42 active reservists in the Israeli army have threatened to refuse conscription in the shadow of Israel’s assault on the Gaza Strip, signaling a growing refusal to participate in Israeli war crimes. We are here to bring you these new refusers’ stories, and why they turned to refusal as their tactic to resist the war. War refusers are diverse, both in their backgrounds and in their politics. While our beliefs do not always strictly align with that of every new refuser, we do believe that war refusal is a radical act, and that war refusers’ motivations ought to be documented. We at the Refuser Solidarity Network look forward to bringing you up-to-date news and stories from the growing refuser wave, and thank you for your support.
Nearly 10 months into Israel’s assault on Gaza, tens of thousands of Palestinians have been killed, but the Israeli hostages have yet to return home. My name is Yuval and I live in Jerusalem. For the past 6 years I served as a combat medic paratrooper in the Israeli army. First as conscript and later as a reservist. I am also one of 42 reservists who published an open letter of refusal following Israel’s invasion of Rafah in May. We vowed to refuse future draft orders because of our country’s continued assault on Gaza and unwillingness to accept a deal that would bring the hostages home. Now, we need your support: Sign this petition supporting me and other refusers of the war on Gaza.
I've always had moral conflicts regarding my service. They were inevitable, stemming from the everyday injustices carried out by our military in the West Bank, or from serving in Hebron myself, a city where Israel’s unjust policies are at their most visible.Only after I finished my mandatory service,with the guidance of the “Freedom School” program I participated in, I began my journey learning more about the history of our conflict and began questioning some core beliefs that so many Israelis hold, recognizing much denied hard truths, regarding the historic wrongs Israel has dished out to the Palestinians. In the process, I began to question the strongest Israeli consensus: that of the military.
Before the shock of October 7th, I was already on the path to becoming a refuser. I was planning to leave my unit, where I served for years alongside close friends, by telling my friends that I was leaving after the holidays. When the war suddenly broke out, a day before I planned to leave, it changed everything.I was shocked, as anyone else, to hear about the horrific massacre Hamas carried out on the 7th. And when my unit was recruited, I joined them; I could not leave my friends as their medic. I felt that I needed to help guard the innocent civilians that were attacked in their homes.
At the war’s outset, I was serving in some of the Israeli towns that were destroyed during the attack. We witnessed houses burned down, cars punctured from bullets, destruction everywhere. Nearly everyone I know, including myself, lost someone that was close to them, most of which were unarmed civilians. Those traumatic events have brought Israeli public opinion to the darkest point I've ever seen. Denying the very existence of innocent civilians has become mainstream, and demands to ignore international law and abandon any and all past restraint grow louder. Ten months into the war, the realization of those ideas into government policy has become clear.
The level of destruction I saw in Gaza was beyond all imagination. Daily Israeli bombings killed countless civilians, and even some of our own hostages while completely destroying all of Gaza’s infrastructure. As time went by, my qualms grew larger, especially when I went inside Gaza myself, while Israel chose to refuse a hostage deal in exchange for ending the war.
Our daily lives in Gaza were carried out in people’s homes, where I felt the absence of the Palestinian families who were forced to flee, and I was left sitting among their belongings. We used those homes to protect ourselves from Hamas’s snipers, but tactical decisions ended up mixing with soldiers' sentiment of revenge: the homes we stayed in were vandalized, graffiti was done, and small souvenirs were taken from each home. When my commanding officer ordered us to burn down the house we stayed at, justifying his orders with military reasons not nearly legitimate enough to take away the home of a few families, I declared that I’m not willing to participate and left.
The day-to-day reality I witnessed on the ground, as time went on, with the hostages still in captivity reminded me that when given the option, Israel is only willing to resort to military force. This was on full display well before the invasion of Rafah, and only further underscored on numerous occasions by an Israeli government unwilling to end the war in exchange for the hostages. When the nation has the opportunity to use other tools at its disposal – diplomatic, for one – it’s not ready to do so, even against popular will. For Netanyahu, whatever plan exists to save the hostages is merely a selling point, even if that means reducing the lives of the remaining hostages to a PR strategy.
My experiences in Gaza, those from before the war, and the sights we've seen after the 7th of October massacre, have all led me to believe that militarism is only a source of pain, for both Palestinians and Israelis. I'm Israeli and I consider myself pro-Palestinian, and know that the establishment of a Palestinian state is the only just solution to the occupation. The tragic massacres on October 7th cannot be justified. Never. Exactly as the destruction we're now seeing in Gaza cannot. That’s why I believe in differentiating between supporting the Palestinian people and supporting Hamas, violence or intifada. Not only is violence never justified, Hamas and its horrific actions have only brought destruction upon Gaza.
In the name of nonviolence, I also believe that war refusal offers hope. Not only to end the assault on Gaza, but to also rehabilitate communities in the “Gaza envelope” by breaking the endless cycle of suffering. Please voice your support for us by signing this petition in order to send a clear message: the world stands behind Israeli war resisters. If you’ve already signed it, please consider sending it to your friends and family.
