“If you don’t care about Palestinians . . . You guys should know: you are next in line. The next one who will die from a tear gas canister into his chest will be in Zucotti Park, will be in Denver, will be in Oakland, in San Francisco. It is happening here already. It is happening to different people, to people of color, to immigrants in this country, it is already happening. You guys are next in line. The next one will die out of brutality of the police will be one of your sons or your daughters–in a protest. Because they [U.S. police] are training together. Your police–training with our army. Our army is training them how to take care of the enemy. . . . But when they come back, you are their enemy.” – Eran Efrati
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[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=93hqlmrZKd8]An Israeli Soldier’s Story – Eran Efrati
Published on Mar 8, 2014
The talk by Eran Efrati was filmed in Denver, Colorado on March 3, 2014 as part of The Soldier and the Refusenik U.S. tour with Maya Wind. Eran talk about his experiences in the IDF and then more broadly discusses Israel, its relationship to the U.S. and the global expansion of militarism.
Eran Efrati, 28, was born and raised in Jerusalem. After graduating high school he enlisted in the IDF, where he served as a combat soldier and company sergeant in Battalion 50 of the Nachal Division. He spent most of his service in Hebron and throughout the West Bank. In 2009, he was discharged and joined Breaking the Silence, an organization of veteran Israeli soldiers working to raise awareness about the daily reality in the Occupied Territories. He worked as the chief investigator of the organization, collecting testimonies from IDF soldiers about their activities. He also guided political tours and to the West Bank and worked to educate Israeli youth about the reality of being a soldier in an occupying army. His collected testimonies appear in the booklet “Operation Cast Lead” and their most recent release “Our Harsh Logic”. Since leaving Breaking the Silence, his investigative reports appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post and The Guardian. Today he is active with the Israeli groups Anarchists Against the Wall and Boycott from Within.
http://www.soldierandrefusenik.com
Related:
Miko Peled: The General’s Son & Return of the General’s Son — Israel’s war crimes & dehumanization must stop. There is a better solution
(video) “Life In Occupied Palestine,” Anna Baltzer: A wonderfully moving introduction to the plight of the Palestinians, in simple, everyday terms — Checkpoints, settlements, Israeli activism, 1948 War refugees, censorship, the Wall, ongoing annexation of Palestinian land — “It is five times more likely for an ISRAELI SOLDIER to commit SUICIDE than to be killed in a terrorist attack. So when people talk about this occupation as helping the Jewish people, they don’t realize how many Israelis are actually against it, and how IMPORTANT it is FOR THE JEWISH PEOPLE AS WELL AS the PALESTINIAN people to end this”
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