By Joshua Rosenstein, Assistant Editor, JTNews
The controversial Pilots’ Letter was originally signed by 27 Israeli fighter pilots who refused to take part in Air Force attacks on civilian population centers that they said kill innocent people.
“These actions are illegal and immoral, and are a direct result of the ongoing occupation which is corrupting all of Israeli society,” the letter states. “Perpetuation of the occupation is fatally harming the security of the state of Israel and its moral strength.” The pilots say they will continue serving the Israeli Defense Forces in any mission that serves Israel’s defense.
On February 28, Brit Tzedek V’Shalom, the Jewish Alliance for Justice and Peace joined with an Israeli group, Refuser Solidarity Network, and the University of Washington Hillel to bring Israeli Air Force pilot and signatory Yonatan Shapira to the Hillel Building and to Temple B’nai Torah in Bellevue. Shapira is spending three weeks on a whirlwind tour around the U.S. speaking to various Jewish groups.
Shapira was not the only controversial Israeli speaker to visit Seattle in late February, however. On February 19 and 20, Israeli right wing settler Ephraim Bluth made his pitch to Ezra Bessaroth and Bikur Cholim Machzikay Hadath congregations.
Bluth is director of development for the yeshivat hesder in Alon Moreh, a religious seminary in the West Bank where soldiers combine their army service with Torah study. In his capacity of director of public relations, Bluth comes to the U.S. to cultivate a network of supporters for the yeshiva.
Both Bluth and Shapira identify closely with the concept of refusing orders given by the IDF, but they represent two opposing streams of thought in the Israeli dialogue.
Shapira, 33, is the son of an Israeli Air Force pilot. He enlisted in 1991, finished his pilot’s training course in 1993, and completed his training on the UH60 “Blackhawk” helicopter in 2001. He and the other IDF pilots from a variety of units signed the letter of refusal and went public in September of 2003.
Shapira explains that the refusers have no morality problem with targeting suicide bombers on their way to kill innocent people, but they draw the line at the use of bombs and missiles in areas with a heavy civilian population.
“When you send a missile to target a terrorist when he is sleeping with his family, surrounded by his community, you know you will kill innocents. Once you justify killing innocents, then you justify the means of those you are fighting against,” Shapira said. “There is a small cadre of leaders deciding who will live and who will die. We have lost faith that they know where to send us or what missions are needed to defend us and which ones are simply revenge killings.”
Shapira says it is difficult to separate out conscience from political views in Israel.
“The decision each of us made came after a long process of becoming aware of the situation in which we are involved and the cycle of violence and revenge. I came to understand that this type of mission, which causes the deaths of innocent people, is the same as the actions that lead to the deaths of innocent victims on our side,” he said. “Our refusal has to do with our conscience, but it is related to the understanding that we are currently occupying 3.5 million people, a whole nation, and we have been for almost 40 years.”
And that, the pilots make clear, is the reason for the problem. “For so many years we have humiliated, imprisoned, forced people to stand at checkpoints, we have created enormous hate against us. If we want to live in Israel with peace and hope, the occupation must end—yesterday,” Shapira said.
He bases his actions on a master command of the IDF. Shapira said this command states that every soldier, officer or pilot must refuse to carry out an order that is clearly immoral and illegal. Shapira believes the government won’t charge him or argue the case in court because he is standing on legitimate ground.
Shapira explains that the pilots’ refusal is based on international, Israeli, and army law. He says the pilots base their beliefs on k’dushat ha’adam (sacredness of life) and the settlers base theirs on k’dushat ha’adama (sacredness of land).
“According to Judaism, life is more sacred than land,” said Shapira, “The Ten Commandments say ‘Thou shalt not kill,’ not ‘Thou shalt not evacuate,’”
When the Pilots’ Letter went public, the active reservists who signed it were stripped of their wings. They were each called to a private interview with the commander of the Air Force and given a chance to recant and take their name off the list. None did so, and they were consequently dismissed from pilot duty.
Shapira said it was during his interview and ensuing argument with Air Force Commander General Dan Halutz that he asked his superior what he would say to a missile attack on a targeted subject that took place on a major street in Tel Aviv, surrounded by Israeli civilians.
“The general then told me that there is a scale of blood-worth: Israelis at the top, Palestinians at the bottom. When he said that, it was clear to me that I had made the right decision.”
Shapira remains a captain in the air force, but he said they don’t call him for duty. He requested that the IDF charge him and put him on trial. He argues that if the government thinks the missions are legal and moral, they should charge the refusers and prosecute it in court.
“My grandparents died in the Holocaust because of soldiers who did not refuse illegal commands,” he said.
For some however, these pilots do not constitute conscientious objectors. Bluth fits the profile of the typical settler. He was born in Brooklyn. He made aliyah with his wife in 1971. They have seven sons and a daughter, all of whom have served, are serving, or are about to begin serving in the IDF. All his sons have served in elite combat units and special forces. His fourth son is an F16 Air Force pilot.
“My wife and I are proud as parents that our children understand the need to defend their country, because we have developed the approach that a country that doesn’t defend its freedom is destined to lose it,” he said.
Bluth said he attempts to balance his commitment to Torah and the land of Israel with a commitment to democratic ideals and the importance of maintaining law and order. “The current situation in Israel is a difficult one because it can bring you into a seeming conflict between those two ideals,” he said.
The conflict he is referring to has given rise to a different kind of refuser—the right-wing kind. A growing number of right-wing soldiers are refusing to carry out orders that involve evacuating Jewish settlers from the territories based on conscientious objection.
Bluth feels that there is an inherent difference between leftist and rightist refusals, however.
“I understand a refusal to follow orders based on a conscientious adherence to Torah tradition,” he said, “but I cannot understand nor condone a refusal to follow orders based solely on political bias.”
“The signatories on this letter are not pacifists, they are prepared to fight, but only if they agree with their own governments’ political agenda,” said Bluth of the pilots. “A person who has a commitment to Torah tradition has a conflict of conscience, not of politics, when, as a soldier, he is ordered to remove a fellow Jew from his home in the land of Israel. A soldier who feels that his Torah commitment supercedes his democratic commitment constitutes a conscientious objector.”
“Everything I am doing here comes from a place of love for my country, care for its inhabitants, a deep connection to Jewish tradition, and a wish to change the future in order to be able to have a family and raise my children in Israel,” said Shapira. “Sometimes, the word ‘No’ is more powerful then a bomb or a missile.”
“We live in the heartland of Israel,” countered Bluth. “Jews are called upon to resettle the entire land of Israel, that is part of the value system we cherish and encourage.”