Israel A Moral Dilemma

By Johanna McGeary

The basic values we grew up on are changed whether we like it or not during our service here. Every day children are being hurt. The Chief of Staff said it would take time. But the time is long, and the price is high."

"I find myself acting violently toward people to make them afraid of me. This is my duty, but I feel humiliated by my conduct."

"It wears me down as a person. It breaks me. These are not the values I grew up on."

"It tears us apart and strengthens the Arabs. Only a political solution will save us from this insult."

These are the candid, plangent voices of Israel's soldiers, angry reservists confronting Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir last week in a makeshift encampment outside Nablus, the largest and most turbulent Arab city on the occupied West Bank. Nothing since the 1982 war in Lebanon has eaten into the heart of Israel's most revered institution, the Israel Defense Forces, as the past 14 months of bitter war against children and stones has done. Seemingly impervious to Israel's iron fist, the Palestinian uprising rages on, and that is exacting a price from the I.D.F. measured less in injuries than in anguish. The army faces not military defeat but moral erosion, and its troops, the young men of Israel, find themselves charged with an impossible task: end the intifadeh but be humane; solve the Palestinian problem but do not jeopardize Israel's security.

The past four weeks have been the bloodiest so far. At least 40 Arabs have died, and more than 500 have been wounded as Palestinians, galvanized perhaps by the U.S. decision to talk to the Palestine Liberation Organization, have kept up a steady barrage of rocks and fire bombs. Nearly 90% of the violence involves stones, and most of the throwers are children. Strikes to protest the surge in deaths led only to more lethal encounters with Israeli troops.

For the soldiers, the moral dilemma only deepened as the determined government of Shamir ordered yet another military crackdown. "We will increase the punishment so there is a higher price to pay for throwing stones," explained army Chief of Staff Dan Shomron. A new kind of ammunition has been introduced: a round, rubber-clad metal ball advertised as nonlethal but responsible for nearly half a dozen deaths so far this month. Soldiers are permitted to fire supposedly less lethal plastic bullets more readily, including at the backs of fleeing protesters. Stone throwers can be jailed for five years, their parents fined $1,000 or more, their family's property confiscated, even their houses destroyed.

A visibly irate Shamir defended these and all of the other measures the I.D.F. has employed against the uprising by blaming the Palestinians. "They force us to take guns and do things you don't like to do," he told the reservists. "We hate those P.L.O. people because they make us kill Arab children. But you must do that to survive."

The proud and powerful I.D.F. will, of course, survive. But the damaging consequences of this unwinnable war are already being felt. Middle-aged reservists trained to fight against tanks and grenades now chase children through the rubble-strewn alleys of refugee camps. When the taunts and the stones become unbearable, they open fire. "I don't feel that I'm fighting against Palestinian terrorists," says a 28-year-old reserve captain on duty in the West Bank. "My enemy is a twelve-year-old."

If some soldiers suffer misgivings over their mission, others feel hamstrung by bothersome regulations to go easy. On patrol in Gaza, a young army private named Shmuel complained, "Three weeks ago, when we tried to be lenient on them, it didn't work. The only thing they understand is an iron fist." Retired Major General Shlomo Gazit admitted, "I would say that a very strong majority would like to see more force used."

Probably the most vocal calls for harsher measures come from the Jewish settlers in the territories, who have increasingly become the main target of Palestinian stones. For months the 70,000 settlers, who claim the West Bank as their biblical right, have complained that the army is failing to protect them. When Shamir started to speak at a memorial service this month for two Israeli victims of the intifadeh, mourners yelled, "You are doing nothing!" Nor did the new battle order satisfy the settlers, who have demanded such extreme reprisals as shooting all stone throwers on sight. "For them ((the Palestinians)) it's a festival, for us a continuous Yom Kippur," said Rehavam Ze'evi of the far-right Homeland Party, referring to the solemn day of atonement.

But each time the army toughens its measures, critics abroad protest. In Washington, State Department spokesman Charles Redman called the new I.D.F. guidelines "very disturbing" and declared, "We don't believe that the use of lethal force in non-life-threatening situations should be necessary to preserve order." Such comments carry weight in Jerusalem at a time when the Israeli government feels considerable pressure to pursue a diplomatic solution. Prime Minister Shamir is drawing up a new peace plan to present to Washington in March that he hopes will cool the fire in the territories by offering a modicum of political autonomy.

The latest crackdown has renewed the debate among Israelis over the role of the I.D.F. in quelling the rebellion. In the Knesset, Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin came under withering fire from opposition parties on both the right and left. Hard-liners charged the army was not doing enough. Doves attacked Rabin for the mounting death toll. "This policy is not only killing Palestinians but also the souls of Israeli soldiers," said Yossi Sarid of the left-wing Citizen's Rights Movement. Hecklers finally drove Rabin from the parliamentary chamber.

Israel's political leaders cannot seem to decide how much force is appropriate or acceptable in the face of international criticism. During the past year soldiers have been instructed to beat rioters; drop gravel on them from helicopters; fire tear gas, rubber bullets, plastic bullets. None of it has ended the uprising. And even some Likud members doubt the new measures will do better. "I don't think there is a lot of logic or common sense in shooting a boy when he's already finished throwing his stone and is running away," said Minister Without Portfolio Ehud Olmert.

Many political and military officials are worried the measures will serve mainly to brutalize Israel's soldiers. Warned Meir Pa'il, a retired colonel: "If we continue, the real danger is that our soldiers will be turned into beasts." That is already happening, said a lieutenant colonel in charge of % one West Bank military district: "The first time you see someone whose face is swollen after a beating by our soldiers, you are horrified. The second time is not so terrible anymore. The third time, you are indifferent."

Some military analysts are more concerned about the impact on Israel's readiness for war. Every day some 6,000 soldiers patrol the territories. More than 90% are reservists, who owe the army about 60 days of service a year, twice the time served before the intifadeh. Yet they have little time for regular training. "We are eroding the army's resources, physically and intellectually," said Knesset member Sarid. So many normal training routines have been interrupted that, as a U.S. Pentagon official put it, "we fear a deterioration of I.D.F. military capability." American military attaches in close contact with the Israeli army report "moral confusion" at all levels of the I.D.F. "The operation in the occupied territories is dividing the young from the old, the regulars from the reservists, the officers from the politicians," said a U.S. expert.

Israel's top military leaders reject any suggestion that the I.D.F.'s fighting strength has eroded. "Don't jump to any conclusions on this point," said a senior Israeli officer. "None of our enemies should have any illusions about a weakening of our military capability."

I.D.F. generals have been among the strongest advocates of a political solution. Chief of Staff Shomron told the Knesset that the I.D.F. could not eradicate the intifadeh because "it expresses the struggle of nationalism." But however much the generals yearn for a political settlement, they prefer to use every weapon available to fight the uprising without legal and political constraints. The army's job, Shomron added, is "to enable the political echelon to negotiate from a position of strength."

The I.D.F. alone cannot possibly fulfill the conflicting demands of a deeply divided nation. At best it can ensure that life for the Palestinians remains extremely difficult. Only political courage on both sides of the barricades can alter the painful status quo. And there can be no doubt that on both sides of the barricades, there is pain. "The Arabs are paying the higher physical price," says Ze'ev Schiff, defense editor of the Israeli daily Ha'aretz. "Israel pays the moral one."

With reporting by Jon D. Hull/Jerusalem