusing Ben - Gurion of political interference in the army , with particular focus on Makleff who was regarded as inexperienced . A group of generals led by Yadin submitted their resignations . These included Mapam generals Cohen ( Ben Hur ) , Zvi Ayalon and Galili . At a stormy cabinet meeting Ben - Gurion accepted the setting up of a five man committee headed by Interior Minister Greenbaum to consider the structure of the high command , on condition that Galili was dismissed . During its secret sessions the committee heard complaints of Ben - Gurion ' s " incessant intervention in operational decisions " as in the recent attacks on Latrun . In the media Mapam accused Ben - Gurion of attacking the Palmach . The committee proposed that there should be a multi - party war cabinet , and that there should be two director generals from different parties : one between Ben - Gurion and the Minister of Defence , and one between Ben - Gurion and the army . With eight days until the end of the first truce , Ben - Gurion announced his resignation as Prime Minister and as Minister of Defence . In the negotiations that followed the cabinet agreed to withdraw the committee ' s recommendations and Ben - Gurion dropped his appointment suggestions and his threat of resigning . Galili was removed from all positions of influence and Ben - Gurion remained supreme commander .