In the Line of Duty-
Israeli Soldiers Refuse to Serve Occupation
By Bette Hurst
Winter 2004
Volume 40, Number 1
There is a limit at which each person draws a moral line. For Ishai Menuchin, peace activist and major in the Israel Defense Forces and founder of Yesh Gvul ("There Is a Limit"), that limit was reached one night when he watched his lieutenant-colonel order a captured Palestinian to "run". The fearful Palestinian lay down to avoid being shot in the back. It was later determined that the man was innocent. Since then, Menuchin has remained in the IDF reserves, but because of the bloody Lebanon invasion, he began counseling conscripts and reservists to selec-tively refuse service outside the defense of Israel.
He spoke about his decision to become a refuser and to form Yesh Gvul in a speech at St. Albans Church on the National Cathedral grounds on Monday evening, April 7, 2003 from 7:30 to 9:30 p.m. He is on a tour of the U.S. sponsored by the Refuser Solidarity Network (202-232-1100).
Yesh Gvul is the oldest refuser group in Israel. It started in 1982 when Israel invaded Lebanon. 168 soldiers were jailed for refusing to participate because of the blood-shed, havoc, and naked aggression. There were more refusals during the first Palestinian Intifada of 1987. 200 were jailed. Yesh Gvul countered this with financial support for those jailed and their families. Altogether, 1,100 men have refused. That is equivalent to 44,000 Americans refusing.
Yesh Gvul seeks to combat misuse of the IDF for unworthy ends and seeks to end the occupation by changing soldier opinion as well as Israeli public opinion. It favors a two-state solution as a peaceful resolution in the interests of both peoples. Menuchin is not a pacifist. He will fight, but only to defend his country. As a "selective refuser", however, he will not fight in the occupied territories. He distributes selective refusal material to Israeli soldiers in the occupied territories. He feels the War of Settlements corrupts Israeli morality.
The Refuser Solidarity Net-work, which sponsored Menuchin's visit in Washington, was formed in April of 2002 and has 1,200 members. RSN "adopts" jailed refusers and writes letters to them. RSN writes in their behalf to the Israeli attorney general and to the Israeli embassy. It is currently supporting 11 jailed high school senior conscription refusers whom the Israeli Attorney General Finkelstein is trying to "break" with successive jail sentences.
One of them, Yoni Ben Artzi, a high school senior, has been jailed for 196 days, awaiting trial before a military tribunal, the first such tribunal in 30 years. He refuses to be drafted, but is willing to serve the state in some form of civil service. The attorney general is denying him exemption. If he wins his case, it will be a victory for the movement. RSN is urging people to write the embassy and the attorney general in his behalf.
In their flier, "Frequently Asked Questions," the RSN reminds people that UN Security Council Resolution 242 (1967) explicitly emphasizes "the inadmis-sibility of the acquisition of territory by war" and requires a peace that includes "withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict." The Fourth Geneva Convention (Article 49) states without excep-tion that "the Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies." Recently, UN General Secretary Kofi Annan directly called the occupation illegal. Also, the 1907 Hague Convention outlaws attacks on undefended villages and dwellings (Article 25) and the seizure of property unless militarily necessary (Article 23). The Geneva Conven-tion states that "medical personnel exclusively engaged in the search for, or the collection, transport or treatment of the wounded or sick…shall be respected and protected in all circumstances" (Article 24).
Mr. Menuchin concluded his speech with a question and answer period. It was
his birthday. As a surprise, a representative of CODEPINK, herself
a Muslim and a wife of a Viet Nam veteran, presented Menuchin with
a bouquet of roses.
