Neta’s difficult choice. A reserve soldier who said no

On October 7, 2023, Neta Caspin was at home in Haifa, the main city in northern Israel. On the day of the Hamas attack, the Jewish holidays were ending and she was preparing to return to the lecture halls of the Technion, one of Israel’s top technology universities, to continue her PhD in food engineering. In August, she had been discharged as a reservist from the Israeli army. After the two years of compulsory military service, she did another three years of voluntary extension with the rank of officer. She decided to remain as a reservist, who are civilians ready to rejoin the army in case of an emergency. They are required to do one week of refresher training each year. Neta was assigned to the Hebron battalion, the military operating in the city of the Tomb of the Patriarchs, which is holy for both Jews and Muslims, one of the Palestinian cities where conflict is is most keenly felt.

Neta Caspin is thirty-three years old, raised in a secular family, with two brothers and a sister. Leftist-oriented, she decided to remain a reservist in order to get first-hand knowledge of the most troubled areas in the Palestinian Territories. In all these years, she has never directly witnessed gratuitous violence, but she has seen the Israeli settlements in and around Hebron where extremist settlers live. She is convinced that it is a moral duty to defend Israeli citizens from terrorist attacks, but she considers the ever-expanding occupation policy of her current Government unacceptable.

In 2023, Neta was assigned to other units, which operate on the Gaza border. On the seemingly impassable barrier that divides the Strip from Israel, many female soldiers are stationed there. They are entrusted with the task of lookouts.

At dawn on October 7, 2023, Neta realized immediately that the devastating Hamas attack would lead her country into an unprecedented war. For three days, she could neither eat nor sleep because of the brutality of the images broadcast on TV.  The more than 250 hostages in the hands of the terrorists was also depriving her of sleep.

At the beginning of November 2023, Neta was back in uniform on the Gaza border, heading a unit that repairs military equipment. Her base was near Nir Oz, one of the kibbutzim where massacre took place. Anger against those who failed to defend Israel is widespread among the soldiers, most of whom are convinced that freeing the hostages will be the priority of the war. Others will follow the truce for the release of the first group of hostages in November 2023, Neta thought, as more and more combat wounded soldiers arrive at the base.

During a dinner under the military tents, Neta argued with the base rabbi, who tried to convince the soldiers that all Palestinians in Gaza are enemies to be repaid in kind.

When Neta talked about the excessive number of Palestinian civilian casualties, she is told that terrorists use civilians as human shields and therefore innocent deaths are inevitable.

Neta experienced an increasing inner turmoil. She loves her country, she wants to serve it, but not in that way. It is not easy to decide to sign a public letter, with 150 other reservists, addressed to PM Netanyahu, stating they will no longer serve in the army, until the government releases the hostages. When, having taken off her uniform in April 2024, she returned to the classrooms at Technion, she experienced the price of the political management of this war in relations with Arab students. Severed ties, mutual distrust, and deep wounds that are unlikely to heal.

Alessandra Buzzetti, tv2000 correspondent from Jerusalem