'Nobody's born a soldier': The Israeli teens who say the draft is a choice

They are not persuaded by arguments of peace through violence. What's the point of being punk if you're going to bend and serve?

Haaretz
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'Nobody's born a soldier': The Israeli teens who say the draft is a choice

Nobody's asking them, but they're saying No: From left, Bar Zvirin, Noor Epstein and Anton Zohar Lifsches Segal Credit: Itay Ron

They are not persuaded by arguments of peace through violence. What's the point of being punk if you're going to bend and serve?

05:51 AM • June 19 2026 IDT

On the balcony of the Left Bank, a radical leftist space in central Tel Aviv, a group of five teens roll cigarettes and compare their latest literary hauls. One exclaims that they picked up Kristen Ghodsee's "Why Women Have Better Sex Under Socialism"; another reads the group a passage of self-indulgent prose by David Foster Wallace. On the whiteboard of the room behind them – covered in Marxist and leftist posters, and furnished with chairs and sofas with shredded upholstery – are the remnants of an Arabic lesson.

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