Women COs imprisoned in Israel

by: Alice Hunt

Israel: On 29 February, pacifist Inbal Gelbert was sentenced to a fourth prison term for her continued refusal to serve in the Israeli Defence Force (IDF). Both the Conscience Committee and the Incompatibility Committee rejected Gelbert’s requests for exemption.

Gelbert is one three women facing jail-time for objecting to compulsory military service in Israel. While imprisonment for COs had been confined to men, these women are the start of what may become a growing trend of female COs behind bars.

“I cannot take part in the injustices that our state carries out by means of the IDF. I am no pacifist, my refusal is prompted by the occupation,” 19-year old Laura Milo said in a statement before reporting to jail on 22 February.

Milo worked in community service in Yerucham for a year before refusing to join the IDF. She said that during that year she “encountered the ugliness of our society,” and that it “reinforced my sense of duty to create something different.”

Milo appealed to the military’s Conscience Committee, but her request was declined. “Her problem isn’t one of conscience,” the committee ruled.

Milo emphatically disagreed. “I will refuse out of a deeply personal motive: So I can go on living in this country at peace with what my conscience tells me.”

Also sentenced on 22 February was Veronica Kravtzov. She was in the academic course of the IDF, which gave her deferment during studies in exchange for a two-year military commitment. But Kravtzov changed her mind about serving during the course of her studies.

All three women received 14-day sentences.

Also serving time, COs Noam Bahat, Adam Maor, Haggai Matar, Matan Kaminer and Shimri Zameret were relocated to civilian jails in late February at the request of military prison officials, who complained that the youth caused disruptions.

“Their presence is completely undermining discipline and good order in the prison…They are political activists with their own agenda, completely unfitting for the conditions of a military prison, governed by military discipline,” said Colonel Major Ochana, Deputy Commander of the Israeli Military Police Corps, to the Court of Appeals in an article by Adam Keller in this issue of Peace News.

Now, Shimri Tzameret and Adam Maor are in Hermon Prison (in the Galilee), while Matan Kaminer, Noam Bahat and Haggai Matar are held in Ma'asiyahu Prison (near Ramle).

“The Five” have spent time in and out of prison since 2002, after signing a letter to President Ariel Sharon stating that they would not be conscripted into the IDF. They subsequently refused as they were called to service. In January all five were sentenced to an additional year in prison, which they serve currently.

To write any or all of The Five, send e-mails to: prisoners@refuz.org.il Address the subject to one or all of the refuseniks.

To write Minister of Defense, Shaul Mofaz, you may use this form provided by War Resisters International: http://www.wri-irg.org/co/alerts/20040303a.html, or submit your own letter to: Ministry of Defense, 37 Kaplan St., Tel-Aviv 61909,Israel. (fax: ++972-3 691 7915; email:sar@mod.gov.il or pniot@mod.gov.il).