Sick of the injustice – Thoughts of an IDF soldier after a month in the West Bank

It's a perspective that you can't get from watching the media, nor from the Israeli or Palestinian politicians. Soldiers, the people “on the ground,” who face difficult situations day after day, put their lives on the line for the sole purpose of maintaining peace on both sides. Yes, both sides.

I know this because I recently returned from a month as a reservist soldier (Miluim) in the West Bank, where I functioned as a telecommunications officer (ICT).

In between dealing with gear issues in our sector, I 'rested' in the brigade's War Room so I could keep track of and take care of issues concerning communications.

Well, one thing I can tell you for sure – the action in this room never ended. There were violent incidents happening every hour.

I'd like to pose the following questions to you: How many of these hourly events have you heard about? How many made it to the news?

Maybe one or two? Ninety percent of what happened this past month never got to the media because the journalists pay so much attention to the Palestinian human rights issue (which is important, no doubt, but only a small part of the big picture.) The media – and subsequently, you- forget that the Palestinians have been living alongside Jews for a long time, and in most cases, coexistence in its most beautiful form thrives there.

As my month out there progressed, I realized that the problem wasn’t really Palestinians or Israel, but foreign journalists and “human rights activists” who think they know what’s going on here based on bits and pieces of information.

In the War Room, there was a big whiteboard that reported every time “human rights activists” and foreign press came to see the “show.” Yes, the “show.” The activists choose their location and timing wisely, as Palestinians get settled in places they know are close to where the “activists” would be–places close enough to the Palestinian side of the border, but not actually inside the villages, where terror organizations like Hamas have power and control.

I don’t blame them. I, myself, don’t want anyone to get thrown into a situation where a Molotov cocktail is being thrown at them (or rocks, or burning tires.) I can tell you first hand that a rock doesn’t distinguish a soldier from a journalist from an activist from an innocent Palestinian.