Mattan here. I refused in 2017 to serve the Israeli army and was imprisoned for 110 days. Today, I work for Refuser Solidarity Network. With your help, in the last two years, we were able to support the biggest wave of soldiers' refusal since 1948 — a refusal wave that helped end the massacre in Gaza, at least for now. We must leverage this turning point to end the occupation of the Palestinian people. Now is the time: We now need your help to build the anti-occupation movement. Any gift can help, and as little as $10 can provide crucial training for one activist.
I would like to tell you about our work to create a support infrastructure for anti-occupation and war resistance. We were able to grow and develop effective Israeli resistance initiatives that helped to push for a ceasefire. We are now in a critical moment where we can use the ceasefire to bring the occupation closer to an end. We need your help to do it by providing training for activists.
Immediately after October 7th, we tried to encourage the Israeli anti-occupation movement to resist the predictable invasion of Gaza, but we did not succeed. The movement was in shock and mourning members who were murdered that day. It caught us all unprepared and unready. This experience sent us on a mission to understand how we can support the movement to respond faster, be more adaptable and have the power not to stop war after it happens but prevent it. We discovered that many successful movements around the world were supported by organisations that provide infrastructure to support, mentor and train activists and new initiatives. We started to develop this infrastructure.
What we do is like a desert greenhouse for cultivating organized anti-occupation resistance, especially focusing on refusal. Its goal: to transform individual grassroots initiatives into a coordinated anti-war movement from within. It provides the support system that new initiatives need to emerge, mentorship to advise and guidance and training to provide knowledge and skills to activists.
We are one of the leading forces of the growing Israeli resistance against the genocide and one of the forces that helped to force a ceasefire. We supported and provided mentorships to initiatives and activists who protest and execute direct action that interfere with the genocidal machine. The most successful, and it is our speciality, was the reservist’s refusal wave which started and was supported by us. I will discuss it further in the next newsletter.
Until today, we have mostly focused on developing and supporting new resistance initiatives. Now we are starting to provide training for activists. Activism is not random actions and hoping for good, but calculated strategic action plans to undermine the power of the regime. We provide activists the knowledge and tools that they need to take action to break the foundation of the Israeli occupation. Training also helps to bring new people and power into movements; this is why training is so urgent to the movement now. With the ceasefire agreement, the movement entered a new phase. The movement has here the opportunity to use the momentum to keep the ceasefire and push for the end of the occupation. We need to create new initiatives that fit the phase and bring new activists from the hostage protests to the anti-occupation movement. That is what training can do, bring new people and create new initiatives.
In order to do that, we need your help. With our $50,000 goal, we will be able to strengthen the anti-occupation movement by training activists. Your gift, even the smallest amount, can make a difference. We do not have millionaires who support us, but normal people, like you, who want peace and justice from the river to the sea. Support the Israeli resistance today to bring the occupation one step closer to an end.