A third of Israelis and a majority of Likud voters support IDF soldiers refusing to obey orders to evict Jews from their homes and withdraw from parts of the Land of Israel.
Earlier this week, dozens of soldiers of the Duchifat Battalion refused to take part in the expulsion of two Jewish families from the marketplace in Hevron.
According to a poll carried out by the Dialog Polling Agency for Haaretz newspaper, 30% of the Jewish public in Israel support IDF soldiers refusing any orders related to the expulsion of Jews from their homes. Less than half of the respondents said they were actively opposed to the refusal of orders by the soldiers.
Broken down by political party, 54 percent of Likud voters supported refusal as well as a whopping 75% of Shas voters.
The poll was overseen by Professor Camil Fuchs of the Statistics and Operations Research department at Tel Aviv University and queried 477 people.
Sharon Call For Hevron Refusal Circulated
An old essay by former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon his being circulated via email lists and blogs. Readers are told to read its content and are informed that Ariel Sharon wrote it on April 15, 1994:
“It wasn't easy for me to come out with a public call last week to Israeli residents to oppose the evacuation of Jews from Hebron. Hebron is Jerusalem, NOT Yamit.
“I called for passive, non-violent resistance against the declared intentions of the government in Hebron. It was only because I am convinced that the security and inalienable rights of Jews in every part of Eretz Yisrael will be irreversibly eroded if the government carries out its plans in Hebron, that I decided that we must arise and passively resist the uprooting of Jews from Hebron. And if, G-d forbid, the government does carry out its intention, it should know, in advance, that we will return to Hebron. […]
“For most of my life I have obeyed orders as well as issued them as a soldier and commander in the IDF. Therefore, I am aware of the absolute importance of the duty incumbent on every soldier to carry out the legal orders, in order to preserve the military system which defends us.
“At the same time, warning must be given, that if the Israeli government dares to uproot Jews from the heart of Eretz-Yisrael - a situation will develop in which the military will eventually have nothing to defend except itself, and will ultimately fall apart and disintegrate. After all, the IDF was organized to defend the Zionist settlement drive, which was threatened from the start as a result of Arab aggression, even before we returned home to Hebron. It was only with tremendous pain that we were able, in 1948, to retain part of Jerusalem.
“If the government uproots the Jews of Hebron, it will be uprooting a vital cornerstone of the IDF - which is indispensable for the defense of all parts of Israel. Therefore, although every soldier and commander must obey the legal orders of the government, so too, must every citizen in a democratic country ask himself what he is supposed to do when he is convinced that the policy of the government endangers him, his future and his family. […]
“Every Jew must feel as if he is personally going to be ousted from Hebron. Each one of us must understand that if we will not stand up to stop the uprooting of Jews from Hebron, we may very well - in the future - be uprooted from Tel Aviv, Haifa, Beer Sheba or from any other place.
“In contrast to the days of exile, it is not only the right, but the obligation of every Jew, in a Jewish democratic state, to stand up and warn his government, through passive resistance, of the disaster that it is bringing upon all of us. What Jews could not do in Germany and Poland before their extermination, they must do in their own country. They have to rise en masse and resist.”