|
Comment on this article |
Email this Article
|
|
News :: Israel / Palestine |
|
Jailed "Refuseniks" to be Released |
Current rating: 0 |
by haaretz via gehrig
(No verified email address) |
14 Sep 2004
Modified: 10:09:28 AM |
|
"Today it is already clear that on the one side of the conscience barrier there are objectors who are not willing to infringe on universal human rights, while on the other side there are objectors whose conscience bothers them only when they are required to move their family to another abode in de luxe conditions." |
The conscientious objectors go free
By Orit Shohat
Haggai Matar, Adam Maor, Shimri Tsameret, Matan Kaminer and Noam Bahat - the five conscientious objectors to military service - are getting out of prison tomorrow, after serving a year's sentence, and another year in repeated remands. It is not clear what the army is planning for the day after their release. Will they be required to enlist again? Will they be sent to prison again? Are five youngsters capable of carrying on their shoulders the entire objection struggle opposite a strong military establishment that enjoys the support of the consensus? Is it fair to expect it of them?
An unjustified feeling of failure prevails in the conscientious objectors movement. The army defeated the objectors, as expected, by imposing on themgrave punishment. But this victory was like the victory over terror. It is a victory of the strong over the weak, which yields only a momentary sense of satisfaction. Just as you cannot crush terror while constantly abusing the population it comes from, so you cannot defeat the objectors while ignoring their arguments on the occupation's immorality.
It is hard to defeat youngsters who refuse to cooperate with continuous anomaly. It is hard to prevent the trickling down of the objectors' message, and hard to ignore their accumulative influence on the revulsion the public feels toward the occupation and the settlement movement, which prevents putting an end to it.
The decision to withdraw from Gaza also derived from a fear of growing conscientious objection; the IDF stopped sending reserve soldiers to Gaza for fear of increasing insubordination.
The IDF has changed in the last decade. Religious nationalists who identify with the occupation policy have filled the command ranks. What is erroneously called "fear of civil war" is nothing other than the fear that hundreds of religious uniform wearers would rebel when the command comes and refuse to withdraw from the territories.
The settlers, who have already taken over the Likud's central committee and the defense agenda, and determine the fence's route and an excessive share of the state's budget, are today threatening the IDF from inside and out. A day will come, and it will probably come soon, when there will be a majority in the public, the cabinet and the Knesset for an overall withdrawal, but there will be no one to carry it out.
The left-wing draft objectors have outed the right-wing objectors, and just as well. Today it is already clear that on the one side of the conscience barrier there are objectors who are not willing to infringe on universal human rights, while on the other side there are objectors whose conscience bothers them only when they are required to move their family to another abode in de luxe conditions. Today it is already clear that the struggle is between the settlers' state and the State of Israel, and the only question is which of these states is the IDF serving.
Insubordination in all its nuances was never a goal in itself. The objectors did not think of sweeping thousands after them, only of sharpening the debate on the morality of the occupation and the settlements, and on the limits of obedience to an unacceptable policy, which includes committing war crimes.
When the settlers say uprooting settlements is a "crime against humanity," they are cunningly using left-wing objectors' vocabulary. But the issues are defined in international treaties, and it is the establishment of settlements on occupied territory that the treaties define as a war crime, not uprooting them.
The objectors made excessive use of the term "conscience" in their trial, mainly for legal reasons, to explain their position, making insufficient use of terms of political protest. Instead of saying that they are not willing to serve in an occupation army, they argued that they are not capable of doing so. This mistake in presenting their case aroused, justifiably, the question, why is it more conscionable to let terrorists murder innocent Israelis than wipe out terrorists while harming Palestinians who happened to be around? Unfortunately, the argument has deteriorated to whether this or that operation is moral, instead of discussing whether the occupation policy in general is moral.
The Palestinian suicide bombers were not the ones who made the public sick of the occupation. While the suicide bombers aroused the instinct for revenge, the objectors aroused the instinct for withdrawal, and the sense of shame. The programs paying tribute to the IDF that fill the state channel's broadcast time table do not increase the public's flimsy confidence in the wisdom of the policy of using more and more force, and the local authority workers who have not been paid their wages know that when it comes to the settlements, the state funds continue flowing like water.
There will not be a civil war because the settlers are ultimately a vociferous, bullying and destructive minority, which can be fitted in its entirety into Jerusalem's Zion Square. The insubordination sharpened the bitter argument with this public, fanned the flames, cracked the fake consensus, canceled the reconciliation attempts and forced everyone, whether he identifies with the objectors or not, to take a political and moral stand on either side of the Green Line.
© 2004 Haaretz
@%< |
See also:
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/477575.html
http://www.seruv.org.il/english/default.asp
|
Copyright by the author. All rights reserved. |
