Refuznik: for the first time, a regular service officer refuses service in the territories

Second Lieutenant T. a 28-year battalion doctor and regular officer, refused
to join his armoured
battalion in an incursion into the Gaza Strip - for reasons of conscience.
Several weeks ago, battalion 82 of the Seventh Regiment was sent on
operation at the town of
Beit Hanoun in the northern Gaza Strip, aimed at preventing the launch of
Quasam rockets at the
[Israeli town of] Sderot.

T. had previously served in the Territories, and even took part this May in
"Operation Rainbow"
[including the demolition of houses and the shooting of tank shells at
unarmed demonstrators]
at the town of Rafah - though already then he expressed reservations about
the army’s activities
in the Gaza Strip. This time he refused to take part in the operation,
stating that taking part in
the
army’s actions in the Territories would contradict the hippocratic oath he
swore as a doctor, as
well as standing in contrast to the army’s own declared values and being
detrimental to the state
security.

Many efforts were made to convince him to recant, but T. stuck to his
refusal. Of no avail were
the exhortations of his commanding officers, who stated that his job would
be to take care of
Palestinians as well as fellow soldiers, and that by refusing to join the
operation he is putting
soldiers’ lives in danger.
Finding him insistent, T.’s direct commander passed him on to the Seventh
Regiment commander,
who sentenced T. to 35 days’ imprisonment for refusing an order during a
military operation. He
also told T.: "You are not worthy to be an officer". It seems that upon
being released from his
prison term T. will be discharged from service - though the army had paid
for his medical studies
in the expectation of getting years of service in return.

"I regard this very gravely" said Defence Minister Mofaz on Army
Radio."There are two highly
detrimental aspects to this officer’s actions. First, he refused to take
part in an action very vit
al to
the security of Israel’s citizens, in order to prevent the shooting of
rockets at Sderot and its
environs. Also, this officer who is a doctor was unwilling to help soldiers
who might be hurt,
which is trampling upon the hippocratic oath. I think that the way his
commanders dealt with this
case is the way to deal with refusers."
On the other hand, David Zonshein of the "Courage to Refuse" movement
praised the doctor’s
action: "It is not ’an extremist act’, it is a very Zionist act. It is
important for the public to
know
that there are officers who want to serve and love their country, but are
opposed to the
enormous damage which service in the country is doing to the country. This
is the first time that
a regular service officer is refusing service in the Territories.

I hope and
believe that his act h
as
broken a fissure in the consensus and that more officers will now be willing
to act for what they
believe in - even if they have to pay a personal price".

[N.B. Ma’ariv did not mention to its readers that the Beit Hanoun operation
in which Dr. T.
refused to take part was about a still ongoing campaign of destruction of
Palestinian fields,
hothouses and orange groves, demolition of houses and the imposition of a
weeks-long siege on
Beit Hanoun’s 20,000 inhabitants. ]

Gush Shalom (Israeli Peace Bloc)
pob 3322, Tel-Aviv 61033 www.gush-shalom.org/