I wonder how many of you have heard of the refuseniks. It is a movement, now around 635 soldiers strong, within the Israeli Defense Forces. It is a movement of soldiers who say that would die to fight for and protect Israel, but who will no longer do so within the Occupied Territories. It is a movement of soldiers who are choosing time in jail, as opposed to serving in the Occupied Territories. Captain David Zonshein and Lieutenant Yaniv Itzkovits are the two founders of this movement (here is the basic story of how the movement began), and it came about after a particularly horrific service of duty within the Gaza Strip. When they returned, they drafted a letter that would become known as “The Combatants Letter” – here is the text of the letter:
We, reserve combat officers and soldiers of the Israel Defense Forces, who were raised upon the principles of Zionism, self-sacrifice and
giving to the people of Israel and to the State of Israel, who have always served in the front lines, and who were the first to carry out any mission in order to protect the State of Israel and strengthen it.We, combat officers and soldiers who have served the State of Israel for long weeks every year, in spite of the dear cost to our personal lives, have been on reserve duty in the Occupied Territories, and were issued commands and directives that had nothing to do with the security of our country, and that had the sole purpose of perpetuating our control over the Palestinian people.
We, whose eyes have seen the bloody toll this Occupation exacts from both sides,
We, who sensed how the commands issued to us in the Occupied Territories destroy all the values that we were raised upon,
We, who understand now that the price of Occupation is the loss of IDF’s human character and the corruption of the entire Israeli society,
We, who know that the Territories are not a part of Israel, and that all settlements are bound to be evacuated,
We hereby declare that we shall not continue to fight this War of the Settlements.
We shall not continue to fight beyond the 1967 borders in order to dominate, expel, starve and humiliate an entire people.
We hereby declare that we shall continue serving the Israel Defense Force in any mission that serves Israel’s defense.
The missions of occupation and oppression do not serve this purpose – and we shall take no part in them.
60 Minutes did a special on them, entitled “Hell No, We Won’t Go” and you can find the segment online here; it’s very good and about 10 minutes long – I encourage you to watch it. Also, the Refuseniks have an official website here.
I find it interesting that it’s not just people like me who are getting “one side” of this issue during the summer, and it’s not just crazy, whacko international peace activists, and Palestinians who see the real evils of this Occupation – but it is the soldiers in the IDF who have seen and taken part in the violations that have occurred, and it is the soldiers, some of them now, who are finally stepping forward and saying, “Hell no, we won’t go. We won’t go fight within the Occupied Territories – this is an illegal occupation, and it’s wrong!” Here is a personal letter written by refusenik Itai Swirski.
I was talking with one of my Palestinian friends online, and she was telling me a bit more about this house demolition, and about how the director of our program was punched and pushed, and when I asked if it was bad, she replied with “blood came out.” But what was even more interesting was when she told me that she saw a soldier crying.
It’s not hard to know that what is happening here is wrong. You don’t have to be educated at all to know that demolishing someone’s house for no reason is a denial of basic human rights. Anyone can see that this is wrong – anyone with any sense of right and wrong in this world would be able to see that something like this is wrong; sorry, no grey area here, it’s just wrong. And to know that a soldier, who was involved in the demolition, would be crying…and would know that something is wrong…that is huge.