There’s an infantry battalion sitting there (in Hebron) that’s trained to charge [on an enemy target]. Like, they went and did basic training, and they did advanced training; they charged; they learned how to shoot; they learned to do fireteam cell drills; they didn’t learn how to deal with [a civilian] population. They’re not police officers. Like, they don’t know how to do it, and it scars them. It’s not fair to them to make them face this, because it’s... Because they have no way of doing it without being scarred or without it causing very bad incidents. Not because they are bad people. They are amazing people; they are just kids my age, really good people with all kinds of opinions about the world. And that’s the thing. Because these people, like, everyone who comes there, are just really good people who get put in a situation in which there is no way to be good. That’s really the thing, and that’s what scarred me. Like, it’s not a political thing, and it’s not a thing, like, obviously everything is political, totally. It’s not right to say. It’s not a political issue, it’s not a security issue; it’s about taking people who don’t have the training for this and putting them in a situation where they have no way to be fair or safe... and each and every one of them gets scarred. And they’re, like, people. I remember that there was a really heated conversation in the battalion after we left Hebron, about how badly people needed a [to see a] mental health officer. Like, suddenly they need to see a psychologist. And some people would fly into fits of rage. Like they thought it was just from Hebron. There is no way to get through this, to really sleep six hours a day, do four hours of guard duty, four hours of rest, sleep in a room with 20 other people without air conditioning, in the middle of the day, in daylight, like, these are not conditions that can be..., the food is not that reasonable, the time that ... Like, the most elementary conditions - they simply did not have. There was a time when there were renovations in their base; they didn’t have a shower; they would shower in some yeshiva (religious seminary). And it’s this situation where the soul just does not have... And then, how does it relate to what ends up actually happening? Terrible things happen all the time. People do things they would never imagine doing in any other situation, regardless of their political opinion. Like, the gentlest people in the world turn into violent animals without empathy, without... Because how can you have empathy when you haven’t slept enough hours, [when] you don’t have your basic needs? And on top of that, pressure, like, which is a whole topic in itself, which is what their relationship is with the Jewish residents of the area. And like what kind of relationship develops there, real reciprocity between the Jewish residents, some of whom are very well-known names like Baruch Marzel, who invites these guys for Shabbat to his house, and sings with them, and it’s like, who are you protecting? Like, what is the soldiers’ mission there in the end? There is, ultimately, I felt that there is- I’m in a situation where there are humans, and there are non-humans. Like, there are Jews that we come here to protect, and there’s everything else in the background. Like, an Arab can get in the way of you protecting a Jew, and so can the weather. You see, like, there’s conditions. Objective conditions, so it could be people, which doesn’t really matter; it doesn’t really matter if it’s people or the weather, because there are simply things that get in the way of you protecting a Jew. Do you understand? And so there’s no humane treatment for these people either.
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