I was skimming the news in the Israeli press today and more and more stories are coming out that just sicken my stomach.
There was the ambulance medic who took a wounded reservist from a medivac helicopter to the trauma room at Rambam hospital in Haifa, and heard only these words from the soldier: “Do you maybe have some food? I haven’t eaten in three days.”
Death to Yuppiestan, or, Nasrallah was right - Haaretz - Israel News
I moved on to read this:
“They sent us into a village they knew 15 Hezbollah fighters were holed up in at mid-day, we were like sitting ducks, it was total insanity. Two of our comrades were killed because of that. We are being used as though we were in the Chinese army, where it doesn’t matter how many are killed,” he said.
Reservists: Officers stopped us from attending anti-war protest - Haaretz - Israel News
That one is interesting, in that anti-war protests in Israel have always been by the left and against the concept of war. Reading this carefully, I’m not sure that this protest is so much against the war as it is how the war was run. This would be a bad precedent.
On the news last night there was a story of a reserve officer who is on trial alon gwith members of his unit for refusing an order. If he refused an order, clearly, punishment must be severe. But, his defense is to claim that he didn’t refuse an order but rather tried to point out to the commander giving the order that he felt the mission he was being given was too risky given the level of enemy presence. The outcome will show what the facts are, I hope. If he is not guilty of refusing orders, this says something even worse on the decision to try him.
Lastly, I found this blog entry from a doctor who served up North:
I, like many others, have noticed that the combat units are populated disproportionately by soldier/citizens from the periphery. The Tel-Aviv Yuppies, the high tech sector (aka technoweenies), the economic elite are all under-represented in these units.
Sleepless in the South: I too was called to serve
He’s not the only one to be saying this. All of my friends up North kept telling me that those in Tel Aviv had no idea what was going on. Truly they didn’t. I spoke with people who thought my going to Kyriat Shmona was akin to walking into the middle of a battlefield with machine guns firing in all directions.
But forget about the fighting. Life in Tel Aviv really continued as if nothing was going on. Only one person from my office was even called to reserve duty, and that was on a “few days on, few days off” basis for a role behind a desk. It was only my friends from my recent service in the army who were putting their lives at risk - who disappeared from their families for weeks - who put it all on the line so that those of us left in Tel Aviv could continue as if nothing happened.
Perhaps that first article hit the issue right on. Perhaps the army’s command has been bitten by the “Tel Aviv” virus that they are completely out of touch with those on the front lines.
[tags]Israel, war, Lebanon, military, MidEast, Middle-East[/tags]
