A Bit Fruity with Matt Bernstein - The Trans Teen Imprisoned for Refusing to Join the IDF

Episode Date: August 6, 2025

Yona Roseman is 19. In two weeks, the Israeli government is imprisoning her for refusing to join Israel's military, for which service is required by all Israeli Jewish teenagers. Because she is transgender, Yona anticipates she’ll be kept in solitary confinement for 22 hours per day. She’s been brutalized by cops who hurl slurs at her despite Israel’s alleged status as a safe haven for LGBTQ people. Ahead of her imprisonment, Yona joins us to talk about the reality of Israel’s treatment of queer people, the way Israel intentionally endangers LGBTQ Palestinians, and why prison and expulsion from mainstream society are prices she’s willing to pay. Listen to bonus episodes on Patreon! Thanks to today’s sponsors! Get an exclusive 60% on Incogni! https://incogni.com/fruity Start managing your money better and cancel unwanted expenses at https://www.rocketmoney.com/fruity.  Send letters to imprisoned refusers: https://linktr.ee/Meaarvot  Find me on Instagram. Find A Bit Fruity on Instagram. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In one sentence, why should people refuse to serve in the Israeli army? Because there's a genocide and you don't enlist into an army that's committing a genocide. Hello, hello, and welcome back to A Bit Fruity. Ever since the Nakhba in 1948, when Zionists violently expelled Palestinians from their land to create the state of Israel, Israel has had conscription or required military service for every Jew who lives there when they turn 18. It's like a military draft, only the draft literally never ends. As of 2022, the minimum service time for men in the Israeli defense forces, or the IDF, is two years and eight months. The minimum service for women is two years.

The IDF plays a huge role in Israeli society. I know Jews I grew up with in New Jersey and New York, who, as teenagers, went on birthright, the fully funded propaganda vacation to Israel, meant to spiritually connect the Jewish diaspora to land that Palestinians still cannot return to. And then they literally uprooted their lives in New Jersey or New York and moved to Israel to serve in the military. I know. It's crazy. Refusal to fulfill your military service requirements comes with punishments, namely jail time. Those sentences will range, and the Israeli government has a practice of continuing to continuous imprisonment until young people submit to their military service. There's also social consequences.

Refusing military service out of protest, especially for the sake of Palestinian life, is deeply unpopular in Israel. A teenager who does this may be cut off from their families, their friends, their support systems, and Israeli society. But as more Israeli teenagers come of age during Israel's ongoing genocide of Palestinians, those are sacrifices that more and more of them are willing to take. Today in a kind of special episode, we're going to talk to Yona Roseman, a 19-year-old Israeli transgender young woman who has done just that. I first came across Yona in a video shared online last month of her and a group of other young refusers burning their draft papers in a public protest in Tel Aviv. Now she's getting ready for prison. Yona, welcome to the show.

Hello, thank you for having me. When I posted about that protest where you were burning your draft papers, you reached out to me and you were like, I would love to come on your podcast and talk about this, but also like, I'm going to jail. So we need to do this now. Yeah. So I have a few questions before we start anything. First of all, when exactly are you preparing to go to prison? And two, how are you doing right now? So my conscription date is August 17th, so at the time of recording in 16 days, and that's the same day I'm going to be imprisoned likely. How does that work? How does the process of imprisonment work when you refuse? So we show up at the draft office because not showing up entails harsher punishment, and we declare our refusal, and then a military commander, and preferably the... highest ranked military commander, like the commander of the draft office. But she, she, it's a woman. Feminist win. This, this war criminal is a woman. Yeah. So, so the reason they wanted to be

the highest ranked commander is because she didn't, she can give the maximum length of sentence, which is 30 days. But after you serve that sentence, you don't get exempted. So then you're, you're called back in and then you're sentenced again. And then you're sentenced again. that goes on and on until the army gives up or you get an exemption somehow. If you don't show up for a couple of days, but then do show up because if you want to have more than three days in between your imprisonments, then you can do that for a couple of, for a week or two, but then you get sentenced for additional days. So those people who've done like 45 days or even 45 days with an additional sentence

if they break the conditions again. So yeah, so it's repeated sentences of, uh, A month by defaults. So do you have any idea, like, when it's all set and done, how long you will go to prison for? No, that's the thing. I only know that I'll go to my next imprisonment. Since the beginning of the genocide, the longest someone has sat in military prison for refusal was 197 days. And that was when the army of the landed.

Just like, we're giving up, like, get out of here. Yeah. Before October 23, there was an unwritten policy that after between three and four months, they'd convene a committee that would exempt you. But when the war started, they decided that they're not going to convince that committee anymore. And they kept threatening our refuses that, oh, you're going to sit here for the entire three years. Three years. And we tested that. and they didn't actually go through with that.

But it did take for about half a year. And then my other question, how are you feeling right now? Well, I'm pretty nervous. Jail sounds not particularly fun. Also, since I'm trans, I'll be probably put in isolation. And we could talk about it more later, probably. But also outside of jail, the entire last two years, but the last couple of weeks in particular

I have been just very despairing and depressing. It's silly on my mind 24-7. That's kind of been what has been holding my mood. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Can we jump into some, you know, of your early life? You know, tell me where you grew up, what your early life was like. So I grew up in a small town in the north of Israel,

the 48th territory. I grew up in what you call a left Zionist family. You know, I was raised on what I would say, like humanistic, universalist values. The world occupation wasn't taboo in my house, but still, you know, very much Zionist Israeli family was very much pro-conscription and, you know, they may want to have peace with the Palestinians, but still, like, it's very clear where, like, on which side were on. Mm-hmm. Everything that I've read about the experience of growing up in Israel talks about, you know, being propagandized from a very young age to fear and despise Palestinians. Would you say that that was true for you or the people around you? And like how much of a role does that propaganda about Palestinians play into people's attitudes towards their Israeli identity and, you know, later joining the military?

So I think since I lived in the north, in the Galilee, which is majority of Palestinian, and with the family that I go up with, I think it was less so that Palestinians or Arabs were demonized and dehumanized, but the question of like the equality was disconnected from the national question. So I was raised in viewing them as equal, but still, you know, the line that I was taught since kindergarten was that we always wanted peace and the Palestinians always rejects. peace and that they want to kill us and we just want to be safe. And that was very much the line in the entire education I've gone through from kindergarten to high school. Would you say that that is standard for Israelis? Yeah. Yeah. I volunteered at a school for like the last year. And I remember when it was Purim, it was the science teacher. It wasn't even like the history teacher. It was a third grade plus and and she talks to them about the story of prorim and how we beat the persians and whatever and

and then she said this is like how today we're also going to beat the iranians and they and no matter how much they want to destroy us will destroy them yeah so so like everywhere it was a very staunchly militaristic and nationalistic line do you think that most israelis never challenged that as they grow up do you think that it's absorbed as you know as your children and you just grow up always kind of feeling like you have to have this military strength towards everyone around you? Yeah, I think even if you develop more moderate positions regarding to like conflicts, it still very much comes from like the lens of where the moral army, where the, we have to be

strong. But for me, it was like really hard as I was becoming more opposed to whatever thing my country stands for was not opposing specific policies. but but breaking the mindset that what we're doing is is fundamentally wrong and and that the army lies and that like so for example i believe like oh you know i think the bombings are bad but i think hamas terrorists are hiding under like buildings that those sort of lines like we're still the most small army in the world like those lines are very much ingrained almost into your mindset even if you oppose, in theory, certain policies.

Like, no matter how brutal the Israeli regime can be, it's always warranted, it's always justified because what they could do is worse. Yeah, and also that it's, like, it has to be a lie, that what we're doing is that bad, because it can be, and because the army says otherwise, and the country says otherwise, and it's our army, and it's, yeah. I have so many things that I want to ask you,

and so I don't want to get, like, stuck for too long on anyone, thing. But while we're here, like, right now in Israel, you know, with finally so much of the rest of the world catching up to how brutal and horrible this genocide that they've been committing is. Like, what is the feeling of people inside Israel toward the global reaction? Like, do they think that everybody is just misinformed? You know, at this point, it's become really difficult to deny. I think what helped for the majority of the genocide was that the media in Israel was very much complacent and just did not show any pictures from Gaza and called every international outlet or a group who did talk about it falling for Hamas propaganda.

Hamas, exactly. Everyone's Hamas. The A Bitfutty podcast is Hamas, yes. I've been told this. Yeah. Well, maybe I'll be arrested for participating in enemy. propaganda. Well, we'll bail you out, we'll bail you out. That's what the Patreon is for. I mean, what can they do? Send me to J. Oh, the fact that you can have a sense of humor about this is pretty wild. Anyways, I think, you know, with the pictures that have been coming out of Gaza in recent weeks, it's become hard to deny and to ignore even for mainstream Israeli media. And that has somewhat broke into the Israeli consciousness. But a lot of it,

still like, oh, you know, it is a catastrophe, but it's Hamas who's responsible for the starvation. Right. It's reluctant. So I think there has been some sort of shift, but the majority of society is still very much for everything that's happening. I want to talk a little bit about your relationship to your queer identity and your gender, because we're just going to talk about a lot of things today and try to weave them all together in a meaningful way.

So talk to me about that. Like, how old were you when you, you know, realized you were queer? What was your coming out journey like? Because that is something that despite a lot of aspects of our lives being very different, that you do have in common with, you know, a lot of the people who listen to this podcast, for example. Well, I don't know what's considered pretty late. But I realized I was trans around puberty. I was 13, I think.

I didn't grow up knowing a lot of trans people. I knew a couple of trans guys or trans-mask people, but no. trans girls. So it felt just very distant. So it took me a bit to come to terms with. It also it took me even longer to come out. It was like a period of like a year or two. I was already out to my friends and even like in class and in school. But like to my parents, I only came out when I was 16. It's crazy that you think that that's late. Like I know people who came out in their 60s. You know, you're 19 right now. Yeah. No, I don't think that's late. It's just, it felt, it felt like a really long time. Oh, of course. The, the night I came out to my parents was the first time I got drunk. So, good for you. It happens to the best of us. It does. So we're going to get into some pinkwashing stuff because I really want to talk with you about that. But, you know, one of Israel's top, you know, marketing strategies as a nation state in places like the U.S.

is like it's a it's a haven for LGBTQ people and that's why we must protect it at all costs. And we're going to get into that in a second. But I want to know like what was it like growing up as a trans teenager in Israel? More than anything, it was a bit of a bureaucratic hell. Say more bureaucratic hell. Yeah. So I came up. I was pretty much only socializing with my friend group and they were fine with it.

So that wasn't an issue. I only came out to the rest of my school. who is quite conservative after October 7th, and by that time my school was evacuated since it's in the farm off. So I didn't see my classmates at all, so I kind of dodged a bullet there. So the main headache I had to deal with

was like trying to get on hormones. There's only one gender clinic in the entire country that serves trans kids. Wow. And it's in Tel Aviv, which is two and a half hours away from where I lived. And it was a huge waiting list, and then until they approved me getting on hormones, it was also longer. And then from there, getting to the national health insurance to recognize it.

It's a really long bureaucratic process. Generally, I grew up in quite a liberal environment. I think the most transphobia I faced was only after being public about my leftist activism. So that's when people start purposefully calling you slurs and misgendering you. And in protests, like the, like people shouted to me, like, what are you, are you a man, are you women? I had a couple of not very fun interactions with the police when I was arrested. I was arrested a couple of times. For your activism.

Yes, yes. In protests, yeah. I was arrested a total of six times. During my first arrest, I was arrested once a year ago and five times in the last three months. So in that arrest a year ago, the cops bit me up quite bad. And after I was a police station, I had to go to the hospital. But that was more so, that was a repression for being an activist, less so than for being transgender. But in the investigation itself, the investigator just refused to gender me correctly,

refused to call me by my chosen name, despite me constantly correcting her. And almost every arrest, I'm called like the it or the half-half. or the they, or, you know, even after I changed my name, they, they, they search for my, like, previous name in the document. They like, they like making an issue out of it. And they use your lack of Israeli nationalism as an excuse to be transphobic, it sounds like. Yeah, yeah. Because you're, you're against the state and you're, you're, like, a terrorist or a terrorist

supporter, then it's justified. And you can throw all that fugitive mask out of the window. oh god that's so that is so horrible and also so predictable because i don't know like i'm always preaching about how like all of these systems of human rights or denial of human rights like they go hand in hand and so it's like the second that you refuse like nationalism during a genocide they're like well so you don't get your you know you don't get your trans rights then yeah and i think like one of the biggest like cultural shocks for me was for like the first year of the genocide the almost became an association of queer and trans identity with like the columbia university protesters

like i was i was but like specifically it's like this stereotype of uh blue herd coffee wearing protester and like yeah like i don't know i've i've been a queer activist for a while and it's but but i've always lived here but that's the association it's uh not that it's a particularly bad thing to be compared to you. It's very much like a stereotype now. I mean, they do that a ton in the U.S. They're always like, oh, the purple hair protesters at Columbia University.

And it's like, well, a lot of times queer people understand how the denial of human rights works and don't want that to happen to other people. Like, I don't know. I guess I wish people understood that better. Like, well, should we talk about pink washing? We could. I would love to because I never shut up about this topic

and I feel really lucky to be able to talk to you about it. So one of the arguments that Israel propagandists, I can't even call these people simply pro-Israel anymore because I think it's like too dignifying of a label for a position that is at this point purely genocidal. One of the arguments that they make, which has been very successful in Western countries like the United States, is that Israel is the only place in the Middle East

that values queer rights. It's what we call the pinkwashing of genocide, the idea that colonization and occupation and genocide are excusable if the people committing it are socially liberal or claimed to be. I have lost American queer friends of mine to fervent Zionism, and this idea of Israel as a safe haven for queer people played a huge role in their brainwashing. I get comments online that you've probably seen at you, Yona, or anyone listening to this podcast every single day telling me how I'd be treated as a gay person in Gaza. Go to Gaza, you'll be thrown off our roof. And therefore, I should support Israeli genocide. And so my question for you, like, as someone who is trans and who grew up in Israel,

I feel like you're in a really unique position when it comes to this issue. was Israeli society pink-washed to you growing up? Like, is that an argument and an attitude that exists within Israel? Or is it just sort of like a global PR strategy? When I wasn't targeted as a, or before I was targeted as a selectoring activist. So just as someone growing up in Israel, or even as a queer person growing up, it's not much of a propaganda line. It's not like, oh, you know, Israel is so good for you. Even like the queer discourse that's confined to Zionism and instead of Israel, like, recognizes that we have a long way to go.

There's violence against queer people and we don't have a right to marry. And there's a lot of restrictions on adoption. And transitioning has a lot of barriers around it. So both socially and legally, there's an active struggle even for like queer Jews within Israel. So that's not something that is propaganda by default. but if you're suddenly also against the occupation, against genocide, and the portion of Palestinians, then you get called ungrateful for everything that the state provides you with. The line that, oh, you should go to Gaza, it could be thrown off of a roof, whatever.

It's very common. Do people say that to you? Yeah, yeah. I've heard people say it to me, cops say to me, it's very common. The thing that's Aniaw even said that quiz for Palestine is like chickens for KFCs. Netanyahu did say that. And it's like, Netanyahu fucking hates queer people of his own volition, not with regard to anything else. Like, that is a far right man. You know, in a lot of pride for AIDS in recent years, we have had like a block against pink washing.

Talks about the intersection between the oppression of Palestinians and oppression of queer people and how Israel blackmails, queer Palestinians. Do you want to explain that? Because I've seen stories about the blackmailing of queer Palestinians by Israel. Yeah, there have been testimonies from intelligence officers who have testified that this is something that they've had to do or tasked with doing or did. Essentially, like, officers contacting poor Palestinians telling them that unless they give them intel on wanted people, family members, just people in the street, they'll out them to their environment. In other cases, the granting of asylum has been conditioned on giving in to it. So it's kind of like using queer rights as a thing to like hang over Palestinians' heads

or use against them if they don't cooperate with the Israeli regime. Yeah. And for example, in 2023, there was a Palestinian from Nablus, whose name was Zuhir Khalid, who was executed for spying for Israel after being blackmailed by Israeli intelligence. for being queer. So he was a gay man who was targeted by the Israeli military, blackmailed into spying for the Israeli military, and then killed by his own government for doing that. Jesus. He said that Shinbet, the Israeli intelligence force, had an illicit video of him doing something

with a male partner. So, I mean, in some senses, it sounds like the Israeli military doing what they claim will happen to gay people in Gaza, doing that to gay Palestinians? Yeah, essentially. I mean, they are contributing to the danger that queer Palestinians have to live through. And that's, you know, without even mentioning the fact that Israel has killed more queer Palestinians than any militant group or conservative force by virtue of killing 100,000 Palestinians in Gaza. There isn't a spatial dome that protects specifically queer Palestinians.

Israel cares all Palestinians. And it exploits the vulnerability of queer Palestinians, which puts them further in danger. A quick break from the episode to give a shout out to Incogni for sponsoring this show and making today's episode possible. Incogni, if you're wondering, is a fabulous service that helps you take your personal data off of the online marketplace. By reaching out to the hundreds of data brokers that buy and sell your information online. all day long and asking them to delete it, which is something that legally you have the right to do, but if you tried to do it, it would very quickly become your full-time job. Incogni is a service that I wish I had when, quick little story time, and I recently told

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is real. All of which I found out after giving them hundreds of dollars. Still bitter about it. Anyways, the point is, I wish that I had incogni then. So those people never would have had my information and known that I was in the market for health care and gone after me and targeted me very successfully. If you want to get your data, you know, your name, your email, your address, your phone number, your employment history, out of the hands of data brokers, you should try incogni. You can take a look and get a big discount off of your annual plan at incogni.com slash fruity with the code fruity. That's incogni.com slash fruity with the code fruity. Now let's get back to the episode. You mentioned, you know, something about where you'd be placed in prison, in Israeli

prison as a trans person for refusing. Can you talk more about that? Yeah. So because I'm trans, Well, there isn't a written policy that we know of. There was a transgender refuser in March. My name is Ella. She's a close friend of mine. She was placed in women's prison, but apart from the morning break and the evening break, which are both an hour. So for 22 hours a day, she was kept in a room alone, in complete solitary. Jesus.

which even the regular solitary section in the military prison is in couples. So there's always the person that gets sent to isolation and the person that is accompanying them. So for her, it was just her. And for 15 hours a day she was awake. All she had to do was sit on her bed. She couldn't even lie on her back or like on the wall or on her bag. Yeah, that's all she was able to do. so we don't know what will happen with me.

For the last week of her imprisonment, she was allowed to do like the work you can do, which is saying as like a reward. If you're a good prisoner, then they let you do certain tasks like cleaning or readying the dining room. And also sewing up uniforms and the eye coverings that they put on Palestinian prisoners, which if I get told to that, I'm not going to do it.

Oh, Jesus Christ. But yeah, they want the prisoners to be productive. So for the last week, she was allowed to do that. And we don't know if it's because of pressure we put on them for them putting a transgender prisoner in isolation, or just because she really wasn't in the eyes a good prisoner that was allowed to get that reward. I believe I will also be put in a similar situation, which is scary because I'm a social person and I don't like being alone. I mean, it just sounds like the Israeli government using queer rights. as kind of like a carrot to dangle over your head as long as you fall in line with this

genocidal regime. Like, it doesn't sound like a place that authentically values human rights for queer people. Yeah. For example, I was contacted by, the IDF has a gender officer. And the gender officer is in charge of, like, talking with transgender soldiers and, like, making sure they are in a unit that is accepting of them and that they get the accommodations that they need. But then if I go to prison,

that I'll be kept in isolation. So it's, yeah, it's conditional in a sense. I guess I want to ask you as a trans-Israeli, because this pink-washing tactic has been, like I said, it's been so successful, like where I live. And it's seduced people that, like, I was friends with. What would you say to people, especially people outside of Israel,

who have bought into this argument and continue to use it to justify Israel's, Well, honestly, the bottom line isn't how Israel treats queer people. It could be the most safe haven for queer people as it claims to be. And it would still be a country that's committing genocide and killing 100,000 Palestinians. It is important to outline how it lies about that, just like it lies about everything. How it lies about being a utopia for queer people. Yeah, yeah, just like how it lies about that atrocity is it committed. Gaza and how it lies about its treatment of Palestinians within Israel.

It constantly lies. And it's important to point out that this is also a lie and propaganda, but the bottom line is that it doesn't matter. There is no amount of progressivism a country can achieve that will permit it to commit genocide and masturbation. And that's the bottom line. I want to talk a little bit about your decision to refuse service and about kind of what happens when you do. Could you talk to me a little bit about the movement to, they call it,

conscientious objectors or refuse nix, there's a historical precedent for this movement. I was wondering if you could tell me a little bit about that. Yeah. So as long as there has been conscription, there has been refusnix. Refusenix is the name that they give to people who refuse service. It's sort of a nickname that we've adopted. It has other connotations with Jews from USR. But yeah, there have been people who have refused mandatory service for as long as there has been conscription. In your intro, when you mentioned that Israel has been employing conscription since 1948, I was actually about to say that even before the foundation of Israel, back in 1947, the many Zionist militias would go to the camps of displaced Holocaust survivors

and conscript Jews from there. There was even a Yiddish play made about it, that is supposed to be like an indictment against a fictional draft avoider. It's insane for how long is Israel has employed it. And yeah, we have testimonies and letters, even from 1948, of people who refused the military service. And in the last couple of decades, it has taken form in two major ways. The first one is reservis refusers, people who did. do army service, but then refused the reserve cause during specific wars that they were in opposition to it. This started around the first war in Lebanon back in the 1980s.

Is that because, so my understanding is that you get drafted initially to do your IDF service and then afterwards they put you in the reserves? Yes. Yes. And essentially, you have to, every couple of years, you have to do training and when there's a war or another incident, and then they send out a bunch of reserve orders to people who are listed as active reservists. And you stay on that list of people in the reserves until you're 40? Yeah, I think 40 or 45 even. I'm not sure exactly what's the cut off. But yeah, for that case.

On then there were people who refused the reserve services, but this was more so like conditional refusal. They refused to a specific war or to serve in the occupied territories, that sort of stuff. later I think around the 90s there started things called like umich therethe minestim which is like letters of 12th graders which is just generations of 12 graders

who would together sign a letter refuse us and this is something that is still being done back in the early 2000s there was the biggest letter in history I think it was signed by around 350 people this was during the second intifada and five of them were sentenced not just to

military jail, but then they were tried in civilian court and sent to civilian jail as well, and they served a total of two years, of two full years in prison. And that was like a really big controversy around then, because they actually like went on trial and challenged the idea of conscription. And specifically, I'm a member of a group called Mesabot. Mesabot means we refuse in the female form in Hebrew. It was founded a decade ago in 2016. Sort of a network of refuses throughout the years. We're not just active around the time of our refusal, but also for refuses in following years and before. I, for example, have been active in Mesa Votes for around two years.

Before you could ever even refuse, you weren't old enough. You were a minor. Exactly. Yeah. And it's a group that it gives us a platform and a group to be active with, and we organize protests, and we organize specifically like protests on the day of the refusers. of different refusers. For example, yesterday there were two of my friends.

I and I knew viral went to jail for refusing, and we went to the draft office with them and protested there. And we also protested in front of the military jail when the refusers are in jail. It gives us legal support, and media support and parental support. So it's really nice. And most importantly, it gives us like a community. Like, refusing is an act that it's really just so out of the consensus

in Israeli society. it really helps to not be alone in it. And that's the biggest advantage. So that's my political home, essentially. Can I ask, how old were you when you learned about the movement to refuse military service? And how did you learn about it? Because I would imagine that officials in Israel try to keep a cap on how people find out about that kind of thing. Yeah. So for a while I knew I didn't want to serve, but it didn't really look like an option. I really didn't know about it. And then I went to this Israeli-Palestinian summer camp, and the assistant guide was a former refuser. And at some point, she talked about her journey of refusing. And it was only then that that concept was really

demystified for me. Before then, I already started finding out about it, because I was going to protests against occupation against apartheid and it was there that I met other people my age were also activists and they were already involved in those sort of circles but it was only then that I properly like heard about it and and it was after that that I joined the support myself and around a month later there was a big event of like us releasing another like refusal letter that was signed by 250 teenagers and I remember when I was active there and I actually talking to people who of went for it and saying that, you know, there's a lot of film on going on not, not serving. Like, there's, like, they tell you, like, you won't be able to find a job and you won't be able to

get housing and a lot of that stuff. And I think just seeing that people continued with their life and that's what they want to completely ostracized really have to dispel the fear around it for me. And I think being active in it. And, like, there's something about, like, taking my freedom into my own hand and saying no, even at the cost of my physical freedom that was very liberating. And it was that feeling that convinced me that this was something I wanted to do myself and that this was a price I was willing to pay. What is the attitude of young Israelis, generally speaking, towards the IDF? Like, do most young people want to serve out of patriotism? Do people not want to serve, but they fear the repercussions, so they do it anyway?

Most people want to serve. Young Israelis are very much captured by the nationalistic narrative that everyone has to serve and that it's a good thing. And then, you know, the army makes an active effort to encourage teenagers to enlist. So, for example, when I was in high school, we were sent to, like, a military camp for a week where we wore uniform and held weapons and had our own, like, miniature military training to it. to make it seem like fun and like this is something that we would want to do and there's in a lot of schools including mind there like teacher offices who are there to like to help you with your

studies but then also check you up on like how how you're doing with the different military orders and if you're if there's specific roles that you want to be in and if you got like calls to try to to get into specific units or walls and they often talk about how you know the if you go to you can then find a job in high tech. And it's seen as a very like personally uplifting move to enlist and to make, to do like meaningful service. How old are you and how old are Israelis when they start kind of like really pushing that onto you as like an integral part of Israeli life?

So your first call to the draft office is in 11th grade. For me, it was just before I turned 17. It's between 16 and 17, but you go to the draft office and. go through different health checkups and then interview, and they ask you which roles you want to do, and inform that as a consistent journey of, like, you get letters inviting you to go to the Air Force trial or to, like, the elite combat units trial, or intelligence trial, etc.

It's funny, my refusal is in 16 days, and I still get messages telling me to go to some computer units, asking me to, like, do specific tests so I could go there. And I don't think they got the memo. Yeah, I don't think so. They're not listening to a bit fruity. No. Yeah, for a while, I get a lot of calls from the Air Force.

I'm like, I'm not interested. They really didn't let go. And for a lot of schools, specifically in less fortunate, like, socio-economic backgrounds, like at the school I went to, the army encourages a thing where they give the first order to military for the entire, like, grade at the same day. So you go with your entire school. Because a lot of time, you know, it's not that people don't want to serve,

but they're too lazy to show up. You know, there's 60 girls who don't want to take a bus at 6 a.m. to a different city to a random, like a random draft office. So they encourage the school to send all of the grades together as like a field trip to the, to the drops office, which was an interesting experience for me not being out yet to my school, but the army knowing I'm trans. So then they were like, well, they want to go to the boys' interview, to the girls' interview, and they were on different floors of the building.

It was a whole long. It was a whole thing. I mean, look, being from the United States, we are not at all free of our own awful military, industrial complex, you know, predatory practices on teenagers, especially from less fortunate socioeconomic backgrounds. We are not exempt from that critique here at all. all. But it does seem like a particularly unique level of fucked up that they require every child to engage on this level and like convince you that like your upwards mobility and society

will be dependent on how well you perform your military service like as children. Like that that I mean not to sound crass, but that's like that seems like very fucked up. Yeah. And and and then you have and then you have teenagers 18 year old teenagers signing not just on. the three-year conscription, but on the academic programs in the army, that then force you to do additional years of professional service after your mandatory service. Yeah, so I have friends who are from my grade who have signed a contract of like nine years of the army. It's insane. And this is something that they already had to aim for before they were even adults. It's, it's insane. It's bad shit. It is bad shit. I would like to take a quick break from the show

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decision to make. As you've said, in another interview that I watched with you, if a military is committing a genocide, you don't enlist in that military. At the same time, though, I want to paint a picture for people of what it means, you know, socially and legally, which we've talked about the legal aspect a little bit, to refuse service in a society that shuns people who make that decision. Could you talk to me about, you know, how refusers are treated? What was the reaction from your family, your friends, etc? So there's a lot of, there's a lot of factors that play into it. Military service is seen by mainstream society as the tickets and gateway into Israeli citizenship. So if you don't serve, then you're not a real participant of society and you're, you're

political opinions, more or less, and you shouldn't be prioritized in academy or healthcare services or welfare or whatever. If you haven't served in the military, then you haven't done your duty, and it's only after you do your duty that you can demand your rights, essentially, is a common talking point. And, you know, there are certain demographics who don't get conscripted for one reason or another, and there's a lot of antagonism against them for that. because the sin is not giving their part. So, I mean, it almost sounds like they kind of like, I don't know, again, with the dangling carrot, Benafour, but it's like you earn your full participation in Israeli society through

like participating in the enforcement of Israeli violence. Yeah, yeah. And in a lot of ways, like serving in the military is that gateway into, it is. It is an inherent part of Israeli nationalism. So, yeah, it's Israeli identity. is in large part made up by it. So not serving in the army is a rejection of his identity in at least some ways.

I've had classmates who cut contact with me over my decision to refuse. My friends these days are essentially made up of the people who are with me in my activism. So for them, obviously, it's not something that they have to contend with. It's a good thing. For my family, it was difficult.

I've had my parents tell me pretty difficult. things over the years since I decided to do it. But I think they, you know, they still, you know, love me as their child and want me to feel like they're behind me even if they don't support my actions. So it's gotten better, but they have not been particularly supportive of my decision. But I think, I do think it's important to outline that it really does not, at least in my eyes, it does not matter how difficult that decision or like how much difficulties it entails. because the decision itself is very trivial

and there's a reason I insist on saying that when people ask me, what are the consequences? Because I think it's interesting to talk about the consequences. Obviously, it's not nothing that the social socialization and that I'm going to jail or whatever, but there's a genocide. And it doesn't matter what price there is to pay when the other option is to serve in an army

that's committing genocide. That's something that I'm very adamant about. So Israel will often brand itself, you know, the only democracy in the Middle East, which is why people in the United States should unconditionally support it. Like pinkwashing, this is a fallacy in my eyes. You know, Israel isn't a full democracy. It has occupied Palestinian land and turned Palestinians into second-class citizens, subject to Israeli control but with no voting power.

So there's that. But also, you know, you're about to go to jail for refusing to join Israel's genocidal military regime. To me, that doesn't feel like the working of a functioning democracy. And so I guess my question for you is like, do you think Israel is democratic? No. Okay. I mean, it's very simple. I mean, when a country has millions of subjects that are deprived of voting rights and that live under a different legal system, then it's not a democracy.

But it goes further than that. The entirety of the Israeli legal system is built to enshrine the supremacy of Jews over Palestinians. And it's not just in the West Bank or just in Gaza. It's throughout the entire, it's throughout all of Palestinians, from the river to the sea. There's really one regime there, and that's its ultimate goal. And this is true for Palestinians who do hold Israeli citizenship as well. And obviously, you know, when a state is committing genocide and is acting in such an immoral and evil, you know, it's a way, then to uphold that system, it needs to continuously employ unimquatic measures. And it needs to suppress dissent and outlaw dissent and jail people and, like, falsely accused, accused them of being terrorists.

unavoidable when this is the sort of system it's trying to uphold. So yeah, there's nothing them quatic about it. I'm just, I find it so valuable to ask you these things because it's like these are the things that like Americans around me and around the communities that I grew up in as like an American Jew. These are the talking points. They repeat over and over and over again. It's all like, you know, well, we have we have to unconditionally support Israeli genocide. Of course, they don't call it genocide, but they'll say that we have to support it because Israel's democracy and you're, you know, you're a queer person. Imagine the Middle East without Israel, whatever, whatever. And it's like, I don't know, I feel like all of these arguments are just so paper thin,

especially once you talk to someone who's actually living through these, like this apparent utopian liberal society that people who don't live there claim it to be. I think there's such a dissonance from that vision once you have like a single conversation with the Palestinian that's living under that system. Hmm. It's not, it's not bridgeable. That entire discourse is just layers upon layers of propaganda and it's like if you just look at the reality in its eyes, it's, there's no, there's no way you can actually believe it. As an Israeli 19 year old, you have made the most. ethical decision available to you. I keep saying that you're 19 because I just cannot believe you're

so young and I also hate not being the youngest person in a conversation anymore. It is what it is. I'm making peace. But, you know, you've made the most ethical decision available to you. And obviously you're going to prison for it. For the rest of us, you know, who are privileged enough to not be in that position. What do you want people listening to do to continue to oppose genocide? Well, I think the bottom line of my refusal is that no weapons, no aid, no resources, no cooperation should be done with a state that's comedic genocide. And of course, you know, that's not to say that before October 7th, Israel was a moral state

that, you know, was suddenly corrupted. Obviously, you know, it's a state that's upholding apartheid system and that's been committing ethnic cleansing for 77 years. But really, the reality, as it exists today, makes the question of what needs to be done very simple, is that we need to employ every tool that we have to withhold as much help as we can from that country to continue advancing its goals.

And for me, it's withholding my own. self as a resource for the continuation of the genocide. And for people living abroad, it's putting pressure on governments, institutions, businesses to cut all ties and aid with the state of Israel and to take matters into their own hands and block the flow of weapons into the state of Israel. And it's not an easy task. I don't want to act like it is, but it's very much what needs to be done. And it's what I did encourage you ever want to do is to find a group that that's the line, that they want to accept as much pressure as possible and organize with them and do it, because that's what needs to be done.

Do you have any plans for when you get out of prison? It's a good question. I want to be a journalist. I'm a writer already. I write an article for a couple months, but I want to do it more. I don't know. There's something about this fear that I'm at. that makes things more simple,

because it's almost like I don't need to think about, like to deeply think about what I need to do, because it's very clear that what I need to do is to refuse a military service. And then I'll be in jail. In jail, there's also not much more I could do. After that, I want to continue doing what I can. Hopefully, you know, I live in some illusion that maybe by the time I get out of one page and side anymore.

And then I'll continue doing what needs to be done against the rest of the atrociously is that the country commits. But I don't know. I want to continue doing what I can, maybe starting at some point. Well, if you want to come back on the A BitFrudy podcast after you're out of prison, I'll be more than happy to welcome you back, Yona. Yeah, that's a life goal for sure. Permanent co-host once you're out of Israeli prison.

You can also do like, you can check up with me in between imprisonments if you want. Oh, that would be awesome. Yeah. No, yeah. Wait, let's do that. Let's, yeah, let me know in the comments. I mean, I actually kind of think that I've already decided I wanted to do. That would be great to it.

Yeah, we can also bring like my partner who's refusing in October. Oh, wait. What? Your partner is also refusing? Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, it's a bit funny to bring it up and I'm into the. recording, I suppose. Yeah, I live with my partner. The conscription date is in October, and he's also going to declare his refusal, and she's sitting right next to me, actually,

and giving me faces. So, I don't know. Hi, partner. My name is Danielle. Hello. Hi, Danielle. Well, maybe we're going to, maybe we're going to have to do this with you in October. I would love that. I would absolutely I really love that. Well, I can't say enough how, you know, I know you're not doing this for the admiration of anybody. I know you're doing it because it's the right thing to do. But, you know, I feel really privileged to have not had to make a decision like the one that you're both making, I've just learned. And I know that it's going to mean a lot for people to hear all of this from you. So, thank you so much for talking to me today. I know this is like 20% more.

earnest than like most of my episodes but man this shit is so serious it's it's hard to you know pepper in the jokes as I usually do but I really really appreciate both of you and and I really appreciate getting to talk to you yonah hearts thank you for me it was it was a nice talking to you I'll see you after I go to jail I suppose where can people find you online before and after your imprisonment that is something that I I've never said in the outros to these episodes. It's like, where can people find you online after you get out of jail? I post on Twitter.

I'll quit eventually because it's owned by a neo-Nazi, but for now I post on Twitter. It's at your nationalists. Yeah, and also you can follow my servaught on all socials, and they post update for me and for my friends who also go to jail. And once I do go to jail, you could send me letters, which I would really appreciate it, because I'll have a lot of time in isolation. So do you want to send me you you'll text me how people can send you letters. Yeah, yeah.

But it's not like physical letters. There's going to be a Google Forms in Messer Wots link tree. And you can write that and you can write to the other people who are also in jail. I would really appreciate it because I'll have a lot of free hours in isolation and have to spend somehow. Well, I think you're going to be getting a lot of letters from a bit fruity listeners. I will link all of those, the Twitter links, the Messarvote. links in the episode description. Thank you. If you have listened this far, I love you so much. This was a really important episode to me. I know topic-wise, this podcast gets all over the place.

Sometimes we're talking about JoJo Siwa. Sometimes we're talking about genocide. But, you know, we all have ranges of interest and this is my podcast, so these are mine. I love you so much and until next time. Stay fruity.