We Will Not Continue to Occupy, Destroy, Deport, Kill, Starve and Humiliate By Yedioth Ahronoth

The meeting with the group took place on the evening of the terror attack in Hadera, in a student's apartment in Tel Aviv. Something doesn't seem right, it looks like a mistake in casting, this is not the way dissenters talk. Where is the ideological fervor? Where are the strident voices? ['] Patriotism is not lacking here. The territories dissenters of 2002 are people who until a few years ago spoke in a chorus about the importance of staying in Lebanon to protect the north and made statements like: "If we aren't here, Hizbullah will be," etc. [']

They have seen from close up that the IDF is unable to cope with terrorism by means of roadblocks and blockades. They have heard brigade and battalion commanders complaining of a serious lack of training and professional expertise among the combatants. ['] They have witnessed bureaucracy being wielded violently against the civilian population that, irrespective of their leaders' corruption, have daily needs: Food, health care, school. Nowhere in basic training or in officers' training school were they taught a "roadblock course."

Zonshein, a veteran of the Kfar Darom front, is full of shocking stories that are often summed up in the IDF lexicon with terms like "exposure." "If something bothers the company commander in the sector, he calls for the division engineering unit to perform an exposure and to lay bare a huge area with four bulldozers. There are greenhouses, fruit groves, homes in this area. The story of the destruction of homes in Rafah is a daily occurrence with us, it happens all the time. A house here, a house there. You stand in an outpost with soldiers who are under fire all the time. Because they don't want us there. And as a commander, you shoot and order that houses be taken down."

"Yes, we were given a briefing from the Givati Brigade commander, who said that the lesson learned from the September events and the Western Wall incidents [in 1996] is that in the case of a mass demonstration, it is important to bring snipers and to shoot three of the organizers. Because if we don't do this, we will have to carry out a massacre. And then he said: `make sure to shoot those people, don't let the matter get out of hand, because then you'll shoot women and children and that doesn't look good in the media.' I told him that was immoral. That is the level the IDF talks about today ' how things look on film." [']

"I had a company commander tell me how he and another sniper observed a force two and a half kilometers away from their position and how they spotted a `legal target.' That's what people in the territories are called, `legal targets.' ['] When he said this I asked him `what is it? Have you seen a person?' and he said, `yes, and it's a legal target.' I told him `those aren't targets, those are people. Did the man endanger you? Did you see him do anything? How can you tell the sniper, a young kid, to pull the trigger. You don't know who is really there.' And this is an excellent company commander, with left-wing political views. Not a hothead." [']

"When I was discharged, I felt I was losing my sanity. We all have limits. You can be the best officer, always be first and volunteer for the most complicated operation in Lebanon, and suddenly you are asked to do things that should not be asked of you ' to shoot people, to stop ambulances, to destroy houses that you don't know if people live in them." [']

Staff Sgt. Ariel Shatil, 32, a computer engineer from Jerusalem, is the commander of an artillery crew. Shatil: "I first refused to serve when I was sent to Gaza last September. I didn't go knowing I would refuse. I was sent to defend the Nisanit outpost. In response to mortar fire on the outpost, we were to fire with a 0.5 caliber gun and machine-guns in the direction of Beit Hanoun. The bullets penetrate thin walls and windows and kill people, and you don't know who you're killing. I went to the battalion commander and told him to put me in another outpost, facing Egypt or in Nahal Oz, because I don't want to be a poster child for Yesh Gvul [a fringe, left wing organization]. I told him that if I were put there, I wouldn't be able to give an order to someone to do what I wouldn't do. The battalion commander court-martialed me, and because I've been doing reserve duty for ten years like clockwork, and there are not a lot of people like me in the State of Israel, I was confined to the base [as punishment in the court-martial] for the entire period and, in practice, did guard duty." [']

The most common kind of dissension in the IDF is `gray dissension.' Combat reserve units rely mainly on the good will of the individuals. It is easy to be discharged. Cases of conscientious objectors are usually handled by the unit, before they develop into protest scenes.

Zonshein: "We were in the engagement in which Etti Fahima was killed. Nahum Barnea interviewed guys from the battalion and asked one of the officers if the guys were showing up. The officer answered `over 100%,' in other words, even people who weren't called were coming. That was an bald-faced lie of course. Only 60% of our unit showed up, and it's the same in other battalions. The army is simply in a panic, everyone whitewashes it and in the end, it will all fall apart." [']

['] Zonshein: "In this Intifada, we began to ask a lot of questions. We are not an enlightened army, that's a lie we've been sold. The last time I was in Gaza I was told to do things that contradict the education I was given at home, in my family, and in the army. If you haven't had to pass through the Kissufim roadblock, you don't know what goes on there. ['] The orders we're given tell of a confused army, something I hadn't ever encountered before. Brigadier Generals give you orders, the purpose and goal of which are totally unclear. Something vague between `protect the residents, keep the roads open and protect yourself.' The orders for opening fire are very general, along the lines of `use your judgement, we're behind you.'"

Itzkovich: "In Gaza, I'm in an impossible situation. I have to protect my soldiers, to defend them and to get everyone out alive, so for me, everyone is the enemy. If someone who is a little suspicious comes near me, for me he's the enemy, because I know that if I don't think this way, I could endanger my soldiers. You can't be both an occupier and moral. I deliberated a long time before I was called to duty in Gaza. I decided to go because I felt I had to see what is going on there. You have to defend the country, so you go to the territories, that's the routine. Terrible things become routine." [']

"Talking about this is like coming out of the closet," says Noam Livne, 27, a computer programmer at Ben Gurion University. "One's political opinion is private, but I went through something this past year, I see myself as a missionary and I'm not ashamed."

"I don't think so, that's the advantage of being a combat soldier. I was in Lebanon, I was in the territories, no one can say I'm scared or dodging service. I know exactly what's going on, and I woke up. In 10-20 years, people will look back, grab their heads and say `what did we do, what were we thinking.' I was contemptuous of the Four Mothers movement, but they were right, and it's thanks to them that we left Lebanon."

"Of course not, Plato said that long ago." [...]

We, reserve combat officers and soldiers in the Israel Defense Forces, who were raised on Zionism, on sacrifice and on giving to the people of Israel and to the State of Israel, who have always served on the front lines, who were the first to take on any mission, whether difficult or easy, in order to defend the State of Israel and to strengthen it; We, combat officers and soldiers who have been serving the State of Israel for several weeks every year, despite the heavy personal price, who have done reserve duty throughout the territories and who have been given orders and instructions which have no relation to the security of the country;

We, who understand today that the price of occupation means the loss of the IDF's semblance of humanity and the corruption of Israeli society in general; who know that the territories are not Israel; who have seen with our eyes the price in blood and fire that the territories exact; who know that the fate of all the settlements is their evacuation; We hereby declare that we will no longer take part in the war for the settlements' safety. We will no longer fight beyond the Green Line with the purpose of occupying, deporting, destroying, blockading, killing, starving and humiliating an entire people.

We hereby declare that we will continue to serve in the IDF in any mission that serves the defense of the State of Israel. Occupation and oppression do not serve this purpose ' and we will not take part in it.