Posted on 05/21/2002 7:55:47 AM PDT by ThreeOfSeven
Observer Worldview Extra
The laywer representing Israeli conscripts who refuse to serve beyond the 1967 ceasefire lines explains why a growing number of soldiers are disobeying orders, in order to protect the basic values on which Israel was founded.
Observer Worldview
Michael Sfard
Sunday May 19, 2002
The Observer
It is said that in the first few years of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, no one seriously thought of holding on to these territories forever. It was at the time widely assumed, that these newly conquered lands were to be handed back to the Arabs as part of a peace agreement. I don't remember those days.
I was raised in a different Israel. In my Israel the small fundamentalist group of Jewish settlers has always enjoyed more political power than their relative share in the Israeli population. In my Israel both left-wing and right-wing governments enabled the colonialisation of these occupied Palestinian lands. My Israel paid, and is still paying, a heavy moral price for ruling another nation by the force of the sword. My Israel, built on the founding values of humanism, pluralism and democracy is being lost.
Three months ago an unprecedented petition by reserve soldiers was published in the Israeli press. The signatories declared their intention to refuse to serve the Israeli occupation and disobey any order to go, as soldiers, beyond the 1967 ceasefire lines. The number of signatories (known as 'seruvniks' for the Hebrew word 'seruv' - refusal) has increased rapidly from 50 in the first petition to 462 as of today. Though refusal in Israel was not uncommon, the scale of this petition is a novelty. Most of the signatories are hardened combat officers and soldiers, and all of them served many years in the occupied territories. Since the launch of the petition, about forty of those who have endorsed the petition have been sent to military prisons as a result of their refusal.
Almost all of the 462 who have signed, among them myself, are between twenty-five and thirty-five years old. None of us can remember a non-occupying Israel. Each and every signatory of the petition has individually reached the decision to spurn the state's demand that they will employ immoral and inhumane means of control over civilian population. And yet, I was amazed to discover how similar our stories are. How identical our personal transitions from being "good" and obedient soldiers to what our Attorney General described as "dangerous outlaws" have been.
As the legal adviser to many seruvniks - and someone who was incarcerated for three weeks for refusing to serve in the Hebron area a few years ago - I have had the privilege of escorting many of my fellow signatories from receipt of their call up papers, through the trial and, finally, visiting them in prison. Given their biographies, the act of refusal was by no means a natural decision. Rather, it was rather the product of a personal crisis, born out of moral agonies and a sense of deep concern for our country's future.
One might expect to hear horrifying stories of atrocities that the objectors witnessed before making their decision to no longer take part in the system. The truth of the matter is that most of the conscientious objectors reached their decision simply from experiencing "everyday" life in the occupied territories.
The occupation corrupted Israeli culture, it eroded our code of ethics, and it even contaminated the Hebrew language. In the name of the fight against the murderous and unforgivable terror that struck Israeli cities and towns, we grew accustomed to manning check-points in which thousands of Palestinians are being detained for hours and humiliated by young soldiers. We grew accustomed to pointing our rifles at children and women. We became tolerant to large-scale demolition of houses ('surface uncovering' in military jargon). Finally, we accepted a state-sponsored policy of assassinations, neatly labelled by Israeli spokesmen as "focused prevention". We learned how to distinguish between roads for settlers (Jews) and roads for 'locals' (Palestinians), and we were asked to implement discriminatory laws for the sake of the illegal settlements that have trapped our country in an endless messianic war. A war which the vast majority of Israelis never wanted.
As soldiers who witnessed, first-hand, the corrosive effect of the occupation on ordinary Israelis and Palestinians we could no longer bear its destructive implications for what we were raised to believe were Israeli values - respect for human life and dignity. The occupation chiselled out unequal relations between Palestinians and Israelis. It planted in many a seed of racism against Arabs.
Under such circumstances, hundreds of officers and soldiers who were always in the forefront of IDF's most prestigious units, who were used to risking their lives for the security of the State of Israel, began questioning both the morality of our presence in the occupied territories and the myth of its necessity. People who have no legal background grew to acknowledge that the command that sends them beyond the borders of democracy to rule another people inherently produces systematic human rights abuses and is therefore neither democratic nor legal.
Entering a village and arresting every male above the age of 14 for up to 18 days, as was done in the recent incursion to the West Bank, is inhuman, even if the mission is to find terrorists. Stopping an ambulance that carries a sick man or a pregnant woman is immoral even if you suspect that it also carries hidden weapons. And that is the tragedy of serving in the occupied territories: one cannot go there without detaining suspected ambulances and treating children in a manner that results in more hatred. The soldiers are placed in an impossible situation, coerced by the occupation's reality to act immorally.
As a lawyer I am allowed to visit these prisoners of conscience. Some arrive in prison filled with pride. Others are shocked by their own deed, and try to explain themselves to their families and friends in long telephone conversations. In prison, most of them discover how angry they are. Angry at the settlers that tangled us in a never-ending war. Indignant at the governments of Israel that enabled them to do so. Vexed at the Israeli Defence Force, which arrogantly took for granted that we would carry out any order.
The seruvniks come from the backbone of Israeli society. They were always seen by themselves and by others, as Israelis from the mainstream of our civic life. "I took seriously the values I was brought up on in this country", they tell me. We must now ask ourselves whether this was always simply rhetoric, or whether Israel has fundamentally changed. As seruvniks, we have chosen to speak out. To silence our voice would be to marginalise further the basic values upon which our country was founded.
· Michael Sfard is a lawyer practising human rights and criminal law in Tel-Aviv. You can read the seruvniks' petition - Courage to refuse - here, and you can write to the author of this piece at legal@seruv.org.il.
Send us your views
Email Observer site editor Sunder Katwala at observer@guardianunlimited.co.uk with comments on articles or ideas for future pieces.
Yeah, imagine that a conservative(????) who likes Lenin, hates Israel, and cites the BBC as a non biased news source
Not only that but a look at the "evidence" Zviadist uses for this assertion that Israel "created" Hamas is quite revealing:
From the article--"Israeli support for Islamic extremists, as an opposition force to the secular pro-PLO movement, eventually blew up in Israel's face. (thus creating Hamas)"
If such a standard were applied to the US it would read as follows:
"American support for Islamic extremists (the Mujahadeen), as an opposition force to the Soviet Union, eventually blew up in America's face. (thus creating Al Qaeda)"
Based on the same faulty Berkeley-esque logic Zviadist might as well have put up a picture of Bin Laden and said we "created" him
So lets, see, Zviadist. Hmm, likes Lenin, hates Israel, likes to scapegoat, believes that the BBC is an unbiased source--
With all due respect to Cachelot, I think he's got it wrong above, Z is no right winger, he's a left wing commie right out of Berkeley.
Yeah, I'm definitely thinking Z-man is a dead ringer for a Berkeley commie.
Correction: it's at the bottom of the Christian movement. Christians believe in a little thing called Jesus Christ, who brought the new covenant with him. I know that bothers you greatly, but it happened. As to the "Christian identity movement", you seem to know more about it than I do, but from what I can surmise they would have little time for one with my religious views.
But you think all Christians are Nazis. You said so yourself.
Isn't it time for you to go trolling around other sites now, seeing what denunciations you can come up with? Bye bye, hate-monger.
Yeah, that BBC -- a hotbed of anti-semitism. I'll tell that to my Jewish friends who work there. It should be good for a laugh at the expense of a silly Yank cow.
If you were not so ignorant, you would know that he was indeed on the CIA payroll at one time. But why waste time on a network news empty-head like you. Go back to your People Magazine.
'In its website coverage and World Service radio broadcasts, BBC continues to purvey a highly distorted anti-Israel picture of events in the Middle East. A website headline about a terrorist who shot dead three Israelis and injured 16 others obscured the fact that he was a Palestinian by stating “Israel bus station gunman kills three” (Thursday, 4 October, 2001, 22:11 GMT). When Hamas terrorists infiltrated the community of Elei Sinai, murdering two Israeli youths and wounding 15 others before being shot themselves by Israeli security officers, the BBC website headline questioned whether this was indeed an assault by using selective quotation marks: “Palestinians ‘attack Jewish settlement’ ” (Tuesday, 2 October, 2001 19:26 GMT).'
Uhuh, That's right. So, according to your own logic We "CREATED" him, and therefore, also by your own logic, we must be no better than that horrible Israel.
So, How is Berkeley these days, I hear the weather's nice? Bash any capitalist pigs today?
The BBC hates America and hates Israel. If you had taken the time to look at the kind of stuff they generally report you would know that. They routinely accuse Bush of starting the war in Afghanistan because he wants oil and natural gas.
Go back to your Pravda
Not only lying, but hallucinating. You really should lay off the crack, little Zviadist :)). That kind of thing quickly turns into a nasty and expensive habit not easily supported by eastbloc trash.
Besides the Christians who believe that Israel is there because Jesus wanted it that way, there is plenty of conservatism that would have a short fuse for Israel or her defenders who can shame even a Johnnie Cochrane through their constant and abusive playing of the race card, in this case, the antisemitism card.
Israel itself was the product of a reparations campaign - a shakedown of Western Civilization for what was due the poor peoples who have suffered. Where do you think the Palestinians learned it? Just because Israel has become colonial itself does not mean that her creation was not born in the same stew of communist and anti-colonialism that runs in the streets of the Palestinian ghettos today. A homeland for everyone! Forty acres and a mule! Back to the Promised Land! Right the ancient wrongs!
There is some overlap between the libertarian limited-government viewpoint and the egalitarian liberal viewpoint. Both support human rights, but liberals go overboard on big government programs to regulate society and redistribute wealth.
I think it is detrimental whenever people label an anti-zionist as an anti-semite, equate them with Nazis, etc. I am not a pro-zionist myself, but have moved further in that direction by getting the bigger picture, as opposed to blindly choosing a side just because everyone else does.
This crowd certainly fits the definition of 'self-hating Jews'. I bolded who they were angry at, Jewish settlers, the Jewish government, the Jewish Army. They are not angry at the monsters who blow up children at Bat Mitzvahs, they are not angry at the terrorist leaders who attack their own families, and they are not angry at the anti-Semites around the world attacking Jews for being Jews. These people have enlisted morally in the PLO, and should be treated as such.
So...America was the product of a reparations campaign too - a shakedown of the American Indians for what was due the British colonists after their having suffered unfair taxation and religious oppression under the King of England? Yes?
There's no overlap here at all. Liberals who want drugs or prostitution legalized or similar things are being like libertarians.
The liberals who hate Israel and America are the biggest PC authoritarian nutballs that ever existed. and the more nutty PC antiwestern, antiwhite, anti-American, anti-achievement anti-civilization they get, the more they agree with you guys.
Sure, I've heard the same arguments from blacks on affirmative action using that very argument for it. Don't look now dude but you look far closer to the race card players than those you accuse.
Just because Israel has become colonial itself does not mean that her creation was not born in the same stew of communist and anti-colonialism that runs in the streets of the Palestinian ghettos today.
Nonsense. Israel is not communist nor anticolonialist either. Although you can bet your a$# that their enemies on the left, the people you have chosen to ally yourself with, are as communist and anticolonialist as any people ever have been.
A homeland for everyone! Forty acres and a mule! Back to the Promised Land! Right the ancient wrongs!
A homeland for everyone, sounds a lot more like your new friends, the Palestinians, doesn't it?
And Of course the people who said they want 40 acres and a mule, reparations, et al. (liberal black malcontents demanding things from whitey) that you've quoted overwhelmingly support the Palestinians and hate Israel. But I know that doesn't bother you, you're happy to march with them, aren't you? They're your new best friends aren't they?
And let's look at who else you are siding with shall we?
the race card playing UN, the biggest marxist entity in the world--with it's--"Israel is a racist state" and blaming western culture for the third world's ills.
And you are on the side of those who rejoiced when Americans were murdered.
And you are on the side of those who deliberately target innocents, even children with bombs filled with nails.
And you're on the same side as the Berkley and the European Marxists.
Hey, maybe if you keep up the good work, some day they'll make you an honorary commie.
"Hey hey, ho ho, Western culture's gotta go!" Come on freetus, chant it with them, you know the words.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.