The dichotomous basis for militraism: one camp against the other, the good guys vs. the bad guys, soldiers vs. the exempt, the front lines vs. the home front, men vs. those who are not men – women, the strong vs. the weak, protectors vs. the protected.

Uri Avneri

“The Other Side of the Coin”

“It never occurred to me that Shula is a girl. She’s petite, tanned and silent, and no one notices her. She works somewhere in the battalion – in the storehouse, the kitchen or the communications post, I don’t know exactly… She has a cute body and we didn’t even know… No one noticed her. It takes a war, a muddy outpost, soppy trenches, for people to notice you, little Shula, to feel that you’re a girl, that you have a soul and a body, that you can give people some beautiful moments, perhaps the last in their lives”.

“The good guys go to become pilots and the good chicks to the pilots”.

“The dominance of … hegemonic masculinity is preserved by employing a dual mechanism of inclusion of different groups through mandatory conscription, and at the same time, their marginalization to peripheral occupations within the army. Through this dual mechanism … the state ensures the loyalty and identification of the soldiers from non-hegemonic groups, while at the same time maintaining their marginalization within the army and the state.”

A militaristic society polarizes and stresses gender differences and deepens the gap between them. Militarism and sexism are linked.

Cynthia Enloe claims that militarism requires the widely accepted beliefs regarding gender – the clear division of roles between men and women. Militarization processes organize a given society according to military thinking and modes of operation, always maintaining sexist division of labor and power and distribution of resources.

Militarism depends no less upon a defined group of “women and children”, being its “protegee”, justifying the existence of the army.

With the raise of nationalism, sexuality, fertility and child raising become strategic issues, and that the control of women becomes the way by which men defend the nation.

War expresses and reinforces violence against women.Militarism is an extended expression of the phenomenon of men’s control of women.

Masculinity is shaped to suit the model of the warrior male. Therefore, exclusion and control of women are central components of that which society terms as “male and masculine”. Masculinity as such, characteristically warrior-like, is then a vital and central element in militarization processes, and in constructing ongoing acceptance of recruiting and fighting.

“The ethos is masculine; but for that very reason women’s participation has been an essential ingredient … without women to objectify … these men’s military service would be less confirming of their manhood, perhaps even of their citizenship.”

“ New Hebrew” of whom the Zionist fathers dreamed, and the state’s founders realized. The “Sabra” – the new Jew in Eretz Yisrael – was groomed as a powerful fighting male, and the Israeli Sabra culture that developed accordingly is a culture of war.

One moreWoman soldier

to the women corpsMeans

One more soldier To the Front .

Amram Mitzna Mayor of Haifa

Shlomo Lahat Ex mayor of Tel Aviv

Ron Huldai Mayor of Tel Aviv

Yitzhak Rabin

Ariel Sharon

Ehud Barak

12 women among the 120 members of the first Knesset (parliament). In the recent Knesset, 17 out of the 120 members were women.

Envision de-militarization as a goal;

A key to democratizing Israel,

A key to ending the conflict,

Without de-militarization – No end to the occupation, No peace.

Constant exclusion and silencing made women in Israel realize they must found women’s peace movements.

Movements that will voice the critical perspective of marginal members of the community

Women active for peace have their own unique voice, opposing not just war but the whole militaristic system.

Virginia Wolf:

War Culture

“Wars are product of society

rather then

outside reality that is forced on it.”

A different perspective on war and peace, a perspective that illuminates the “natural” status of war as a product of militaristic society, and peace as a comprehensive social concept of equality and justice.

End of the general’s time, It is women’s time

Women coalition demonstration, Jerusalem

Get Out of Lebanon

(1998)

Women, Mothers, Daughters from all over Israel

The marginal perspective carried by the women’s voice, questions accepted truths, norms and practices especially regarding the militarization processes within Israeli society. Such perspective offers the insight that peace can only be possible if the army stops its constant penetration of society and its institutions.

Israel has become from a state with an army, to an army with a state. A look from the sidelines enables one to speak of de-militarization and civil-ization as crucial processes to end the occupation and attain peace.

Criticism and resistance of ruling norms, such that produce the enemy, the danger, and the imminent war.

To illuminate all the cultural and educational practices that make such norms acceptable.

The concept of peace offered by the women’s movements differs from the (dichotomous) militaristic concept of “all or nothing”. The women’s movements in Israel see peace as a holistic state of human rights for all state citizens, all social and ethnic groups. Peace is seen as social justice, and social justice includes peace.

Plain people, Women, Men, Parents, Children

Bat Shalom A feminist peace organization of Israeli women. Bat Shalom, together with The Jerusalem Center for Women, a Palestinian women's peace organization, comprise The Jerusalem Link, which works together to secure a just peace

New Profile: Movement for the Civil-ization of Israeli Society Addresses issues of militarism and gives support to conscientious objectors to military service in Israel.

Women in Black – Stand, dressed in Black, Since 1987, in a Tel-Aviv Junction, Calling for the end of occupation and a just peace

The 5th Mother A movement that keeps the work of “Four Mothers” that called for withdrawal from Lebanon. Still active for just peace.

Machsom Watch – Keep watches and record the activity in Army Check-Points to prevent inhumane behavior

Women's Initiatives

for Peace

through Demilitarization

New Profile:

The members of New Profile study the “grey,” vague area that exists between citizenship and militarism in Israel

The Lines between political and military decisions, in Israel, is not at all very clearly drawn. .

The issue of mandatory enlistment in the IDF and how it is generally perceived to promote social

cohesiveness .

Draft resistance is a growing phenomenon in Israeli society and it clearly worries the military authorities.

Conscientious objection 300 signatories of the "High School Seniors' Letter "

A movement of reservist soldiers who refuse to serve in the occupied territories.

Yesh Gvul (“There’s a limit” or “There is a Border”).

Ometz Lesarev (“The Courage to Refuse”).

New Profile strives to put the legitimacy of conscientious objection .

A support network for young people who are looking for information about draft refusal or avoidance .

We accompany conscientious objectors in court cases .

New Profile collects and publishes information about the phenomenon of draft refusal, its dimensions in general and the number of declared refusers at any

point in time .

Open discussion of resistance to and non-cooperation with the army’s activities and government policies .

Options for an alternative form of civic service .

Education is one of New Profile’s central fields of activity.

Education, acts as one of the main channels through which, militarism is internalized as the norm. It is also mainly through education that young people become ready and motivated to enlist

New Profile reveals the complicity between the army and the education system and the fact that the study materials used in it prepare children, from early stages for

enlistment.

Children’s booksMy Dad is a GunnerMy Brother’s a Soldier

Pictures taken from study book of Joshua for 3rd grade analogize

statue on the right

Trumpeldor and his friend tomb, the myth says that his lastwords were

“it is good to die for our country”

Schools compete by a military criterion .

A good school, by this standard, is one that can boast a high percentage of students who have been invited for air force training.

New Profile has drawn attention to militarist contents in study programs .

A central place to Israel’s war heroes. Israeli’s wars are presented as no-choice wars, conflicts between the sons of light and the sons of darkness, the just and persecuted on one side and the evil ones on the other.

National holidays tend to be celebrated with strongly militarist overtones.

50% parachutes 50% infantry100% family

They serve in the parachutes or in the infantry ….but on Friday when they come home for Israeli dinner: green salad eggs and cheese, they become our children again.

50%Infantry

100% family

50%parachutes

Tnuva CottegeCheese

My child is a fighter. The tension ,the pressure ,The telephone call…

I asked my pharmacist for

Kalmanervin ,And it helped me relaxNow I can function as usual

Civic alternatives with the aim to de-militarize Israeli mainstream education.

Other ways of marking Jewish and national holidays.

Changes in the standard routes and activities of school fieldtrips.

Institution of civic celebrations .

Parental-civic involvement in the schools.

Change in militarist projects conducted by the schools such as traditional gift parcels and letters of support for soldiers.

“Shai lahayal”Send a Gift to a Soldier.

The cover of a recent children’s book.

Discussions, study days and conferences on militarism in Israeli society.

On how militarism affects the status of those groups that are not part of the hegemonic militarist elite.

The influence of militarism on women.

Sexual harassment of women soldiers in the IDF.

Lieutenant Dan Moed file a complaint against her superior Lieutenant Colonel Yehuda Shefer on sexual harassment.A military discipline court believed Moed, yet chose to acquit Shefer. Moed appealed to the supreme high court of justice who chose not to intervene in the military procedures.

“Easy Conscription”card; The text reads:

LOTS OF THINGSARE HARD IN THEARMY

CONDOM INSIDE

PUSH-UPS,FOR EXAMPLE...

EASY CONSCRIPTION

New Profile aims to increase women’s awareness of their inferior place in a militarist society; On the one hand, to boost their awareness of how they cooperate (mainly unwittingly) with militarism. How they cooperate through participating in an education system that envisions enlistment.

New Profile aims to help them realize their ability and power to refuse the policies of the militarist system, to refuse doing as they’re told.