Israeli soldier sentenced to 28 days for refusing to fight in Lebanon

[kentuck]

I guess there are some Israelis that believe like many here on DU. Let's be careful not to paint with too broad of a brush. Not all Israelis support this war.
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http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/744379.html

<snip>
The first person to refuse to do army service during the current fighting was sentenced Sunday to 28 days in a military prison. According to the refusal organization Yesh Gvul, which issued a public statement Sunday urging others to follow in Amir Fester's footsteps, more than 10 other people have contacted the organization about the possibility of refusing to serve.

While some of them have answered reserve duty call-ups and are participating in military training, they have said that they will not take part in the fighting, according to organization spokesman Yishai Menuchin.

....more

[ForrestGump]

1. Just 28 days?

Really, that's not bad for such an egregious breach of military conduct. People have been shot for less elsewhere.

I'd hope that nobody here applies that broad brush to the Israeli people but, yeah, surely enough some of us are going to (and not even necessarily because they're antisemitic or even blinded by hatred of Israel's actions...plenty on our side of the political fence seem just as incapable, at the best of times, of seeing shades of gray as are the right-wing types).

[indygrl]

5. How can we get

our congressmen and senators to stop defending Israel and be more neutral? The US has got to be the most hated country at this point. Many of us are not being represented by our government, dem or rep. It's just like when Bush led us into Iraq, the dems followed and then said they were lied too. Well, they were but many of us could see that at the time. Why are dems afraid to speak up and how do we get thru to them to try peace for a change?

[ForrestGump]

6. 1) Democratic politicians are (mostly) spineless

2) Democratic politicians are (almost all) politicians

3) Israel is the big untouchable in US politics, no matter which party's in power. Always has been. Allying with Israel is one thing, but throwing our lot in with Israel no matter what the circumstances is incredibly dangerous, as we're probably going to find out (we already have, to an extent).

Kind of reminds me of the IRA being so strongly supported in parts of the US but not really anywhere else: lots of Jewish people in the US hold Israel's continued existence and welfare as something far more important than mere nationalism (I've known uberliberal American Jews who were granola-munching pacifists who'd never support a Bush II policy except where it came to Israel). The issues gets murkier and murkier with accusations of antisemitism where there is none and, of course, with actual antisemitic sentiment playing into the picture. layer on the ever burgeoning anti-Arab feelings here in the US and it gets even more tough to figure out.

Kind of a mess. :-(

[entanglement]

7. If I could nominate your post,I would

Item (3) is SO RIGHT

[Cleita]

2. This isn't the first time Israeli soldiers have refused to

follow orders when they felt it was immoral. I don't have other incidents on the tip of my head right now but I know it's happened. The difference is that they get sentenced to some prison time, our soldiers would suffer something more dire if they refused.

On Thom Hartmann today he read the letter of a soldier in Iraq. There was a lot of stuff in it about contractor and so on but mainly he said that he refuses to re-up because he's tired of being a criminal. Yet, he can't refuse to obey orders.

[QuestionAll...]

4. IDF Soldiers that refuse to fight are called refusnicks

can't find an update on their numbers, but in the many hundreds I believe.

btw, this is about refusing to go into occupied territories, I believe.
sorry, been a while since I read anything on this and can't seem to find a definitive site for more info.

[UndertheOcean]

3. The first Hero of this war :)

n/t

[mom cat]

8. Good for him That takes real courage!

:kick: