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THE HANDSTAND |
JANUARY 2003 |
tHERE ARE MEN AND WOMEN WHO REFUSE TO CARRY OUT MILITARY ORDERS AND OTHERS WHO BECOME SERIOUSLY DISORIENTATED , TRAUMETISED OR PSYCHOLOGICALLY ILL BECAUSE THEY HAVE CARRIED OUT MILITARY ORDERS wherE could that be do you
suppose? do those people ,who vote,
intend to maintain and direct this world on this suicidal
course ?... by continuing to vote for politicians whose
mindset is patterned on the security of the rich, who if
protected, will enable them, surely (!), live similarly ;
To climb the rungs of a ladder set up against the
mountain of corpses of children and innocents whose name
they bear.? Three texts follow:
a legal adviser , ....Having served as Legal Advisor to
the Palestinian Delegation to the Middle East Peace
Negotiations from 1991 to 1993, and in a similar capacity
to the Syrian Delegation to the Middle East Negotiations
during their First Round held in Washington, D.C. during
1991, I can state unequivocally that if there had
been good faith on the part of the governments of Israel
and the United States back in 1991, a comprehensive
Middle East peace settlement between Israel on the one
hand and Palestine, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan,
respectively, on the other, At this writing,the governments of the United States and Israel are plotting to launch catastrophic aggression against Iraq . Israeli Prime Minister General Ariel Sharon could very well use this second Bush Family anti-Iraqi oil crusade as a pretext and a cover to launch yet another Israeli round of ethnic cleansing against the Palestinian people, driving their West Bank residents into Jordan, which Sharon has always quite disingenuously maintained "is Palestine", and their Gaza inhabitants into the Sinai desert, together with Israel's Palestinian third-class "citizens." A second Al Nakba for the Palestinians. There
are also indications that Sharon would very much like to
launch a major new aggression and land-grab against
Lebanon and Syria just as he did in 1982 when as Israel's
so-called Minister of Defense, he obtained the proverbial
"green light" from the Reagan administration to
do so and exterminated about 20,000 Arabs in the process. Francis A. Boyle,Law Building,504 E. Pennsylvania Ave.Champaign, IL 61820 USA 217-333-7954(voice):217-244-1478(fax) conscience The following is the
English translation of an address by Anat Matar, activist
and mother of imprisoned Anat Matar The IDF rules the current government, just as it ruled the previous one and the one before that. The prime ministers and ministers of defense, Barak, Sharon, Ben-Eliezer, Mofaz, and some of their reigning cheiftans, know no thought or feeling that is not militarized. The IDF, and the state it tows behind, are waging a war the sole goal of which is the utter subjugation of the Palestinian people living in the occupied territories. We should not forget this for a moment. The IDF is a criminal army. Immersion in the details of daily events – including the shootings of children and elderly women – diverts our gaze from the overall view, from the broad move being undertaken here, minute by minute, by well-disciplined soldiers. The soldiers’ role is to crumble the Palestinian population. Unthinkingingly, they are destroying not only the physical infrastructure of West Bank and Gaza Strip cities, not only homes and roads and fields and orchards, but also every trace of life-spirit. Over 50% of the Palestinians in the occupied territories are suffering from malnutrition. Overall health conditions verge on a catastrophe, and people in need of more than a bare minimum of health care fade silently away, uncounted among the casualties. At least 75 people have died in the last two years because the curfew, the road blocks and the ruined passes prevented them from receiving medical attention in time. Just yesterday we got word of two stillborn babies whose mothers could see the ambulances waiting from a distance, but couldn’t reach them. The Palestinian educational system is limping along, functioning with extreme difficulty, and the universities hold classes in warehouses and private homes, in order to keep alive a small ember, so as not to burn out altogether. Family visits, travel from cities to villages, going to the beach – all these are concepts long forgotten. Some of those present here today
were justly stirred to strong protest against the
transfer of Palestinian Everyone who lends a hand to the IDF today is complicit in this move. Not just the soldiers of the combat units bearing idyllic names and insignias of birds and flowers, but the sentry at the army headquarters in mid-town Tel-Aviv as well, the “grease-monkey” in the Negev armor corps, and the woman soldier working in military intelligence, and the woman computer programmer at the army adjutancy center, and the flight instructor. All of them are accomplices to the crime. My son Haggai has chosen the route
of resistance. For succeeding not to drown in the IDF
fascism that These young objectors teach us an important lesson and I call on the people here in the audience, and equally – or perhaps even more – on those speaking here tonight, the Israel Prize Laureates, to understand and internalize this lesson. Haggai and his friends are realizing in full the concept ‘citizen.’ To be a citizen means, first and foremost, to act. Just as being a soldier means being passive, obedient, well-disciplined, being a citizen means the exact opposite: action, resistance. In Israel in 2002 it is very difficult to be a real citizen. Precisely because of the near-total rule of IDF over everything, it is almost impossible to give expression to its civic, civilian “other.” But people unwilling to be swallowed up by fascism are compelled to turn resistance into practice – not into a single, one-time performance. There are many wonderful left-wing organizations struggling due to lack of activists and poor funding. Help them! Write letters to the editors of the press, letters to the authorities, articles, poems, speak out on television, make noise, noise, noise to counter the sleepy IDF silence, or the IDF-style pitter-patter of news announcers. Uncover what they wish to hide, screen the banned film, demonstrate in support of the marked Knesset Members. Come out in support – public, stubborn, clear and consistent – for refusers. All of these acts are successful expressions of citizenship. (To conclude I mentioned the
philosopher Bertrand Russell, who served a six-month
prison sentence for Thursday's event at the Zavta theatre club was a great success. Regardless of the inclement weather, hundreds of sympathisers and supporters arrived from all over the country to fill the hall, in a striking expression of solidarity with the imprisoned refuseniks. Speakers included parents of refuseniks, and nine Israel Prize laureates headed by former Education Minister Shulamit Aloni. Without necessarily identifying with the refusal movement or the positions of Yesh Gvul, the speakers were unanimous in denouncing the army's systematic persecution of refuseniks, specifically their repeated imprisonment (up to six terms and more in the offing !). This savage treatment is a gross violation of the basic norms of law and justice, and is in glaring contrast with the indulgence the army exhibits towards soldiers who kill innocent civilians, or settlers who break the law with impunity. In close cooperation with the High School Seniors ("shministim") and on behalf of the entire refusenik community, Yesh Gvul intends to keep up the campaign until the army respects these young persons of conscience who refuse to become part of the apparatus of occupation and repression. It gives us pleasure also to note that several people and organisations have sent messages of support for the Shministim and the rest of the refusenik community. Amongst them: Amnesty International, Not in My Name (South Africa), the Refusal Soildarity Network (US), Jane Fonda and several adoptions groups. Ram Rahat
- Peretz Kidron
rehabilitation By Nicole Gaouette Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor Date: 12/17/2002, CAESAREA, ISRAEL Childhood in Israel is short. The golden days of adolescence that North Americans celebrate - the fun, the dates, the new freedoms - barely exist. By 18, most Israelis are struggling through basic army training, then shouldering a gun in a bitter conflict with Palestinians that, after two years, shows no sign of slowing - but is increasingly leaving its mark on those who fight it. Reserve officer and social worker Omri Frish is trying to help young army veterans who are, as he puts it, "completely fried, totally indifferent, and without a grasp of reality." In March 2001 he started Kfar Izun, or "Balance Village," to help restore them to emotional and psychological equilibrium. The response, particularly from parents seeking help for their children, has been overwhelming. "We've received over 900 [calls] from parents with terrible stories," Mr. Frish told the Israeli paper Ma'ariv. These days, he tells the Monitor, "we're trying to rent more buildings. More and more people are trying to come, but we don't have the space." With funding also limited, a maximum of 24 patients at a time can stay for up to four months at the two- to three-acre compound, where clusters of bungalows border a white-sand beach and the lapis-blue Mediterranean. As a fat puppy trips over himself to join in, a small group of patients sways through the motions of a judo practice, part of their treatment. Sixty percent of the patients here are male. Former soldiers talk about having to kill, watching comrades die, and the fear of their own deaths. Those who didn't deal with death firsthand speak of encounters with Palestinians. "We'd go into houses. We'd see children and old people crying. We shot their televisions. At first you don't pity, you do the job. But when you sit at home later, you begin to understand that you've done things that have hurt you emotionally," one patient told Ma'ariv. A female patient named Jade huddles in a chair, hidden under a hat and a hooded, pumpkin-colored sweatshirt. "You meet [Palestinian] people just like us," she says. "It can be traumatic." As Jade speaks, she slowly pulls off her hat and peels away the layers of insulation. Birdlike in a tank top and pants, she has sheared her brown hair close to the scalp. Soldiers sometimes pay a heavy emotional price for violent encounters with civilians, she says. "When they look in the mirror after it's over, they say 'What did I do? What have I done?' " Thirty counselors work with the patients, who have been evaluated at a Tel Aviv psychiatric institute. The young veterans garden, drum, and draw as part of their therapy, which also includes more conventional forms of healing. "The idea is to help people develop an inner control, to give the patients the responsibility and power to heal themselves," says Frish, who hopes to expand using donations from private citizens and the government. Treatment costs just over $2,000 a month. Sponsors cover about $600, families must make up the rest. Once treatment is over, counselors keep in touch with alumni to see how they're doing. Those in need can come back for a month or two. "Our team keeps an eye on them," says Frish. "We remind former patients of what they were like. We want them to remember." Frish says he initially founded Kfar Izun to help young Israelis who had "lost their way while traveling." Backpacking around Asia is a common rite of passage for those fresh out of the army and eager for more benign adventures. "Young people making a transition from the stiff, demanding, intrusive institution of the army to a very open, unconventional, enabling situation like traveling can have problems, especially if there are previously existing vulnerabilities," Frish says. Many of these travelers run into trouble with drugs, and some attempt suicide. Frish's group works with wayward travelers' friends and family to bring them back to Israel. Frish eventually started taking in other young Israelis, after realizing that soldiers - particularly those with drug problems - had few places to go for help.Counselors at Kfar Izun say the use of drugs like LSD and Ecstasy contributes to the emotional problems some young Israelis face, but they also point to the simple stress of being young here. "The level of vulnerability is higher here than many places," Frish says. "Young people are exposed to terrorist attacks, they go through army service." And then there is the intifada. This
latest incarnation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
has killed 211 As Israel has reoccupied most Palestinian areas, soldiers come into increasingly close contact with the communities they keep under closure. "People are in fighting situations, they face death, and when that becomes something you do daily and you're physically stressed - you lack sleep and food - it begins to wear you down," says a counselor named Tomer. "You witness and participate in things you can't share with others and have to bottle this up inside you." Many soldiers at Kfar Izun have come from elite units. "They aren't trained to deal with failure. They have high standards, and there is no emotional flexibility, so they are very prone to emotional crises when something goes wrong," says Tomer, a lean man whose baggy Thai-style pants and shaved head are reminiscent of his backpacking clients' style.Patients have arrived at the village believing they are the messiah, that they caused the intifada, and that they are being watched and followed by the secret services. Jade says she began to unravel psychologically after an extended trip to India, finding that everything seemed "wrong" when she got back here. But her brown eyes light up when she talks about Kfar Izun, where patients' days are rigorously structured with gardening, cooking, and cleaning work punctuated by the occasional drug test. It's a very listening, empathetic place," she says. "They don't just see problems or see you as a pathology, they see all of you." (c) Copyright 2002 The Christian Science Monitor. All rights reserved.
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to foster hatred or fear of others
in their society, those in opposition who may have the
innocence or determination that knows not how to lie.
