In a possibly unprecedented move since the onset of the Gaza war, three Israeli soldiers have come forward with their real names to speak to the media about why they refused to continue serving during the ongoing conflict. In an interview with the newspaper "Haaretz," they shared the shocking experiences that led them to sign a "refusal to fight" letter along with other soldiers, citing incidents that may amount to "war crimes."
Soldier Yuval stated he was tasked with setting fire to two residential buildings, while his comrade Michael realized the number of civilians likely to be killed with every airstrike he witnessed. Tal broke down when Israel entered Rafah.
Tal Vardi, 28, a teacher in Jerusalem, expressed how he had been absent from his high school for a long time due to being called up for reserve service, surprising his students since he had expressed clear political views and was the most left-leaning of the teachers called to serve. Vardi disclosed that at the end of last month, he, along with 41 other reservists who have been serving since October 7, signed the first refusal letter published by reservists since the war in Gaza began. He recounted a friend's commentary: "I was at the Shifa complex with my tank... Four months later, they sent me another emergency summons to return to the same place, to occupy territories I had already occupied."
Vardi, a tank unit commander, affirmed that should he be called for combat in Gaza, he would refuse. He remembered, "When I returned from reserve service, I began to question where this was heading." Following October 7, he had no doubt that Israel would commence a ground operation in Gaza, which would last several months and ultimately lead to the release of the hostages. However, as time passed, his doubts grew, partly due to conversations with friends serving in the professional and reserve army.
For Vardi, the turning point came when Israel opted for a ground operation in Rafah instead of accepting terms to release the hostages and end the war. He stated, "The moment the operation in Rafah commenced, I felt it exceeded what I could ethically accept, to support and justify it."
Yuval Green, a 26-year-old reserve paratrooper, noted that he had not decided to continue his reserve service even before October 7 due to his opposition to the occupation and Israeli policies in the West Bank. On October 8, he set aside his moral doubts to enlist in the reserves. After a few months of training and duties in the north, the division was sent to the Khan Younis area. Early in December, he learned through reports that Israel was firmly rejecting Hamas's conditions for a new deal to end the war.
Green stated he could not understand the operational reason behind setting fire to a residential building, noting, "This was a red line I set for myself, but I crossed it. The division was important to me... Another red line was crossed when the division commander ordered the burning of one of the houses they were occupying when it was time to leave. The division had burned houses before, but that was in areas designated for demolition due to proximity to the border."
This time, Green could not grasp the operational rationale behind incinerating a residential building. He recalled speaking to the company commander, trying to understand the reasoning, asking, "Do we know this house belongs to a Hamas fighter?" The commander explained that the house had to be burned to prevent military equipment from being left behind, revealing the army's combat methods, but Green was unconvinced. He asserted that the equipment could be removed, and there were no specialized combat methods that could be revealed simply by looking at a house where soldiers were staying. He added, "I told him if we do that, I will leave. They burned the house, and I departed. I went during the next break and never returned."
He confirmed he has not received an emergency summons since then and does not intend to volunteer for reserve service again if called upon. He never thought about how to handle potential sanctions for refusing service. He clarified, "When I thought I should be in the army, I was there and took risks. So here, I'm not risking my life but my social standing, and this risk is worth saving human lives and doing what I believe in."
Michael Ofer Zeif, 29, from Tel Aviv, also signed the refusal letter for further reserve service. He was a combat soldier in an infantry brigade and later served as an operations officer in the 16th brigade. He mentioned that in October, he cut short a vacation in Turkey after being notified about his service. He was responsible for monitoring from the brigade’s headquarters, tracking real-time drone strikes and Israeli air raids on Gaza.
He recounted, "I saw them destroy vehicles, buildings, and people. Every time a building collapsed, everyone would say 'Wow!'... Many people, including myself, have had the 'wow' experience; it's madness, and there are those who say we show them, deceive them, and take revenge on them... This is the atmosphere you hear in the war room."
It took him a week or two to realize that "everything I saw was buildings collapsing… If there were people inside, they died. Even if there were no people inside, everything like televisions, memories, pictures, and clothes vanished. These are tall buildings. In the war room, they know the level of evacuation."
He added, "They keep saying that 50% of the population has been evacuated, and on the same day, I saw a building in the area collapse and thought to myself: But 50% are still there... At the same time, there were also bombings in southern Gaza, and we know that no one was evacuated from there. On the contrary, everyone fled to there."
Zeif expressed confusion when watching the airstrikes from headquarters. "It's easy to say: 'This is how it is in war; people are killed.' But in war, 30,000 people aren't typically killed, most buried under rubble when bombed from the air. The sense is one of random firing."
One signatory of the refusal letter, who remained anonymous, revealed that they received, for example, "a list of five or six people significant enough, and if we could reach them, we would diminish Hamas’s capabilities." He added, "At a moment, we realize that we are unable to hit those significant people, and we start to look for other targets, ones no one has heard of before, and suddenly we tell ourselves they are important too."
He explained, "We begin chasing this person as if they were the most important target in the world, and in the end, when we blow them up, we say we have no problem with him being at home with the entire family," despite there being no indication that killing this person had any genuine military justification. He continued, "I felt that what I was doing was pointless. We were just chasing heads to achieve some sort of accomplishment, without any strategy or direction."
Given the testimonies of these three Israeli soldiers and others, it appears that these actions could indeed amount to "war crimes," particularly as the International Criminal Court contemplates issuing an arrest warrant against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his Defense Minister Gallant, and several Hamas leaders.