He was an IDF officer, but now he says he'd rather go to jail than participate in the Gaza war

This time last year, Michael Ofer-Ziv was halfway through his military work on the war in Gaza. The reservist was called up a week after the devastating Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.

The 29-year-old says he was torn about whether to serve with the Israel Defence Forces or not. A self-proclaimed leftist, he says he was abroad when the call came, and was hesitant to accept. But emotions among friends and family were running high. His family knew some of the victims killed at the site of the Nova music festival, one of the areas the militants had targeted.

So Ofer-Ziv reported for duty on Oct. 13, 2023, serving as a control officer for the next two months out of Sde Teiman, a military base in the Negev desert in southern Israel, near the border of Gaza.

"As a lefty, I do not believe that military action will solve anything in the long term," he said during an interview with CBC News.

"But it was very clear that in the short term, there was a need to re-establish the border to protect civilians on our side."

However, even during his term, his apprehension toward the military's stated goals for the war remained in the back of his mind. In June, after a break, he officially refused to return a decision that could mean jail time.

Ofer-Ziv is now among over 100 Israeli servicemen and women who have signed a petition addressed to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, refusing to return to service without an immediate ceasefire deal in Gaza and return of the Israeli hostages who remain there. The letter, which is still collecting signatures, had reached 165 at time of publication.

Conscientious objectors also called refusers or refuseniks in Israel reject the mandatory call to service over moral or political grounds, and can face jail time for their actions. Though they remain a minority of the population, the country has seen recent high-profile cases of young refusers.

Netanyahu's office declined to comment to CBC on the letter and on refusers protesting the war in Gaza.

The IDF said in a statement that any narrative suggesting an uptick in refuseniks is "false," and that the cases described are "marginal."

"Since the outbreak of the war, hundreds of thousands of reservists have been called up, some of whom continue to be actively deployed even now."

The tipping point

Ofer-Ziv was part of the brigade command unit, which controls the movement of troops in the battlefield. He was stationed in a "war room" at Sde Teiman, where he would monitor a portion of the ground operations in Gaza live through screens. He described it as the "cool-headed" team driving the fight on the ground.

(Sde Teiman would later gain infamy, as it was partially converted into a detention camp during the war and faced allegations of IDF soldiers abusing Palestinian detainees. Ofer-Ziv was not involved with the detention camp operations.)

He said he couldn't share too many details of his time there, but said it was an environment where officers were constantly debating where, who and what to strike next. And between those debates and the high-stress environment he was in, compounded by a lack of sleep and separation from his family, Ofer-Ziv says making decisions was difficult.

He also felt that, while troops were never told to target civilians in Gaza, many didn't see the accidental killings of civilians as a big deal.

"The general sentiment is this disregard [for] Palestinian lives: It's not as important of a thing that we should talk about or care about that much," he said.

The thinking was "we should avoid it when we can, but it's not something that we should work really hard to avoid."

Part of what kept Ofer-Ziv in that war room was a belief that a ceasefire deal was imminent. And he believed the presence of someone who was more critical of the war could make an impact on the decisions made.

"I really believe that when I was there, I made a bit of a difference," Ofer-Ziv said. "In many cases, the decision not to fire, I had a part [in] making that decision."

But the tipping point was in December 2023, when the IDF mistakenly killed three Israeli hostages in northern Gaza.

"At the time, we already had this concept that the military pressure is killing hostages, rather than making a reality for a deal," he said.

He was given a routine break that month, and by the next month, he had already decided not to return.

Regarding any wrongdoing on the battlefield, the Israeli army told CBC it had referred nearly 2,000 such cases to the General Staff Fact-Finding and Assessment Mechanism, an independent body, for review.

No soldiers, no war

Mattan Helman refused to enlist with the IDF in 2007, and spent over 100 days in jail. Now, as executive director of Refuser.org, he works to support fellow refusers and their efforts to resist Israeli military action in the broader Middle East.

An international organization, Refuser.org funds refusers' legal fees, and also supports their press and social media campaigns about war resistance.

"This kind of initiative of soldiers is resistance," he told CBC News. "The work cannot go on without soldiers to continue the war."

Though they are a minority, refuser movements have gained some traction in the past. Yesh Gvul which roughly translates to "There is a limit" is one of them, created at the start of the 1982 Lebanon War by Israeli veterans who refused to serve in the military. Nearly 3,000 reservists signed the petition against invading Lebanon, according to its website.

Shimri Zameret, the chair of Refuser.org's board who has also spent time in jail for refusing to serve, says it's difficult to reject military service in Israeli society.

Though there are exemptions, most Israeli citizens are required to serve in the military once they turn 18 men for at least 32 months and women at least 24. After that, they're typically required to be part of the reserve force, where they're not always on active duty but can be called up for emergencies.

It's not just the legal requirement that makes refusing difficult, however. Many refuseniks keep it to themselves, Zameret says, because they fear reprisal from their family and friends, as serving in the military is an important part of Israeli society.

"Most of them don't understand that they're doing atrocities because they are told by their societies, they are socialized to believe that what they're doing is protecting their society," he said.

"So this is the cognitive dissonance, where soldiers are going and they're doing this thing that they believe is for protection."

Possible jail time

Ofer-Ziv officially refused military duty when he was called up again in June.

He was then notified that he was suspended from military service shortly after signing two refusal petitions. There was an attempt to sway him to remove his signature from them.

He says he believes the government is hoping to keep the activities of refuseniks like him quiet. But he is adamant about his decision, he says.

"I participated in occupation for, let's say, four years, when I was in mandatory service. I participated in the occupation every day.

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"I live in Israel. I pay taxes [that] go to the West Bank, they go to occupation," he said.

"So the way I see it, it's me paying my dues. "[And] this is what I can do to pay back for what I did."

He could face jail time, though he says he may not find out until after the war ends. But Ofer-Ziv says he's at peace with any punishment that he may have to face as a result of his outspoken objection to the war in Gaza.

"I'd rather sit in jail than participate in this war."