Israel jails 600 reservists

[Bryan Atinsky]

As O'Conner stated, there have been some of the people willing to talk to
the foreign press...as with his BBC example.  However, it may very well be
that some of the individual reserve duty officers who are refusing to serve
do hold back, as you stated, and don't want to talk to the foreign press.

I think that one has to seperate the individuals who refuse to serve from
the organizations like Yesh Gvul and New Profile.

 From what I heard today on Israeli television (a half hour interview with
one of the reservists who signed the petition with the 60 some others), the
choice not to serve was a very hard personal choice with a lot of weighing
back and forth whether to act or not.  Many of the objectors may still hold
much of the Zionist value system yet feel that their action's in refusing to
serve are in the interest of Zionism as a whole.  Therefore, those
individuals could very well put limits on their critical actions against the
state.

The people who refuse to serve run the gamut from left liberal Zionists to
anti-Zionist.  Therefore there is no solid "Them" but semi-coordinated
actions of individuals, sometimes under the umbrella of one of the
conscientious objector organizations, and sometimes not.

I have asked someone at Yesh Gvul to put out a more general article on the
present situation and publish it onto Indymedia Israel This evening I got an
answer to the affirmative that they would do it as soon as possible.

I will notify you all when there is something.

Best Wishes,

Bryan

----- Original Message -----
From: "Seth Ackerman" <sia at nyc.rr.com>
To: <bryan at indymedia.org.il>; <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com>
Sent: Saturday, February 02, 2002 9:03 PM
Subject: Fw: Israel jails 600 reservists


> Bryan -
>
> Why do the soldiers refuse to talk to the foreign media? I've heard noises
> about their not wanting to undermine Israel abroad, but that just confuses
> me. Why, then, do they translate their website manifesto into English? Is
> there some potential here for an international solidarity campaign?
Perhaps
> at least from "diaspora Jews," like myself?
>
> Seth
>
>