- cross-posted to:
- world@quokk.au
- cross-posted to:
- world@quokk.au
Vilk is among a growing number of Israeli soldiers speaking out against the 15-month conflict and refusing to serve anymore, saying they saw or did things that crossed ethical lines. While the movement is small — some 200 soldiers signed a letter saying they’d stop fighting if the government didn’t secure a ceasefire — soldiers say it’s the tip of the iceberg and they want others to come forward.
Their refusal comes at a time of mounting pressure on Israel and Hamas to wind down the fighting. Ceasefire talks are underway, and both President Joe Biden and President-elect Donald Trump have called for a deal by the Jan. 20 inauguration.
It’s an interesting article, because to be honest, it feels like an attempt to create news more than cover it. Two-hundred or so objectors is paltry, frankly. If anything, I think the lack of dissenters in Israel is a more notable point of news.
But then again, refusing to serve and criticizing Netanyahu can be a very frightening and risky thing to do. The culture is brutal, and the head of police in particular, Ben G’vir, is a hardline fascist who doesn’t tolerate challenges to the ruling government. So we’ll see what happens.
Those 200 could spearhead convictions of thousands of war criminals if they properly testify.
It is also showing time and time again, that the narratives spread by Israel, its allies and complicit media are lies and fabrications and they know exactly what they are committing.
Under fascism every centrist will loyally enforce fascism, that is why it destroys a society and why the long history of centrists shouting down leftists trying to raise the alarm about a descent into fascism is so ironic.
These people never realize the vile they spit at progressives for violating established rules and norms is the same vile they will deploy on innocent people under fascism because “well that is the way things are now and I am going to live my life, now get in line and follow the new rules!”.
It is now a serious question how to deradicalize essentially the entire population of Israel away from genocide, and since neoliberalism is ideologically bankrupt there really isn’t much of anywhere to even start (I say this as a USian who very much implicates my country in this, only verrry low horses here)…
…which is what people really mean when they say neoliberalism and capitalism inveitably attempt to set the stage for fascism. Once the stage is set and the transition complete it is far to dangerous for the average individual to resist and limit the machinery of violence they are now part and parcel of… and most centrists then have lost the language to even think in those terms anyways. Going back is much much harder.
Once you shout down leftists and systematically disempower them for advocating for treating oppressed people like human beings and “compromise” with fascists who will never settle for anything less than fascism, you have not simply destroyed a societal guardrail, you have destroyed that society’s capacity to even understand there is a cliff or what it feels like to fall off it.
200 fewer perpetrators of genocide is still a good thing. One less IDF soldier willing to kill lowers the potential number of people killed significantly, because one man with an automatic weapon can kill a lot of people with no weapons at all.
That’s true when the limiting factor is how many people are willing to kill, but Israel has those in spades. The limiting factor here is the number of people available to kill (people who don’t evacuate in time, those who enter buffer zones, etc etc). Anyone who’s able to be killed will be killed, so 200 fewer soldiers won’t actually change the number of war crimes being committed in Gaza.