Sometimes she uses a Jewish name, sometimes a Muslim one, sometimes she uses a Hebrew name, sometimes an Arabic one. But with her many names, none can be published here for fear she will be recognized and targeted. For purposes of this article she will be referred to as Private A. She sometimes feels safest when she has no name at all.
Last Friday A returned home for the first time since beginning IDF basic training at the Nitzanim base. After missing her ride home, she waited until someone leaving the base could take her part of the way. Finally a religious Jewish family leaving the base after visiting their son who is also doing his basic training there offered her a ride.
It’s not easy being a soldier living in the thin line between Judaism and Islam. While getting into the car she explains to the passengers that there is an article being written about her because she is half Muslim and half Jewish, and she immediately gets grilled with countless questions. 'Why did you join the army?' 'Where is your father?' 'How will you get home?' 'What does your mother think?' To some of the questions she simply answers 'I don’t know.'
The questions don’t bother her. The more people know about her, the more comfortable she feels around them. Suddenly she stops and asks a question of her own. 'They told us about our company yesterday, the Nachshon company, which is named after Nachshon who was the first to enter the Red Sea when everyone else was afraid, and the water reached up to here,' she demonstrates to the amused passengers by putting a hand under her eyes. 'Is that story true?'
'You shouldn't ask people like us if it really happened,' the driver answers. 'The question isn’t whether or not it really happened. The important part of the story is the idea behind it; the act that Nachshon chose to do symbolizes something.' His wife adds, 'That’s where the word 'Nachshoniyut', for an original and brave act, comes from. It is someone original and brave. Like you.'
They called and said I was going to be drafted
A was raised as a Muslim in every sense of the word. Her family arrived to Israel from Iraq when she was four years old, after both of her parents converted to Judaism in order to move to Israel where her father had Jewish relatives. For two years they lived in a Jewish neighborhood, and changed their names to sound like Hebrew ones. Everything went smoothly until A was six years old, when her father divorced her mother and disappeared. A’s mother remained alone with her daughter, married a Muslim man and moved to an Arab city in northern Israel where she would later give birth to three more daughters.
At the age of 16, her life turned upside down. One day she returned home to find a notice of IDF induction waiting for her in the mail. It is known that Arab citizens are exempt from IDF service but A is listed in the Ministry of the Interior as a Jewish girl born to Jewish parents even though she lives in a Muslim home.
Today she says that she doesn’t identify herself with any religion or nation. In the religious Muslim home where she grew up she stands out. Her girlfriend who has already completed her military service is sitting on her bed, but A's mother, sitting on the other side of the wall, doesn’t know about her daughter’s sexual orientation. 'Maybe she suspects something,' says A. In the army, she doesn’t care who knows. She shares a room with her three little sisters, who suddenly burst into the room giggling. She speaks to them in Arabic, they leave with a slam of the door, and she returns to answering questions in her flawless Hebrew.
She says she was the only one from her class, and perhaps from her entire school, who received an IDF induction notice. 'I was terrified,' she admits. 'I didn’t want to enlist. I also didn’t know anyone who had been in the army who could explain to me what the IDF really was and what I should do.' She asked her Jewish cousin who lives in a Jewish city for advice, and was told that she should declare to the army that she is religious, in order to be exempt from serving. In an act that in retrospect seems almost comical, but was at the time the source of much anxiety, A arrived at the induction center dressed as a religious Jewish woman.
'I came dressed up in a skirt,' she remembers. 'I said I was a good girl becoming religious. I have no idea what I was thinking, I just did it. I was told if I pretended to be religious it would work, and I just didn’t want to enlist.'
She waited in line with other girls, some of them religious, and others also pretending to be, in order to avoid enlistment. 'There was another girl there pretending, but she was Jewish and really in the process of becoming more religious. She went in before me and came out in tears. I didn’t know what to do. I asked her, ‘What happened? Are you alright?’ and I hugged her. It completely scared me, but then it was my turn and I went in. I told them I was becoming more religious, that I feel closer to God.'
The committee wasn’t impressed. She was sent to another committee and was then sent home.
'They didn’t tell me if I passed or not. A month later they called from the enlistment center and said I was being drafted.'
I feel both sides. I am both sides.
After her girlfriend gave her a special bag for being drafted, a kid from her neighborhood asked if she was going to the army. 'I said ‘Of course not, this bag is for a trip’. I have no idea how he knew it was a soldier’s bag.'
The kid’s question bothered her, but she was already used to hiding the truth from him and from others. 'I learned Hebrew before I learned Arabic,' she says. 'At the age of four when I was in a Jewish pre-school, I used to say that when I grew up I would be a soldier…Then I came here and I saw how the Arabs live. I experienced both sides. People always think they see both sides, but they don’t feel both sides. I feel them both, I am both.'
If A didn’t want to join the army, it would have been easy for her to be exempt. At the time, she didn’t know who to turn to. But during the year spent in job placement interviews in the enlistment center, something inside of her changed. She realized she wanted to experience something new, and her relationship with her partner in Tel Aviv taught her that a better life was waiting for her outside of her house.
'The army is my chance to get out of here and to live my life,' she says. She still worries about how she will cope during her service. 'After all, my mom has no one else but me. I support her emotionally and now I’m not here for her.' Meanwhile, A will avoid coming home wearing her uniform out of fear for her safety and that of her family.
I Don’t Care If They Know
On the morning of her enlistment, A went to the enlistment center accompanied by her mother. 'She told me that she wasn’t going to come' A laughs. 'She thought that if she told me that she wasn’t going to come, I wouldn’t go either. But she knows that if I decide to do something, I will do it. I planned on coming alone, but then in the morning my mom woke up earlier than me at 4:30AM, prayed, and began organizing my bag.'
They sat among the other families and waited for A’s name to be called. A described how she began removing her jewelry in preparation for wearing the uniform. 'I was about to take off the necklace with my name, and my mom looked at me and said, 'Don’t you dare'.
A few minutes later, A’s name was called. Not her Arabic name which is on the necklace, but her Jewish first name and Arabic last name. Although the combination of names may seem strange, no one in the enlistment center seemed to pay any attention.
When she arrived to the Nitzanim base, there was a basic training opening ceremony. 'There were Israeli flags, and everyone sang the Israeli National Anthem.' She says, 'I don’t know most of the words. I don’t think anyone noticed, even though I was standing in front of the Platoon Commander.' She explains that she doesn’t mind being different. She doesn’t care if people know she’s a lesbian, or that she’s Arab. 'But at that moment, during the ceremony, I wanted to cry. I have no idea why.'
From the moment she put on her uniform, the golden necklace with her name on it has disappeared to be replaced by a dog tag. The food is ok, the commanders are a bit bossy, but she says that she’s getting along well and is always laughing with everyone. It was hard for the commanders and the other soldiers to say her name, so they created nicknames. However, she insists that people call her by the name which cannot be printed here.
Towards the end of basic training, the trainees began preparing for their swearing-in ceremony. 'The commander said we would all have to choose what to swear on: the Torah, the New Testament or the Koran. I told her that I didn’t want to choose, that I believe in God and that all religions are equal in my eyes.' A laughs, remembering how she could not decide and so she and her commander did 'ini-mini-mieni-mo' together." (source)
