On Wedensday, March 19 at 10:00, in Tel Hashomer enlistment camp, Ella Keidar Greenberg, an 18-year-old Israeli conscientious objector, will publicly declare her refusal to enlist in the Israeli military. She will be accompanied by a demonstration organized by Mesarvot Network. Keidar-Greenberg is refusing as a direct response to the ongoing occupation and the war on Gaza, that may be resumed to full scale any day.
Ella, a trans woman, views her refusal as part of a broader struggle for justice, linking the fight for queer rights with opposition to state violence and military oppression. “As I rejected the Gender role assigned to me, so I reject my militarisation in the service of violence and domination,” she states. “True liberation cannot come through an army that enforces apartheid and commits genocide. In a time of mass destruction, of trampling on rights, of war—refusal is necessary. Do not be complacent. Gather, organize, resist.”
