… In the beginning, they kept trying to feel out what my opinions were. After all, I must be some kind of rare bird on the kibbutz if I joined the Border Police. So they kept trying, in all sorts of ways, made all these jokes, and one of them said to me: “Me, I support coexistence.” And I go: “Really.” “What, don’t you?” I go: “Yeah, the truth is that there’s no other choice.” I knew I had to be careful, I knew where I was by then, it wasn't my first day in the army. So he goes: “Yeah, I'm for coexistence: them under the ground and us above it.” And then I realized that I’d fallen into the trap, I’d said I was in favor of coexistence [between Jews and Arabs] and that’s as if I’d said that tomorrow I'd be willing to give up all the Land of Israel. So it happened slowly, and there were all these situations where they went: “What, you don't want to? Come on, punch him.” Every time, I avoided it. I said no, leave it, I don't… it doesn't do it for me, to beat them up, leave me alone, and yuck, and what do you get out of it. But to start speaking out against it? I knew that, a) I don’t stand a chance and b) I was afraid. I mean, the officers didn't back it openly, they didn't come up to us and say: go on, go beat up some Arabs. But it was clear that there was backing for it. Meaning, it wasn't that they didn't know and were the three monkeys: we didn't see, we didn't hear. Everything was pretty clear and well-known. Again, since that incident that was filmed on video (the witness related an incident in which Border Police personnel were filmed robbing Palestinians) was mostly answered with “why didn't you think you’d be seen”, it was clear that there was no point going to my officers. On the contrary – even without saying anything, I’d already got a reputation as a real snitch, so that after half a year, no one was prepared to go out into the field with me any more. So [instead], I kept doing sentry duty and guard duty, and I didn't have anyone to complain to.

So when did the penny drop? Or did it not drop? Let's say that the first half of the penny drops pretty quickly. I mean, it happened already in that conversation I mentioned about coexistence, which took place on my first day in the company, when I was very na