Friday 16 July 2004
Khalid Amayreh in the West Bank
For the first time, suicide has become the leading cause of death in the Israeli armed forces, according to an Israeli newspaper report.
Quoting statistics from Israeli army’s rehabilitation division, the Hebrew daily Maariv said that in 2003, the number of Israeli soldiers who committed suicide was significantly higher than those killed during military incursions in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
A total of 43 Israeli soldiers took their own lives last year compared to 30 soldiers killed in intifada-related hostilities, said the report.
This represents a 30% increase in the number of suicides over the 2002 figure of 31.
Additionally, in 2003, 32 Israeli soldiers died of various illnesses, 27 were killed in traffic accidents or during vacation and 10 died in traffic accidents while on duty.
Nine soldiers were killed during training and practice exercises and in course of military operations. A further eight soldiers died due to other reasons.
This year’s suicide figure is just as disturbing. The newspaper said 15 Israeli soldiers have killed themselves in the first six months of 2004.
Embarrassed by the report, the Israeli Ministry of Defence refused to comment on its content. A spokesperson said she “knew nothing of the report”, adding the ministry “had nothing to do with it”.
The publication of the Maariv report appears to have taken the Israeli military by surprise. An army spokesman said the fatality figures may have been leaked by unauthorised sources within the army or the Ministry of Defence.
He said the army is deliberating about the revelations.
The Israeli army denies as a matter of course any connection between army “excesses” in the occupied territories and the phenomenon of suicides among soldiers.
Army sources routinely cite more mundane reasons such as emotional crises, bullying and persecution by superiors, and psychological depression.
However, it is widely believed that a significant number of the suicide cases are connected to soldiers’ traumatic experiences in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
‘Terrible burden’
An Israeli peace activist, who spoke to Aljazeera.net on condition of anonymity, said she believed many of the soldiers who went on to take their own lives, simply couldn’t live with the moral burden of causing avoidable and unjustified deaths in the occupied Palestinian territories.
Submitted by Zanjabil on Fri, 2009-01-30 19:08
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Shows at least some of them have conciences. If i did the things they did, i wouldn't be able to live with myself.
It's hard to believe that the overwhelming number of Israelis statistically supported the slaughter of hundreds of children, and yet the increase of soldier suicides tells us something else. Yet I haven't the least bit of sympathy for any of them.
As far as I am concerned, their constant hollering "Never Again" has been completely discredited. They have made me ashamed of being a Jew myself, and hope they all rot in hell.
It would make me rejoice to know top members of the Israeli government and army command were killing themselves ... rather than some young kids who are haunted by the evil they committed ...
... that Israelis who obviously belong to the human race cannot find any other way to express themselves in the "only democracy in the Middle East" than by taking their own lives!
We surely need them whilst we can easily do without the leadership of the Synagogue of Satan. Revenge is up to God, but the justice of the Hague is not bad either!