Dreams are meant to come true - The Beginning
28th June, 2004
I'm in the middle of my guarding duty in a watchtower located in northern Telem - a settlement in the West Bank, near Hebron. I'm spending my time thinking about my angel and about our upcoming week together, how to convince her mom to let her daughter go?
(I've been planning to finally meet Angel, after a year and a half of having internet relations, sms exchanging and rare phone calling... soon I will have a regila - a week long vacation during which I hope she'll be able to come. Because she's 17 years old, she has to get her mother's approval, which is currently the main problem because her mom won't let her daughter go to a foreign country alone, to a dangerous place to meet a 18 year old stranger who can be deceiving her on the Internet. It's a reasonable decision, any sane mom would do the same in her place.)
I don't want Angel to choose between me and her mom, or more precisely, to choose me and disappoint her mom. The runaway option (runaway from the army to Germany), although being a true alternative, has never been the primary solution and is definitely does not offer positive outcomes. I have 17 more days before I come home again - over 150 hours of guarding and planning.
While in the army, especially while on duty, I can't set my mind off my Angel. It is obvious that while the army causes depression and sadness within me, thoughts of my Angel bring back happiness, hope and ambition. In some cases, it feels like thinking of heaven while being in hell. In other cases though, when the air is clear and a breeze blows into your face, when a beautiful view opens up in front of you, you feel like you're in heaven... a heaven that lacks 2 of its most essential features: Angel's presence, and freedom. Without them, it's just an illusion, or perhaps - a vision, giving you the idea and the feeling of what's it going to be like, after the military service.
I came home on Thursday at 5:30pm and came back to the army on Saturday night. After 18.5 days I'll come home again... At home, I mostly watch movies with my mom and play PC games, surfing the Internet and chatting with my great girlfriend as often and as much as it is possible. It's incredibly great to be at home and incredibly sad whenever a thought crosses your mind: "soon I'll have to go back to the army and not see home for a looong time". At least that way you really learn to appreciate what you have, value your home and your freedom.
I'd write and fill the whole diary with praises to Angel, saying for billions of times over and over again how much I love her, but words would never be able to describe the strength of my love to her.
Tonight my mom called me and told me some good news: A high ranked officer who is a friend of hers had said that any soldier who served over a year in the army can fly abroad during his regila. "If anyone gives you trouble with that, go to the City's Officer." (It's a military office for soldiers to complain to while on vacation. Usually soldiers go there to fake illnesses and get extra vacation days.) :) Hopefully...
3 more days and I'll be able to receive e-mails from Angel. Her mom doesn't allow her to SMS anymore due to high phone bills. -.- I want to try the mobile phone's chat service and chat with her, depending on the price.
Saturday, June 10, 2006
Friday, June 09, 2006
Prologue - A short biographical background
I was born in former USSR in 1985. In January 1991, after the collapse of the Soviet Union (its borders became open for immigration) my whole family moved to Israel.
I grew up in a small town located in the southern part of Israel. After 10 years (Dec 2000), following my parents' divorce, I moved with my mom and my brother to Tel-Aviv, where I graduated in 2003.
The same year, just 2 weeks after I turned 18, I was drafted into the military service.
I maintained an online contact with a girl (we'll refer to her here as "Angel") from Germany. Throughout the year, despite the distance, our relationship had suddenly become serious and thus we decided that no matter what, we'll meet each other and be together. (What may seem to many as a pointless and impossible relationship would later prove to be a romantic love story with a lesson for all.)
The army soon became an obstacle. I hoped to either skip the military service, hoping to meet her earlier (skipping the army would have cost me a month or two in a military jail, which isn't suitable to me at all, besides Angel was against it, she didn't want me sitting in jail) but then decided against it.
If not skipping the army, then at least serving where I wouldn't regret spending 3 years of my life... That would be... computers... something with computers. Unfortunately (or perhaps eventually fortunately), my request was rejected. The army saw me fit to serve as a combat soldier in an Artillery battalion. At first I refused as I was told by my friends that stubbornness on the drafting day can eventually get me to where I desire to be, but after a day in a detention cell (a punishment for refusing a command to draft to the Artillery training base) I changed my mind and obeyed.
The basic training ("Tironut") was really hard for me. It was still a period when soldiers in "Shivta" (the name of the training base) had to carry Galil weapons - long and heavy pieces of iron assault rifles. After 2 months of basic training I gave up on trying to actively drop out of the training as a combat soldier, but continued to hope that my fate would eventually get me where I want.
I feared serving in the territories. Long before the army, I had a terrible nightmare of me parting with all my relatives and going to the army to never come back again. For some reason I feared this nightmare as if it were some kind of a prophecy. Since then I decided to avoid the army at all costs... but here I am, serving as a combat soldier in the territories...
It seems that the army knows better than us where it's most suitable for us to serve. Looking back, I don't regret having served in an Artillery battery, as both an Artillery soldier and a standard infantry soldier in the territories. I've served in all parts of Israel, on all borders - Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. I've learned a lot from my experience and the experience of other soldiers, I've visited many new places in Israel where I have never been, where I would have never visited, I've met a lot of good people (and bad people as well) and despite all the difficulties of being a combat soldier, despite missing home for weeks, I am proud I have gone through it like a man.
Let me conclude the prologue...
August 2003 - 4 months of basic training in the Negev desert
December 2003 - Advanced Artillery training in the Golan Heights
January 2004 - Hermesh settlement protection & motorized patrols in the region (Near Jenin)
End of January - 2 months of protecting the Maccabim area (The town of Maccabim-Reut, route 443, Beit Sira and Beit Likya)
March 2004 - Joined the A battery as a fresh soldier. (After 8 months, you either join a battery of "senior soldiers" or take a commander's course of 4 months, after which you become an Artillery team commander. I didn't want no responsibility for the lives and fates of other people and decided to try joining the A battery. A battery consists of mostly nice and shy soldiers. B battery consists mostly of hooligans and troublemakers)
In the A battery I served in the area of Rantis. (near the town of Halamish, village of Budrus, during the fence construction there)
April 2004 - Took a 40-day commander's course with infantry soldiers (It's a different course which gives you the skills but in the Artillery corps, it's worth nothing... They hoped I would continue and take an officer's course, I passed the exams but refused, it wasn't obligatory. I didn't want to become an officer because officers have to serve at least 4 years... 3 years was long enough for me)
June 2004 - I got back to the battery as a regular soldier and after an Artillery training in the north, we were assigned near Hebron. (Hebron, Halhoul, the settlements of Telem and Adora) That's where I started writing the diary...
My next post begins with my first diary entry as a combat soldier in the area of Hebron. My experiences, my personal life, the way Palestinians live and the way the soldiers live and the consequences of the siege that was laid on Hebron when a suicide bomber from Hebron exploded in the southern city of Beer Sheva...
I was born in former USSR in 1985. In January 1991, after the collapse of the Soviet Union (its borders became open for immigration) my whole family moved to Israel.
I grew up in a small town located in the southern part of Israel. After 10 years (Dec 2000), following my parents' divorce, I moved with my mom and my brother to Tel-Aviv, where I graduated in 2003.
The same year, just 2 weeks after I turned 18, I was drafted into the military service.
I maintained an online contact with a girl (we'll refer to her here as "Angel") from Germany. Throughout the year, despite the distance, our relationship had suddenly become serious and thus we decided that no matter what, we'll meet each other and be together. (What may seem to many as a pointless and impossible relationship would later prove to be a romantic love story with a lesson for all.)
The army soon became an obstacle. I hoped to either skip the military service, hoping to meet her earlier (skipping the army would have cost me a month or two in a military jail, which isn't suitable to me at all, besides Angel was against it, she didn't want me sitting in jail) but then decided against it.
If not skipping the army, then at least serving where I wouldn't regret spending 3 years of my life... That would be... computers... something with computers. Unfortunately (or perhaps eventually fortunately), my request was rejected. The army saw me fit to serve as a combat soldier in an Artillery battalion. At first I refused as I was told by my friends that stubbornness on the drafting day can eventually get me to where I desire to be, but after a day in a detention cell (a punishment for refusing a command to draft to the Artillery training base) I changed my mind and obeyed.
The basic training ("Tironut") was really hard for me. It was still a period when soldiers in "Shivta" (the name of the training base) had to carry Galil weapons - long and heavy pieces of iron assault rifles. After 2 months of basic training I gave up on trying to actively drop out of the training as a combat soldier, but continued to hope that my fate would eventually get me where I want.
I feared serving in the territories. Long before the army, I had a terrible nightmare of me parting with all my relatives and going to the army to never come back again. For some reason I feared this nightmare as if it were some kind of a prophecy. Since then I decided to avoid the army at all costs... but here I am, serving as a combat soldier in the territories...
It seems that the army knows better than us where it's most suitable for us to serve. Looking back, I don't regret having served in an Artillery battery, as both an Artillery soldier and a standard infantry soldier in the territories. I've served in all parts of Israel, on all borders - Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. I've learned a lot from my experience and the experience of other soldiers, I've visited many new places in Israel where I have never been, where I would have never visited, I've met a lot of good people (and bad people as well) and despite all the difficulties of being a combat soldier, despite missing home for weeks, I am proud I have gone through it like a man.
Let me conclude the prologue...
August 2003 - 4 months of basic training in the Negev desert
December 2003 - Advanced Artillery training in the Golan Heights
January 2004 - Hermesh settlement protection & motorized patrols in the region (Near Jenin)
End of January - 2 months of protecting the Maccabim area (The town of Maccabim-Reut, route 443, Beit Sira and Beit Likya)
March 2004 - Joined the A battery as a fresh soldier. (After 8 months, you either join a battery of "senior soldiers" or take a commander's course of 4 months, after which you become an Artillery team commander. I didn't want no responsibility for the lives and fates of other people and decided to try joining the A battery. A battery consists of mostly nice and shy soldiers. B battery consists mostly of hooligans and troublemakers)
In the A battery I served in the area of Rantis. (near the town of Halamish, village of Budrus, during the fence construction there)
April 2004 - Took a 40-day commander's course with infantry soldiers (It's a different course which gives you the skills but in the Artillery corps, it's worth nothing... They hoped I would continue and take an officer's course, I passed the exams but refused, it wasn't obligatory. I didn't want to become an officer because officers have to serve at least 4 years... 3 years was long enough for me)
June 2004 - I got back to the battery as a regular soldier and after an Artillery training in the north, we were assigned near Hebron. (Hebron, Halhoul, the settlements of Telem and Adora) That's where I started writing the diary...
My next post begins with my first diary entry as a combat soldier in the area of Hebron. My experiences, my personal life, the way Palestinians live and the way the soldiers live and the consequences of the siege that was laid on Hebron when a suicide bomber from Hebron exploded in the southern city of Beer Sheva...
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