Guarding the Darkness

It’s my turn to guard, with rifle and combat dress I make my way to the position overlooking the entrance to the base. First one thick steel door is pushed aside and then another immediately after. Were it not for the occasional luminous light all would be pitch black as I navigate through the guts of a small base on the border between Israel and Syria. The grey concrete is at first painted white though as I move closer towards my position the white gives way to the original concrete grey colour of the concrete used to build the base and the lights are spread further and further apart until a lone white flickering bulb on the wall is the only illumination that remains.

Above me are the naked cables that are responsible for bringing light, heat and air to my skeletal palace. There are thick black cables and small, thin cables of varying colours and unknown lengths snaking around in infinite directions over my head. My shortened M16 is slung over one shoulder and my oversized combat helmet is in my hand. The first time I made my way to this position I got lost and struggled up and down several different stairways opening doors to deserted field positions. My attempts to navigate fell to pieces each time I moved down the concrete steps and was offered the mere options of left and right and more steps to go up. Eventually I gave up and called out to be greeted by the screech of a rust covered steel door being forced open from the inside and a friendly greeting.

Tonight I know my way and move through the intestines of this beast thinking only of the lonely hours I have ahead of me. There’s nothing to do in my post, there’s no light and it's pretty much the only job in the world where the bosses emphatically insist that their employee does absolutely nothing. The shift lasts from 1a.m.-4a.m. with nothing to do but stare into the darkness and wait for it to end while hoping that the soldier responsible for switching me wakes up in time.

My predecessor hears me mounting the concrete steps and I hear the clanging of the lock and the grind of steel against stone as he pushed the barrier between him and me open. We’re too tired to exchange words and the grunts that pass between us count for a complete conversation. With the metal door closed behind me I am well and truly enclosed in a world of concrete and Perspex that is that is about 2m x 2m. I have no light and nothing to do but look into the darkness and hope that nothing happens. In front of me is a big machine gun complete with hundreds of rounds of ammunition, each bullet linked to the next creating a conveyor belt of death just waiting to be activated.

There’s a small chair but if I sit on it I can’t see out of the windows that provide me with a 270 degree view of the darkness outside. Despite having a panorama of darkness to look at the only thing I am really supposed to be watching is the constantly deserted dirt track that leads to the gate of the base. 50 meters beyond the gate and up a small hill is a big green skip where we empty the garbage. I can hear noises coming from within, yelps and clanging along with the occasional bang permeate the darkness from that big green hulk of steel. I feel around for the night vision goggles and eventually get to them, raising them to my eyes with one hand and flipping the on switch with the other.

The sight that greets me is another familiar one as I watch two cats battling over the food that my friends and I left behind. I kill some time watching them circle the skip then jump inside then explode out of one of the openings. Guard duty is all about killing time. The cats are only one noise, I am treated to an entire symphony of sounds that are usually blocked out by the hustle and bustle of the day. The wind continuously batters itself against my small tower, it whistles and it blows and occasionally thunders against me in a continual effort for some attention. 

There are other noises coming from out there in the dark. There is the crunch of footsteps on gravel, the crunch that tells me that persons unknown are already in the base and are preparing their attack even while I stand there listening to them. The crunch repeats itself over and over and I know that it is the noise of a fallen part of the perimeter fence. The wind blows the tangled pole over and over again over the small white stones that have been spread around the outside of the bunker. I take a look with the night vision and there the pole lies locked in it's own perpetual battle against the elements. Other assorted debris surrounds the fallen pole and each piece makes it's own special sound when rocked and buffeted by the howling wind.

I can look over both Israel and Syria from my position though I can see neither. The night vision turns the darkness into shades of green but it cannot penetrate the cloud that has settled below obscuring both countries. I can see the illuminated sections of cloud that signify a cloud covered village but I can’t see anything else. I turn my attention up to the night sky for I never tire of viewing the plethora of stars and planets before me that are illuminated by the night vision. Somehow the sheer loneliness of my position ensures that even this vista of twinkling jewels in the darkness provides no particular solace tonight. One last sweep of the area and the picture brightens for a moment and then disappears altogether, it seems that even my equipment is against me being able to force out the loneliness.

The radio doesn’t work, no surprise there, a couple of guys are convinced that it’s the work of Syrian radio jammers, perhaps they are right. The static keeps pumping through the radio and I imagine those jammers out there and wonder if they are celebrating jamming a frequency, if they even know that they have succeeded...if they are even there at all.

My thoughts turn inward, I count how many days I have left here at the edge of my world. I knew before I started counting but I count anyway. I try to figure out once again on which day I'm leaving even though I already know it’s on a Tuesday. I push deeper, I contemplate my life, where I am going and where I have come from. I ask questions that have no answers and try to pluck one out of the darkness.

I imagine that an attack is coming, that infiltrators are already in the base, that they are moving from room to room with silenced weapons. I open up the Perspex windows to listen for the tell tail signs of movement, perhaps some rocks slipping as people move through the ravine nearby, equipment clanging against something or even some words carried to me in the wind. 

There’s nothing out there, nothing that I can hear anyway. My mind moves on. Sounds come to me from beyond the steel door bolted behind me. The crackle of the flickering light that I passed on the way up, the clanging of a door that can’t be bolted shut.

I don’t know everyone on this base.

There are my friends, we’re the fighters tasked to defend it against attack but there are others here too. There are small clusters of people in other units, I don’t know them, they don’t know me. They have been here in this mini fortress a long time. What if one of them was to go crazy, what if one of them was to simply go into the kitchen grab a knife and…my thoughts have turned as dark as the night before me.

I unbolt the door and kick it open, see Aviad coming up the stairs with a cup of tea in his hand and breathe my sigh of relief that the shift is finished. “yalla go get some sleep” he says. I nod and murmur some words that even I can’t understand and make my way back towards the heart of the base. My bunk is waiting for me but I don’t go to it, I sit down with my computer and write this piece instead, then I go on a little patrol with a couple of the others and take some pictures of the clouds below me in the light of dawn.

Now I'm going to bed.

Evolution of a Political Opinion

With the South of Israel once again being pounded by rockets emanating from the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Desert becoming increasingly active as a new front against Israel I find myself once again evaluating my political position. It seems that my belief in peace and a better world is constantly being put to the test by those who seek nothing more than to watch the world burn.

When I made aliyah in 2001 I immediately began Ulpan Etzion which was then located in Baka, Jerusalem. I had the distinction of being a part of the smallest intake that Ulpan Etzion (running since before 1948) had ever taught. The reason was the Al Aqsa Intifada raging all around us. Not many people were inclined to make Aliyah while there were bombings, shootings and a general nightmare going on all around.

Ours wasn't the only trouble going on in the world. I watched the second plane hit the Twin Towers live from the common room on Ulpan and reasoned to myself that I was in precisely the right place, at the right time and by going into the army was doing exactly the right thing (right being a subjective term). Ultimately at that time I had no interest in peace, I wanted war, I wanted to fight! These people who were coming and blowing up buses needed to die and I wanted to be in a unit where I could kill them. This was as far as my politics went.

Once I was in the army and had my first taste of dealing with Palestinians I found myself to be on shaky ground when it came to ideology. I hadn't put much thought into how Palestinians lived or who they were. I tended to talk about Palestinians as "they", lumping them all together in one big group. Once I had met people there and started talking to them, not to mention experienced taking over the homes of people who were not considered to be terrorists in any shape, size or form I took on a more nuanced view of things.

People who were so inexpressive as to use the terms "them", "they" or "The Palestinians" ceased to carry any weight with me in conversations about the conflict. Such was the beginning of my feeling that it was time to get out of the territories.

It was the smallest thing that really made me think that the end to occupation needed to come. While guarding Tapuach junction near Nablus I saw teenagers from nearby settlements waiting for the bus. They were walking around and weaving between the lines of Palestinians waiting to get through the checkpoint as though they didn't exist.There is a feeling of power that comes from being around so many utterly hopeless people, to know that these people are the vanquished and you the vanquisher. It isn't what ensuring our security is all about I didn't want future generations of Israelis to grow up with their regular lives being about moving among Palestinians as though those people were ghosts. It leads to an inability to view these people as real at all, as people who have their own dreams and desires and problems and are just as deserving as anyone else to be able to see their dreams fulfilled.

I found it impossible to find a bridge between the things that I had seen and done and the country that I had known before. I left Israel knowing that I would return but unable to remain until I had found the perspective I needed. The Israel that I had known was utterly moral whereas the Israel I had served wasn't interested in morality but in killing terrorists. If innocent people died in the process (which they certainly did) and if the regular lives of people were wrecked in the process (which they were) then so be it. It took time to adjust to being the one wrecking people's lives and watching the innocent get killed in aid of the greater good.

Eventually, back in London I did find my perspective, came to terms with the fact that Israel isn't the shining light within the world but a regular country with extremely tough problems to deal with. I stopped viewing the Israeli Army as a moral force and started viewing it as an Army and I stopped looking at the Palestinians at all. The clear truth is that I am an Israeli, to that end I want what is best for my people. I believe that leaving the West Bank is in the long term interests of Israel and therefore that's what I want to see. There are some other things that I would like to see too. I would like to see some interest from the PA in having their own state. I would like to see Palestinian activists campaign as hard as Israeli activists for Palestinians to have their own state. The fact that I can't see these things makes me fearful for some kind of settlement between us.

Now, while subject to attack I feel that Palestinians need to have their own country more than ever and I feel that they are further than ever from having one. Ruled over by one government that can't stop trying to kill Israeli civilians and another who isn't angered enough by Israeli human rights infringements to take every measure possible to remove an Israeli presence from the West Bank it appears as though the status-quo is set to continue indefinitely. Naturally the biggest losers will be the Israelis and Palestinians caught in the crossfire. Were does this leave my political opinion?

Absolutely no idea!

ELAD'S WORDS:

Marc what you don't understand is the fact the "The Palestinians" excuse me, the Palestinians leaders, don't want a country they want us not to be here. They shout this from every possible mode of propaganda open to them, they are telling everyone that this is what they want no one is listening. We are taking steps such as freeing prisoners who murdered and killed Israelis to take steps forward and what are they doing? Nothing, they aren't taking steps to normalise the situation between us and if they really wanted a state there would actually be one in existence for years already.

I ask you, do you think that we enjoy being occupiers? Do you think that if the Palestinians wanted this situation to end it would continue?

We pay for the occupation of Palestinians lands all the time with money, with lives. What should be is that we both have our countries but it can't be that way...they don't believe in it they want everything and they'll be left with nothing.

Miluim

I have a short M16, a Belgian made FN Mag machine gun and a radio with which to prevent any incursions into Israel, large or small. I am living in a bunker that can best be described as a mixture between something out of WW1 and Doctor Who. Trenches and steel are built into the side of this mountain to keep me safe from a bombardment that is unlikely to occur anytime soon.

I have a panoramic view down at both Israel and Syria. On the right is the Druze village of Majdal Shams, on the left is some dead ground rising into a small hill upon which sits a UN outpost, further to the East is a small Syrian Army post where they are doubtless watching me watching them. I can see far to the East, deep into Syria from my position, the nearest Syrian village is Hudder and there are many more moving off into the distance. To distinguish where the border is all I have to do is watch for where fertile green turns to arid brown and I know that I am looking at the fault line between our two countries.

Occasionally I can see through my night vision bursts of gunfire as Syrian kills Syrian far away from their once war torn border with Israel.

Things are tense here, despite my low expectations of combat. My weapon remains constantly loaded and ready to fire, a tunnel network that would make any decent Viet Cong go green with envy ensures ease of movement and the static of multiple radios keeps me company during the lonely shifts that I spend sitting here watching for infiltrators or whatever it is that I am looking for. Code names like Indigo and Sunrise get thrown around on high power radio sets that link together to form a lattice work of defensive border emplacements.

I am standing in perhaps the most expensive real estate in Israel in a fortress that was built by Israel after the capture of the mountain in 1967, then taken back by the Syrians in 1973 during a helicopter assault and then retaken by the Golani in 1973 after they crawled up the mountain in silence to surprise the Syrians. 

I often find myself daydreaming about the what it must have felt like to be sitting in this spot almost exactly 40 years ago and see thousands of tanks and tens of thousands of soldiers on their way to kill me with artillery falling all around. Such thoughts make me grip my rifle that much tighter despite the ineffectiveness the weapon would have against such a horde.

Someone sitting in my spot last year gawped as he witnessed 90 buses pull up opposite Majdal Shams and disgorge thousands of people who promptly made for Israel. They formed columns as they moved so that the front person would be the only one to be blown up when they trod on a mine and all those behind could keep moving towards the Zionist entity. At some point snipers opened fire and people started dying, that ended the story pretty quickly.

I can see the new fortifications that have been built to prevent a repeat performance and I have ample to time to wonder whether or not they’ll work.

It has been a mere week since I threw a few uniforms and my Old Spice “Scent of Courage” shower gel into a bag and took the bus North but a feels like a lot longer. The army is an all consuming force that makes me feel both comfortable and secure in its embrace and utterly trapped within it at the same time. I’m here with many of my friends from my regular service and a bunch more that I have met since. We swap stories from our old army service and regular life. I look at Yehuda’s amazing comic book art and pictures of Glick’s kids. Natanel fills me in on his studies for the Bar exam and Elad is on the end of the phone every day telling me that yes he is coming but no not today.

The smell of mould permeates my concrete enclosure, particularly around the bathroom area and the occasional mouse scuttles around our makeshift kitchen. There is a huge, industrial hob with 4 surfaces for cooking although only one of them can be used at a time since using more kills the electricity.

They have set us up with YES television and I fall back into my old army routine of finding sleep of paramount importance and scoffing at the idea of a shower a day and brushing my teeth when I wake up and when I go to sleep. The shower is a tap set high up on the wall for if the army made shower heads then…well…there would be some on their showers, alas the army does not make shower heads therefore a high up tap will suffice and suffice it does, for this is the army not holiday.

These are the 30 days a year for which I cease to be Marc Goldberg and become 5489872 First Sergeant. I’m here with people of all different backgrounds and political opinions and for perhaps the only time in the year politics becomes the most boring conversation going as we all simply agree with each other and then go and vote our respective ways regardless.

This is the month a year where I discard my personal politics  and say just maybe those generals and politicians that I love criticising so much really do know what they're talking about. My country has called upon me to stand on the line to defend it, how can I say no?