Published on Portside (https://portside.org)
Our Girl --
Israeli Conscientious Objector Sentenced to Sixth Term in Military Lock-up
Sima Kadmon
Friday, June 24, 2016
Yedioth Ahronot (Israel)
This last Sunday, Tair Kaminer, aged 19, stood before the
commander of the Induction Center, Col. Aran Shani and was sentenced for the
sixth time for her refusal to join the IDF for reasons of conscience. She was
sentenced to an additional 45 days in prison and reached an accumulated period
of imprisonment of 170 days.
Col. Shani told Kaminer that she is indeed brave and intelligent,
but she was being tried for her refusing induction and not because of her
opinions and it will cost her dearly. He also emphasized that, if it was not
clear to her, that the army was stronger than her.
It should be stressed that the IDF allows most of those required
to enlist, more than 50% of each yearly call up, to evade induction or to
receive early release. The reasons are numerous and varied. Health causes,
marriage or pregnancy, economic problems at home, psychological stress. Another
reason is exemption for religious or conscientious causes.
There is no doubt the commander of the Induction Center, Col. Aran
Shani, knows what religion is' but it is not certain that he knows what
conscience means.
This is what Kaminer wrote to the Conscience Committee, which is
to meet by the end of the month to discuss her case.
"I was born and grew up in Israel, I studied high school
at the School of Arts, I was a member and then a group leader in the Scouts
Youth Movement in Tel Aviv and ten months ago I completed a year of voluntary
service with the Scouts in Sderoth. Since January 10, 2016 I have been
repeatedly jailed again and again in military prison for my refusal to serve in
the army despite my request to do alternative civilian volunteer work.
Since I was a child I heard of many events linked to the army, to
its rule over the Palestinian population, its role in the defense of the
settlements, about rights denied to many citizens in the region. In my home I
was educated towards critical thinking and not to accept things without
question but I was never pressured in regards to any decision to serve or not
to serve in the army."
Kaminer detailed formative stark events such as a demonstration
for peace and equality at a Palestinian village when she was 9 years old, when
the IDF broke up the demo with smoke grenades. Or, the change she experienced
after a year of volunteer work in Sderoth, when she decided not to serve in the
army."The youngsters with whom I worked, writes Kaminer, "grew up in
the heart of the conflict and suffered from traumas from a young age, which
were formative and engendered hatred (understandable) just like similar
experiences of those in Gaza or in the territories. I am not able to
participate actively in preserving the status quo. That is activity opposed to
my conscience.I understood that I would not be able to live with myself if I knew
that I collaborated and kept silent in the face of everything going on in my
country. sadly what is considered security is security only for Jews. Moreover,
the atmosphere today in Israel permits bloodletting for all those who are not
Jews.As long as the government of Israel, protected by the army continues to
occupy and oppress the Palestinian people, will continue to deny its basic
right of the people for freedom and self -determination, I am unable to serve
in such an army which acts so sharply against my convictions.
Since so many supported the shooter soldier from Hebron,
Eluor Azria, and have named him "our boy," I permit myself to call
Tair Kaminer "our girl."
A girl who opposes the occupation, who requests release on
conscientious grounds and is unwilling to declare that she is orthodox, or to
enter a fictitious marriage, or go to see the Officer for Psychological Stress,
or to find a way to serve in the IDF magazine, or the IDF radio station, or in
the IDF spokeperson's office or in the military Rabbinate.
What she is unwilling to do is to try and be a celebrity, or an
outstanding athlete, or act as many MK's - pillars of society and even
ministers and party leaders have done. She stubbornly demands release on
conscientious grounds from an army that seems to have forgotten long ago what a
conscience is.
The shooting soldier from Hebron did not spend a single day in
prison, and it is doubtful that he ever will. The battalion commander who shot
a fleeing boy in the back after he threw a stone was never put on trial. An
administrative check, not judicial, exempted him from punishment.
Ultra-orthodox men refuse even to appear in the Induction Center to receive a
discharge hang out in the streets, undisturbed. But Kaminer, our girl is in
jail.
Tair's mother, Sybil Goldfeiner, told me this week that her
daughter didn't want to declare herself a pacifist, because she is not. Most of
the people just lie, said Goldfeiner, and Tair didn't want to lie. She did a
year of volunteering and she wants to do national service. But the army fights
against my moral daughter, who wants to contribute. A real enemy of
Israel.
Kaminer is in Prison 6. She can speak on the phone for seven
minutes a day. She can receive visitors for half an hour, once every two weeks.
She writes a diary in prison and gives it to her mom on paper. Goldfeiner types
it and posts it as a blog.
She could have done so much if she did national service, says
Goldfeiner. As a leader in the Dizengoff Scout Club she organized sending
800 kids to summer camp. In Sderot she led the whole Scout youth group
for the year.
But what her mother sees, the IDF doesn't. And the commander of
the induction base and his officers are going to continue to use force
against Kaminer until she gives up. Maybe to prove to other conscientious
objectors how things stand (Omri Baranes, who already served 37 days was
also sentenced for the third time now).
Apparently, the army fears, that with the many who lie and are
released each year, the number of conscientious objectors will double and maybe
even reach the number of six, and what will we do then. They are determined to
prove, as if there is doubt, that the army is stronger than her. But there is a
doubt. Apparently there is a young woman who is stronger than them.
For sure smarter.
Israeli Conscientious Objector Sentenced to Sixth Term in Military
Lock-up
Tair Kaminer will have served 170 days in military prison when her
current term ends. Omri Baranes, another conscientious objector, handed 30-day
sentence.
By Gili Cohen
June 20, 2016
Conscientious objector Tair Kaminer [2], 19, was
sentenced to another 45 days in military prison on Sunday for refusing to serve
in the Israel Defense Forces.
The sentence, imposed by the IDF's Tel Hashomer induction base
commander Col. Eran Shani, will be the sixth term served by Kaminer.
She has already served some 125 days in lock-up. By the time
Kaminer completes her latest sentence, she will have spent almost 170 days in
military detention.
Kaminer wrote on her Facebook page that she refused to serve
"for the sixth time with full belief in peace."
She has served more time in military prison than any conscientious
objector before her.
In addition to Kaminer, another conscientious objector was
sentenced to a 30-day term in military prison on Sunday. It was the third
prison term for Omri Baranes, who said she was not prepared to
"participate in an aggressive system, in an occupation army that thrusts
weapons into the hands of 18-year-old children."
Baranes added that she "hews to the path of pacifism and
hopes for the day when compassion will awake and peace will arrive through
discussion and tolerance."
Both Kaminer and Baranes are members of a group of conscientious
objectors called Objectors - A Political Objection Network.
Source URL: https://portside.org/2016-06-30/our-girl-israeli-conscientious-objector-sentenced-sixth-term-military-lock
Links:
[1] http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/1.726062
[2] http://www.haaretz.com/misc/writers/tair-kaminer-1.711501
[2] http://www.haaretz.com/misc/writers/tair-kaminer-1.711501
Donations can be sent
to the Baltimore Nonviolence Center, 325 E. 25th St., Baltimore, MD
21218. Ph: 410-323-1607; Email: mobuszewski [at] verizon.net. Go to http://baltimorenonviolencecenter.blogspot.com/
"The master class
has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles.
The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject
class has had nothing to gain and everything to lose--especially their
lives." Eugene Victor Debs
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