Increasing toll of IDF deaths.

Apparently since the start of the Gazan offensive 888 IDF soldiers (an interesting number!) have been killed. How many more have been injured physically or psychologically is not available but it must run into tens of thousands. To get a flavour of the true experience and feelings of those poor brainwashed soldiers, read the article from Haaritz at bottom of page.

Norman Finkelstein

Scott Rickard  · roStsdnpoec9420lgmau4t94g74ccu96amm1a100cal3agaa7i88a14u2gm1  · 

A Colonial Project in Collapse: The Death of Foreign Soldiers Fighting an Illegal Occupation in Palestine

By Scott Rickard

Hat tip Suhair Nafal

The recent deaths of three Israeli soldiers — Shoham Menahem, Shlomo Yakir Shrem, and Yuliy Faktor — illustrate a stark and unsettling reality: Israel continues to send young people, many with no historical or ancestral ties to Palestine, into a war of occupation against an indigenous people fighting for their survival. None of these soldiers were rooted in the land they were ordered to dominate. Nor were their families. Their presence in Palestine is not an accident of geography or culture, but a product of deliberate settler-colonial policy.

For over seven decades, the Israeli state has pursued a demographic engineering project designed to displace and replace the native Palestinian population. This policy, codified in the 1950 Law of Return,[^1] encourages Jews from anywhere in the world to settle in occupied Palestine — often receiving financial incentives, housing, and military training upon arrival. In stark contrast, millions of Palestinians expelled during the Nakba in 1948 remain stateless and barred from returning to their ancestral homes — a clear violation of international law and basic human rights.[^2]

The soldiers who perish in Gaza or the West Bank are often products of a militarized society that indoctrinates youth from an early age into a narrative of entitlement to land stolen through force, displacement, and apartheid. Israeli curricula and media normalize the dehumanization of Palestinians, portraying resistance to occupation as terrorism, while ignoring decades of systematic violence, home demolitions, land theft, and extrajudicial killings carried out by the state.[^3][^4]

These latest casualties are not simply victims of war; they are enforcers of a colonial regime whose legitimacy has been condemned by numerous human rights organizations. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have both declared that Israel operates an apartheid system over Palestinians — a conclusion rooted in extensive legal and factual analysis.[^5][^6]

Their deaths, like those of thousands of other IDF soldiers since October 7, are the tragic result of a morally and legally indefensible project — one that survives only through violence, propaganda, and U.S. military aid. The Zionist enterprise is not a liberation movement; it is a settler-colonial ideology built on erasure and domination.

As history has shown from Algeria to South Africa, no colonial regime — no matter how well-armed — can indefinitely suppress the will of an indigenous population fighting for justice and self-determination. The growing international recognition of Israel’s crimes is not a passing trend. It is a reckoning. And it is long overdue.

References:

[^1]: Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs. “Law of Return, 5710-1950.” https://mfa.gov.il

[^2]: United Nations General Assembly Resolution 194 (III), Article 11 (1948). https://unispal.un.org

[^3]: Peled-Elhanan, Nurit. Palestine in Israeli School Books: Ideology and Propaganda in Education. I.B. Tauris, 2012.

[^4]: UN Human Rights Council. “Report of the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel.” (2022) https://www.ohchr.org

[^5]: Amnesty International. Israel’s Apartheid Against Palestinians: Cruel System of Domination and Crime Against Humanity, 2022. https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/mde15/5141/2022/en/

[^6]: Human Rights Watch. A Threshold Crossed: Israeli Authorities and the Crimes of Apartheid and Persecution, 2021. https://www.hrw.org/report/2021/04/27/threshold-crossed

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: <jayne.kirkham.mp@parliament.uk>
Date: Tue, 15 Jul 2025, 09:56
Subject: Gaza and the Occupied Territories (Case Ref: JK06695)

Dear Nigel, Thank you for contacting me and for raising your concerns on the situation in Gaza and the other occupied territories.
 
Like you, I am appalled by the reports coming out of Gaza, in which civilians and aid workers have been killed and I have raised the issue of aid and aid workers particularly with the Prime Minister in Prime Minister’s Questions.
 
Following the Government of Israel’s announcement of plans to transfer all Palestinian civilians in Gaza to a camp in the city of Rafah, the Labour Friends of Palestine and the Middle East wrote to the Foreign Secretary on 10 July calling for the UK to urgently consider recognising the State of Palestine. As a signatory of the letter, a copy of which is also attached, I will continue to push for this. 
 
After Labour got into power in July 2024, the Government’s legal advisers were asked to look at whether there was any risk that any exports from the UK might be used for military operations in Gaza in violation of international humanitarian law. That legal opinion concluded there was a clear risk that might be the case with some exports and so, as a result, the Government suspended approximately 30 licences for exports to Israel. The situation with export licences is constantly under review.
 
F35 components that are made in UK factories are not exported to Israel. Under our legal and treaty obligations with 17 other countries they are supplied to a global pool for F-35s. The government has said it could not pull out of the defence programme without endangering international peace.
 
In the recent High Court case on the F-35 components, the two judges said the case was not about whether the UK should supply arms and other military equipment to Israel - because the government had decided it should not. They were being asked to decide on a particular issue: whether the UK "must withdraw from a specific multilateral defence collaboration" because of the prospect that some UK-manufactured parts may be supplied by someone else to Israel. They ruled that the decision was for the Executive to make. The Government has been transparent that it considers the risks to global and national security posed by withdrawing from the pool and breaching the international obligations and potentially grounding our allies and our own F35s would be so dangerous and significant that they will continue to allow British companies to provide components to the global pool. The Government does not supply any arms to Israel itself.
 
I support the Government’s decision to suspend trade negotiations with Israel, and to sanction individuals and entities involved in settler violence and expansion. That is an important recent step made by the Government and the Israeli ambassador has been summoned to meet the Minister about what is happening in the occupied territories and the Minister has spoken out about it numerous times. The record of his spoken contributions is here:
 
https://members.parliament.uk/member/5148/contributions#expand-4946673
 
Despite the glimmer of hope from January’s ceasefire, the suffering in this conflict has worsened. January showed that another path was possible, and we will continue to push the Netanyahu Government to choose this path. Withholding aid and expanding the war is indefensible; it will not bring the hostages home and must stop.
 
Thank you for the concern that you have shown about this distressing situation.
 
Yours
 
Jayne Kirkham MP

TTV Reply to Nigel:  

Sadly this letter sums up the problem of the British position. It has been one of 'expressing concern', devoid of any positive proposals or action. It has been nearly two years of empty rhetoric, as thousands of innocent lives have been violently ended or damaged and a region flattened and millions up-rooted and displaced. It has been a con-trick to cover tacit support for the tyrannical brutal regime, whilst saying just enough to maintain political and domestic support. 

The failure to clearly condemn the Israel regime's actions; hosting Israeli politicians and delegations; maintaining trade and intelligence links; supplying arms and tactical support; and the recent banning of the Palestinian Support Group, preposterously labelling it as 'terrorist', is undoubted proof of it. The contrast between its approach to Ukraine and Gaza is eye-watering in its hypocrisy. 

The techtonic plates of international opinion have shifted: Israel is no longer seen as the innocent victim, with, in Starmer's words, "the right to defend itself", but as a vicious aggressor, bent on territoral conquest and the erradication of its natural inhabitants. A people that has so effectively hyped its past mistreatment by Europians, is now guilty of the same egregious holocausting of Palestinians. 

It is about time the British and European elites reflected this sea-change in public opinion, and made clear to Israel its support was at its end by DEMANDING: 

1. An immediate no-fly zone over gaza enforced by European and other military powers

2. An immediate end to Israeli bombing of Gaza, the West Bank and all other foreign territories 

3. An immediate and total withdrawal of IDF troops from Gaza to behind the previous border.

4. An immediate removal of all administrative and other barriers to the supply of aid to Gaza to be organised by UNWRA only.

5. An immediate end to the settlement programme in the West Bank and associated harassment of Palestinians living there.

6. Recognition of a Palestinian State based on 1967 boundaries.

These demands should be backed by action. For example providing aid and assistance using military assets by sea and air, and responding appropriately if Israel attempts to block it.  Providing naval and ground forces to protect the civilian population from attack. By making it clear the sanctions both military and economic that will be imposed if Israel fails to comply.  

Of course this would put Britain and Europe at odds with the United States, but that country is also on the move and fissures have already occured in NATO and beyond, questioning old alliances and postures. Israel is weary of war and in no position to take on the world. It is in its own interests to compromise and withdrawal. It is in humanity's interest, including that of Europe, to ensure that it does.

Will it happen? Well of course that is another matter entirely.  Regards, Tim.

Claude Baesens

rdoneSsoptg4i5athm6thl825818t02ticiau9t9a8776l5291if5ft1h41f  · 

Gilad Atzmon:

When Zionism Became Judaism

Chabad-Lubavitch is one of the largest and most influential Jewish movements in the world. Chabad has more than 5000 centers all over the world. These centers are located in over 100 countries and all 50 US states.

In the light of the above it is fascinating to study the transition of Chabad from being a vocal Anti Zionist Jewish orthodox sect into an ardent Zionist and pro genocide enthusiasts.

Pre 1948

Like most traditional Orthodox (especially Chassidic) Judaism, early Chabad leaders (pre 1948) were strongly opposed to Zionism. They saw the movement as a heretical attempt to replace divine redemption with human political action, led by non-religious Jews.

The 5th Rebbe, Rabbi Sholom Dovber Schneersohn (1860-1920), was a vocal opponent of secular Zionism and the Mizrachi movement (religious Zionists).

The 6th Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn (1880-1950), maintained this opposition, viewing the secular Zionist enterprise as spiritually dangerous. In the light of the Holocaust, however, the 6th Rebbe recognised the establishment of Israel (1948) as a ‘practical refuge’ for Jews and began establishing institutions in the Jewish State. The 6th rebbe, before his passing in 1950, also instructed his followers to do everything possible to ensure that territories liberated in any future war remain under Jewish control. This shifted the focus towards the ‘land's sanctity.’

Post 1967

The 1967 Six-Day War was the critical turning point for world Jewry Chabad included. Israel's military victory, including the capture of East Jerusalem, the Western Wall, and Judea & Samaria (West Bank), was seen by many religious Jews, including Chabad, as a profound divine intervention and a step towards redemption.

The 7th Rebbe's Leadership: Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson (1902-1994), who became Rebbe in 1951, embraced this perspective fervently. He saw the newly accessible holy sites, especially the Western Wall, as unparalleled opportunities for Jewish spiritual connection and the advancement of the Judaic cause.

Under the 7th Rebbe, Chabad's support for Israel transformed. Chabad became known for its strong support for the IDF,its commanders and its actions (war crimes included) . Zionism became a core Judaic religious duty based on:

1.Pikuach Nefesh: The supreme commandment to protect Jewish lives against all odds.

2. The Sanctity of Eretz Yisrael: The land itself, especially the liberated biblical heartland (Judea, Samaria, Gaza, Golan, East Jerusalem), was intrinsically holy. Settling it and ensuring Jewish control was a religious obligation tied to the Divine promise.

3. Messianic Fulfillment: The 6th Rebbe saw Israel's existence and its victories, particularly in 1967, as clear signs of the unfolding Messianic process. Protecting and building up the land was preparing for the ultimate redemption.

STILL IT CONTINUES! IT HAS TO STOP.

Fares Abulebda 

retSdoonpslc1ihufictmmc15f1fmchi2h0gluuu0c2c20cltai0ia50c9ha  · 

In just 48 hours, my city lost more than 50 people.

Not numbers.

People.

Names I knew.

Faces I loved.

Men I grew up beside.

Families who sat on their doorsteps. Children I watched grow up —

Now buried beneath rubble.

Now just silence where life once was.

Among the many lives stolen, two names broke me completely:

Hamed Suleiman Abu Khoti, 48 years old

and

Hussein Mohammed Abu Khoti, 35 years old.

They were cousins.

They died together.

Not in battle. Not with weapons.

But under the weight of a war that shows no mercy — not even to the sick, not even to the kind.

Hamed married my aunt, but he treated me like his own son.

When I was a child, he took me in the car on his wedding day.

I still remember dancing with him —

me, just a boy, and him, full of joy and warmth.

He loved me so much, he named one of his sons Fares, after me.

In recent years, Hamed was fighting cancer.

He used to travel to Jerusalem for treatment —

until the siege made even medicine unreachable.

Five days ago, I spoke to him.

He was weak. Tired.

He told me quietly:

“Maybe death is more merciful than this life.”

He didn’t die from cancer.

He died from an Israeli airstrike.

He died in his home — not a battlefield, not a hospital.

A man fighting for his life… until war made even that impossible.

Beside him died his cousin, Hussein —my childhood classmate.

We sat in the same classrooms, shared the same breaks, the same childhood dreams.

He grew into a man who worked with his hands and heart.

A traveling electrician, Hussein repaired fridges, washing machines, lights —going from house to house helping people live a little better in a place filled with hardship.

He was one of those quiet heroes who didn’t ask for recognition —

just a chance to help.

In a place where everything is broken, Hussein spent his life fixing what he could.

Now both are gone.

Hamed leaves behind his wife Reem,

and five children —

two of them were wounded during the first displacement from Khan Younis.

They were taken to Qatar for medical treatment.

But their father didn’t make it out.

He died before he could hold them again.

And Hussein —he leaves behind neighbors who depended on him,

and a silence no one can repair.

What kind of world kills a man dying of cancer?

What kind of justice allows an electrician to be erased with a missile?

This is not collateral damage.

This is the deliberate destruction of life, of love, of people who were simply trying to survive.

I have mourned over 50 people in two days.

I don’t know how to carry this grief.

I don’t know how to keep breathing when everything familiar is turning into names on a list.

But I write this so the world won’t forget.

Say their names.

Hamed Suleiman Abu Khoti, 48.

Hussein Mohammed Abu Khoti, 35.

They were not terrorists.

They were not threats.

They were family men. Workers. Fighters for life.

Hamed fought for his life — and lost to a war with no mercy.

Hussein fixed what was broken — but no one could fix what broke that day.

May they rest in peace.

May their memories live longer than this silence.

And may justice find its way to Gaza —before there’s no one left to name.

الله غالب

Fares Abulebda

15 July 2025

Jewish Not Zionist

Walter Lippmann  · tdpsooSnerlt49ai50mhg02ti1f13g32h940gu46hfm49019tt61ag1cc36u  · 

Pay attention to them, not to me.

From: https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2025-07-03/ty-article-magazine/.premium/idf-soldiers-reveal-what-no-one-in-israel-wants-to-hear-about-months-of-fighting-in-gaza/00000197-cf00-dcbf-abd7-df3d0ea30000?fbclid=IwY2xjawLjNe9leHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHtTd5m2wfCWO7Cp421q1Ml95CS4QJLJuyGuw1LFeMferpiIuCgcA_li3INOe_aem_j2SnpJ3-6zbaVlOLuKvAhA

Viet Thanh Nguyen

tdpsooSnerltt7aiP m0g02Jiaf13u22h810l:46Mfm49y1 tt61a  cc36u  · 

In case you were wondering how some IDF soldiers feel about their combat experience. It brings to mind some posts wondering what ICE agents feel, or what German soldiers felt, or what American soldiers in Viet Nam felt. On the one hand, I have empathy for the human experiences being described, and they provide insight into why postwar soldiers become alcholic, turn to drugs, become homeless, commit suicide--these are all real effects of war.

On the other hand, only one of the IDF witnesses even describes the effects of the genocide on Palestinians. The last comment is telling: "When will you understand that it's time to end this? When there are 900 dead? A thousand? Please – stop. Speak out. Protest. Don't let all this death keep going." For most of the IDF profiled here, it's only the Israeli dead that count--human enough, but also evidence that Israel is perfectly fine with killing endless numbers of Palestinians, if it wasn't costing Israelis anything. That psychology is true for Americans as well.

'We're Not the Same People Anymore': IDF Soldiers Reveal What No Israeli Wants to Hear About Months of Fighting in Gaza

Sent into Gaza straight from high school, five young Israeli conscripts describe the brutal, exhausting reality of the war with Hamas – a world of despair, rage and crippling fear, with no end in sight

Tom Levinson

Jul 3, 2025

She stands in front of the cameras. Her eyes are red, her voice cracked. The tears flow freely, but she doesn't try to wipe them away or stop them. The anchor asks her to talk about him. He's used to asking such questions. She's not used to answering them. Still, she emphasizes that she wasn't surprised. "Since October 7, we've been living in fear. Every knock on the door, every phone call," she says.

And then she decides to break the script. Instead of talking about what a wonderful person he was, instead of saying there was no one else like him, she chooses to say something else entirely.

"From the moment he finished high school, he's been fighting, nonstop. He was already exhausted. They're all exhausted. Mentally, they're completely drained," she says. "This has to stop."

That moment came last week, a day after her son, Staff Sgt. Niv Radia, was killed along with six other soldiers by an explosive device in southern Gaza.

Speaking on Israel's most-watched news channel, Radia's mother, Alexandra, managed to shock many – perhaps even shake the foundations of public discourse. It was a rare moment in which the wall the army has tried to build between the public and the daily toll on combat soldiers began to crack.

The voices of reservists are often heard. They speak out about the impact on their businesses, their families, and the inequality they feel compared to segments of the population that don't serve. But the voices of active-duty soldiers, those doing the daily fighting for nearly 21 months now, remain largely unheard and unknown to the Israeli public.

Even when journalists are embedded with IDF combat units, what they see isn't the day-to-day reality – it's a carefully orchestrated performance. Soldiers interviewed are handpicked by commanders and IDF spokespersons and thoroughly briefed on what they can and cannot say. And so, reporters return with the same clichés: "This is a generation of lions," they declare. "Morale is sky-high."

But active-duty army soldiers who spoke to Haaretz in recent months paint a very different picture – one that bears little resemblance to the official narrative.

They describe mounting exhaustion, severe physical and psychological strain, and a constant fear that they'll be the next to have their names released as fallen.

Most refused to be quoted on the record. Five agreed to speak. They had just one request: "You sent us to war – now listen to what we have to say."

* All names in this article have been changed.

Yonatan, 21, Kfir Brigade

"It happened a little after we entered Jabalya last November. During the day, the heat was unbearable – at night, we froze. Sand and dust clung constantly to my skin. We hardly saw any people, just dogs roaming everywhere. They were looking for food – anything, even rotting scraps. Our company commander warned us that anyone who so much as petted them would 'face a court-martial and end up in jail.' But I didn't care. When no one was looking, I'd sneak them slices of sausage.

"A few days later, we were positioned near a house when a pack of dogs came close, barking nonstop. Our deputy commander got annoyed and decided to shoot one of them. The dog howled in pain – then fell silent. The others scattered, but he kept going, aiming down his sights and shooting another dog, then a few more. 'They need to learn not to come near us. These are terrorists' dogs – probably rabid,' he said with a grin. I was furious, but I didn't say a word. That night, I was ashamed of myself for not speaking up, for not trying to stop him.

"The next morning, we were sent on another house-clearing mission. We scanned the building with a drone and didn't see anything, so we went in. Two minutes later, there was an explosion. The blast threw me through the air, and I couldn't understand what had happened. Suddenly, I realized my mouth was full of blood. I thought I was wounded, but I wasn't – it was the blood of my best friend in the unit. He kept calling my name, begging me to help, but I didn't know what to do. I froze.

"Eventually the medics arrived and evacuated him. For days after, I couldn't sleep, couldn't eat – everything tasted like blood. We just kept going, clearing houses like nothing had happened, like everything was normal. Afterward, we were sent out of Gaza for a little while to 'refresh,' but I couldn't do anything. I felt like someone had taken part of my soul.

"One morning the commander told us we were going back home to rest and everyone was excited – but I felt nothing. I felt dead, empty, completely numb. Right before sunset, the commander told me I had to guard the equipment at 2 A.M. I stood there for a few minutes before I felt like I couldn't breathe – everything was closing in on me. I ran off to wash my face. When I came back, my officer was waiting. 'Aren't you ashamed of abandoning your post?' he yelled. Then he told me I'd face disciplinary charges the next day.

"By morning, I was standing trial in front of the battalion commander. He asked if I had anything to say, but no words came out. 'You're getting 28 days of confinement,' he said.

"I didn't know what to do. When no one was looking, I grabbed my things and ran. Within hours I was sitting on the sand at Gordon Beach in Tel Aviv, still in uniform. I changed into civilian clothes and just sat there, feeling the cool breeze. I opened my phone and scrolled through messages with the friend who'd been injured. I wanted to send him something – even though he was unconscious – but I couldn't figure out what to say. The hours passed and I had no idea what to do. Go back to base? Go to my parents? And what would I even tell them? Lie and say they let us out? Tell the truth? I had no clue.

"They taught us how to charge forward, how to fix a jammed weapon, how to bandage a wounded friend. But no one taught me what to do after you taste your best friend's blood."

Or, 20, Paratroopers Reconnaissance Unit

"My breaking point didn't come in Lebanon or Khan Yunis – it happened in Tel Aviv. After ages without being home, they finally gave us 48 hours' leave. It was a week after my birthday, and my parents wanted to celebrate with a big family dinner. I just wanted to stay home and sleep – but I didn't want to disappoint them.

"When we got to the restaurant, everyone hugged and kissed me and asked how things were. All I could manage was a vague 'fine.'

"I ordered shrimp pasta. When it arrived, I felt everything rise up inside me – like I was going to throw up. I rushed to the bathroom and vomited harder than I ever had in my life. Then I splashed water on my face and looked in the mirror – I looked awful, like I'd aged ten years. When I came back, my grandmother looked at me and asked, 'Are you okay? You're white as a ghost.' I didn't know what to say. I just wanted to disappear.

"Meanwhile, everyone kept eating. The smells overwhelmed me – I thought I was going to throw up again. 'Why aren't you eating?' they asked over and over. I couldn't answer. The smell was driving me mad – I couldn't get it out of my body. At first, I didn't understand what was happening – and then it hit me: it was the smell of corpses.

"A few days earlier, we'd approached the rubble of a house in Khan Yunis that had been bombed by the air force. In the debris – what was once walls – we suddenly found five, maybe six bodies. There were flies everywhere, and I think dogs had torn at the flesh. There was barely anything left. Two of them were small children – I saw their bones. It was horrible, unforgettable, something that still haunts my nights. But more than anything, I remember the smell – it took over my body, clung to my clothes. Even after I sprayed myself with deodorant nonstop that night, it wouldn't leave me.

"After the restaurant we went home, and I went straight to my room without saying a word. I didn't want to leave until Sunday, but my friends insisted we go to a party in Tel Aviv. We drank endlessly – all night. I tried to smile, tried to laugh. 'What's up with you?' they asked. 'Nothing, nothing,' I replied. Around 1 A.M., the DJ played some track I didn't know with pounding bass. It felt like everything was closing in – like I couldn't breathe. I ran to the bathroom. It smelled like sewage and it reminded me of Gaza.

"In the stall, I tried to calm my breathing, but nothing helped. My heart was pounding out of control. I left the club without saying anything to my friends, grabbed a taxi that cost me something like 300 shekels, went home and crashed. I stayed in bed all weekend, until it was time to go back.

"Sunday morning, I reported for duty in the Gaza border area. We packed the gear and loaded up quickly onto the Humvees that took us back in. I wanted to jump off. I wanted to run – but I didn't have the guts. So I kept going. Another week of explosions. Another week of socks glued to my skin, of heat I can't even describe. A living nightmare. I just want it to be over already – please. I'm exhausted as if I'm 80 years old."

Omer, 21, Givati Brigade

"Sometimes when I think about it, it's hard to believe this war has been going on for only 20 months – it feels like 10 years. I was there from the start, when they rushed us to the kibbutzim in the Gaza border region just hours after it all began. I still haven't been able to process what I saw there. Burned-out cars, people screaming, gunfire, explosions. What I remember most is the smell of corpses in Kfar Aza – the smell of death, like a steak forgotten on the grill.

"But honestly, there are a lot of things I don't remember at all – entire hours wiped from my memory. What did I even do there? I have no idea. And there was no time to think about it anyway. Right after October 7 we started preparing to go into Gaza. We were in a kind of high – we wanted it so badly. Now it just seems so stupid to me. I've lost track of how many people I knew who've been killed – from my battalion, my brigade, my school, my neighborhood. I don't have the strength to hear about one more. It breaks me.

"They didn't even let me attend most of the funerals. They said we were needed – that they couldn't let everyone go. And the ones I did attend – they were awful. How can you sit there and listen to the battalion commander recite clichés about friends of mine he didn't even know, about fighters he never cared about?

"People think soldiers die in battle, but the truth is, lots of them died for no reason – because of officers' negligence, or because there weren't enough munitions to bomb a building before sending us into it. Then the media says he died from an explosive device and everyone thinks it makes sense. It feels like no one cares. How many more friends do I have to bury before people wake up?

"All of us have wills saved in our phones – in the notes app. Sometimes at night we talk about what our funerals will be like, try to guess how many people will come, if our ex will cry. 'Do you think Tuna [an Israeli rapper] would agree to sing at my funeral if I put it in my will?' a friend once asked me. 'If I die, promise me you'll tell my mom I didn't suffer – that it wasn't hard for me,' another friend said. Two weeks later he was wounded by an anti-tank missile.

"And if that's not enough, now they're forcing us to do another four months of reserve duty. No one asks if we want to or if we even can. 'There's nothing we can do – we're short on soldiers,' the officers say. And if anyone complains, they threaten him with jail – call him a traitor, a coward. So most of us stay quiet. Sometimes we cry to our moms on the phone, or to a friend we feel safe with. But even that doesn't always help. It's just shit. I've had enough. I can't do it anymore.

"In high school I was sure that right after the army I'd take the psychometric exam and go study medicine – like I always dreamed. But now? I just want to run away. Travel. Rest. Do drugs. Forget. I don't know what will be left of me. I already know I'm not the same person I was – that's for sure."

Yair, 21, Nahal Reconnaissance Unit

"There were ten of us. It was 2 A.M., maybe 3. Just a routine ambush in the northern part of Gaza, I think near Beit Lahia. I suddenly woke up in a panic and realized everyone was asleep – even the officer. I woke him up, and he freaked out, started yelling at the whole team like a madman. It was surreal – I think he forgot that yelling like that could expose our position, but no one dared say anything.

"'You bunch of idiots,' he screamed. 'You want to die out here? What are you, brain-dead?' He completely lost it – like something had been building inside him for months and just exploded. The next day, he pulled me aside and made me swear not to tell anyone outside the unit that he had fallen asleep.

"It wasn't the first time something like that happened and honestly, any soldier who's served in Gaza knows it. You don't sleep during the day and then you're sent on night missions – we're just collapsing. It might sound weird to admit, but it's kind of a miracle Hamas hasn't taken advantage of it more.

"Every time there's some serious incident in the news, people criticize us – 'How could this happen?' they ask. But what do you expect when we've been fighting for months and barely get to go home?

"People who've never been here think the hard part is just the big events – when soldiers are killed or wounded. But the struggle is also in the small stuff, the things no one talks about on the news. Do you know what it's like to walk around for days with a ceramic vest glued to your back? What it means not to take off your boots for ten days straight? To lie in the dirt covering your team and not be able to keep your eyes open? To be packed so tight together that even the people you love drive you crazy?

"I remember once a guy on our team kept humming a song that got stuck in his head. It pushed me over the edge and I threw a can of tuna at him. 'What the hell's wrong with you?' he shouted. We almost got into a fight. If the others hadn't stepped in, I don't know how it would've ended. I apologized, but I'm still ashamed I did that.

"The worst part is it doesn't just happen with the guys in the unit – it happens with my family too, with my girlfriend. A few months ago, I came home and just started yelling at her – for no reason, just because she moved one of my shirts. She started crying and walked out. I begged her to forgive me. I didn't know what to do. I started crying too and she hugged me. I don't think I've ever cried like that before.

"Later we tried to have sex and I just couldn't. Nothing worked. She tried to calm me down, but I went into this spiral – convinced this was how it would be from now on, that the war had broken me. That she would leave me.

"Lately, my hair has even started falling out from the stress. I keep touching it, pulling it without even realizing. It's destroying me. I keep telling myself I have no right to cry – that I'm lucky compared to others. One of our squads was completely wiped out. I'm alive. I wasn't hit by a missile or an explosive device.

"But still, it's hard. I don't know if I'll ever recover. I just want everything to be normal again – like it used to be."

Uri, 22, Yahalom combat engineering unit

"At some point, I just stopped believing in what we're doing. During the first year, I was all in – totally committed to every mission. I really believed we were part of something historic, that we were protecting Israeli civilians, that we were helping to rescue the hostages.

"But little by little, I started to doubt it. After you hear about another hostage killed because of an airstrike, after you attend yet another funeral for a friend – it just starts to fade.

"I can't go on another mission. I can't go back to the same areas we've already been through a million times, investigate another tunnel shaft, enter another building that might be booby-trapped. And for what? Anyone with half a brain can see this war is continuing for political reasons. There's no reason to keep going. We're not achieving anything – we're just risking our lives over and over again.

"Even the commanders don't know how to explain it anymore, how to convince us to keep at it. Except for the religious guys, no one understands what we're doing. No one believes we're helping to bring the hostages home. If anything, we're putting them in more danger.

"Every time I got close to a tunnel shaft, that thought would hit me. What if the intel is wrong? What if there are hostages down there? What if the terrorists hear us and kill them? And if that happens – how could I live with myself? How could I go on?

"The officers will call it a mistake and say that's just war – and I'll have to live with the guilt and shame. No one's going to help me. Just like no one's helping my wounded friends. Some of them the commanders didn't even bother to visit. They were just left on their own.

"Luckily, I'm about to be discharged. But what about the rest of them? I look at the younger soldiers in my unit and I can't help but wonder – who will live and who will come home in a coffin? It's awful, but that's our reality. This has to stop. We can't bring back the ones we've lost, but there are still so many more we can save.

"When will you understand that it's time to end this? When there are 900 dead? A thousand? Please – stop. Speak out. Protest. Don't let all this death keep going."