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Refusing Orders in the Israeli Army

By VVAW

The massive Palestinian protests taking place on the Israeli-occupied West Bank have focused world attention on the Israeli military and its repressive policies towards Arabs. What is not so widely known is the opposition to these policies that has grown among Israeli soldiers themselves.

In the flowing interview, Israeli activist Guy Levi offers the unique insights of a peace organizer in the Israeli army.

Levi was a founder of Soldiers Against Silence and a participant in the soldiers' and reservists' resistance movement known as Yesh Gvul (it translates as "There is a Border"). Now a veteran Levi is studying at the New School for Social Research in New York City. He spoke with the understanding he is not an official spokesman for Yesh Gvul: his views are his own. The interviewer is Chris Deisinger, member of Milwaukee VVAW.

Q. What is the cause of the Palestinian uprising in the West Band and in Gaza?

A. After 20 years of Israeli occupation, those taking the most active part in the uprising are a new generation with no knowledge of the earlier Jordanian or Egyptian occupation. They are mostly 15-20 years old—a generation born after 1967. All they know is the occupation by Israeli soldiers.

Under the surface a revolt was always boiling. You just needed something to happen—the meeting in Amman, the car accident in Gaza where Palestinians died. It didn't matter what happened to start it. Now it has found its own dynamic. Taking into account the Israeli policies on settlement, semi-annexation and repression by the military authorities, I don't think it's surprising.

Q. Would you tell us some of your background as a resister?

A. I was part of a volunteer unit when I refused to serve in Lebanon. It took me two months to decide because of social pressure from my family and all my friends in my unit. We were all members of Peace Now, but it had the policy of obeying all orders and not refusing service. When I finally decided I wasn't going, I went to my commander. He told me if I didn't go to Lebanon, then I couldn't continue to serve in the unit and had to leave. I was transferred to another unit. When they went to Lebanon, I refused again and they just let me do other work. But 150 other soldiers who refused were tried and sentenced to 21 to 35 days.

The most important thing about me was that I was an average Zionist. I was born on a kibbutz and received a typical Zionist education. I volunteered for one of the best army units and really served the country.

Refusing to go to Lebanon was hard. On one hand, I understood I couldn't go because it was a political war. On the other hand, what about my friends in my unit? It just shows how much ideological pressure the typical Peace Now activist faces.

But once I decided, it was rather easy. The problem is that events must go much further before more people will cross this line. In this sense the Israeli peace movement is too connected to the establishment. It can't go beyond the mainstream line and say: "That's it—no more rules. We can't take it anymore. We have to act." Maybe the events of the last three months will help this change to occur.

Q. What is the history of your soldiers' group, Yesh Gvul?

A. Yesh Gvul state in 1982 as the Green Line group. We organized about 150 signatures on a letter to the prime minister asking not to serve in the Occupied Territories. With the Lebanon war, we set aside the Green Line group and concentrated on building Yes Gvul to oppose the invasion of Lebanon. But the West Bank and Gaza were always on the agenda. In 1982 and 1983, there was a hot debate among our members over whether to include or exclude the issue of the territories. Even then we felt a Palestinian uprising of some kind was needed to help us make the Israeli public understand how the occupation was a cancer within Israeli society.

I've heard many soldiers who hadn't joined Yesh Gvul before are joining now. I've hear of 18-year olds sending letters saying they will refuse to serve in the territories. I don't know how major or minor these trends are, but it is a significant change in attitude. It's caused problems for the army.

Q. Why do you describe the occupation as the "cancer" of Israeli society?

A. Since 1967 we've had the era of Israeli colonialism in which 1.5 million Arabs in the Occupied Territories have no political rights. This had an effect on Israeli society and an impact on individuals in military service. When a young Israeli starts his basic training, he goes to villages and towns with the so-called disturbances. This clearly effect his relations with Palestinian civilians and shifts his attitudes to the right. For example, everybody was struck by the number of votes Kahane got from the military in the last election.

You can compare Israel with South Africa. In the economy, a new Arab working class has emerged in the territories. Every day the come to do the so-called dirty jobs and Israeli society has gotten used to it. Our perception is of an Arab who is always down, inferior, doing menial work.. It has increased racism in our society. Politically things are more complicated, but the measures used in the Occupied Territories slowly and constantly penetrate into Israeli society.

These trends are all part of a process of Israel's self-destruction. The Palestinians are showing that a Palestinian state will finally be established. A Palestinian state without Israel is a possible outcome, but Israel without a Palestinian state cannot exist anymore in its contemporary form. For Israel to stay a democracy it needs a Palestinian state.

Q. What is the danger of a new war breaking out between Israel and its neighbors?

A. The current situation is weakening the military. The danger for Israel then is not being able to stand against the Syrian army. As long as Israel was a relatively democratic state—at least within the green line—and as long as the Israeli soldier felt he was fighting for his land, then his morale was high and he could identify with these basic strengths of the Israeli army and Israeli society.

Since 1967 this belief and motivation has been in decline. Since the Lebanon war in 1982, the rate of decline is much higher. This is what I mean by self destruction. If there is no solution in the long run, undoubtedly there will be another war.

Q. During the Lebanon war, there was also a group called Soldiers Against Silence. Although they did not refuse to serve, they protested the war. What was their role?

A. I was one of the tree people who established Soldiers Against Silence. We organized the first meeting in Tel Aviv because we felt there was a chance to widen the protest movement. But within days, Peace Now took control of Soldiers against Silence. Unlike Yes Gvul, the came out with a manifesto saying they would obey orders. They held army as a sort of sacred cow, but demanded that the government do this and that. It was good in itself, but not good enough. After two months, Soldiers Against Silence just dissolved into Peace Now.

Yes Gvul went on. They said this is a political war and we are going to protest by acts of conscious refusal. The Yesh Gvul influence on the withdrawal from Lebanon was minor, almost nothing. But if your protests are really contrary to what's happening—refusing to serve, going to jail, holding press conferences—it's at least a step into one gray cell of the Israeli public consciousness. This is different from Peace Now. Although I don't want to underestimate their importance, they often don't know how to react because they never had a solid policy toward a solution.

Q. What do you believe is the path to peace?

A. There is not just solution but to divide the land between the two peoples. In this I share the view of Professor Liebovitz who on June 11, 1967, the day after the Six Day War, called on Israel to withdraw from the Occupied Territories. His analysis is that we have a mutual history that connects the same land, Palestine, deeply in these two peoples' hearts. The representatives of these two peoples should get down and talk. They would be the Israeli government and the PLO or whoever the Palestinians would choose—although I believe ti would be the PLO since 95% of the West Bankers support the LO as their representatives.

I don't care if they come out with one secular state or two states, buy they should come to an agreement. Practically speaking, I think the 1967 West Bank and Gaza strip borders are going to define the Palestinian state...

Q. What about the proposals for an international peace conference?

A. Which proposals? Prime Minister Shimon Peres' proposal? The Peres' proposal is a joke because he wants to tell the Palestinians who their representatives are. It can't work—he knows it, everybody knows it. It was just for internal politics. But an international peace conference with the PLO, the Arab states, Israel and the superpowers is fine with me—so long as the Israelis and the Palestinians agree to it.

I really don't care what form the negotiations take. Myself, I would love to see a confederation of an Israeli state and a Palestinian state. Given the problem of reactionary regimes in the region, I think that both Jews and Arabs could make a contribution to the future of the Middle East.

This is sort of a utopia, but maybe we can look for it after the first stages. First we have the psychological barriers, not only from what happened since December but also from two decades of occupation. It is not easy for the Palestinian to overcome the psychological barrier presented by the Israeli soldier they have faced for 20 years. It is not easy for the Israelis to overcome the brain-washing they have been through.. But it can work. I worked with Egypt and it worked with France and Algeria. It can work so long as leaders try for it to work.