The repercussions of what the Israeli newspaper “Haaretz” revealed about the “internal hell” faced by Israeli soldiers returning from Gaza continue to provoke widespread reactions among the Israeli public and followers.
Haaretz had highlighted, through an extensive investigation, stories and testimonies that revealed outright crimes committed by these people, which haunt them today in the form of nightmares, the result of what some of them say is a reawakening of conscience.
Karim Jubran, spokesman for the Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem, which opposes the occupation, told Al-Quds Al-Arabi, commenting on what Haaretz revealed, that “reports about moral and conscientious injuries among some Israeli soldiers cannot be dealt with in isolation from the broader context.”
He emphasizes that “the issue is not about isolated individual cases, but raises a deeper question about the position of Israeli society itself: to what extent does it reflect or ignore this moral wound?”
B’Tselem’s spokesperson told Al-Quds Al-Arabi: “The issue is not about isolated individual cases, but rather to what extent Israeli society ignores this moral wound?”
He believes that “any professional investigation must go beyond the individual dimension, to examine the social structure that coexists with the scenes of mass killing and ongoing genocide in the Gaza Strip for more than two years, without this appearing as a general moral crisis. This absence or marginalization of the human dimension constitutes in itself a fundamental axis for understanding the scene.”
Returning to the Haaretz investigation, titled “Wounded Morally,” it presents confessions from soldiers about crimes they committed against Palestinian civilians, revealing the nightmares that now haunt them after a “moral awakening.” Following the publication of these confessions from several occupation soldiers, experts confirm to Haaretz that the scope of this phenomenon is steadily increasing.
Haaretz offers examples of soldiers grappling with inner turmoil, describing the experience of soldier Yuval, who sat huddled in on himself, biting his nails, his legs trembling with anxiety, his face etched with worry, glancing nervously left and right. This was midday in the heart of Tel Aviv, on a bustling street. He looked at them, scrutinizing passersby with apprehension and panic. Sometimes he quickly checked that there was no danger, other times he lingered. "I'm sorry," he said apologetically. "My greatest fear is blood feuds."
Israeli soldier Yuval: “I fired like a madman, just as I learned in platoon training. When we reached the target, I saw that they were not terrorists. It was an old man with three children, maybe boys. None of them were armed.”
The newspaper explains that “Yuval,” a pseudonym like the others in the report, is a programmer who was not born into a criminal family and is not a criminal himself. Until recently, he worked for one of the world’s largest high-tech companies, but he was absent for months. He says today, “I was in hell, but I didn’t realize it at the time.”
Haaretz notes that the hell he's describing was in Khan Younis in December 2023, when the apocalypse around him was still unfolding. He recalls it now: “There were airstrikes all the time, bombs weighing a ton falling close by and making your heart leap.” He adds: “We advanced westward toward the city center. The fighting was fierce, clashes on every corner. It was automatic, it didn't ask questions.”
Haaretz reports that just months later, those questions began to surface and haunt him: “I don’t have good answers, I don’t have any answers at all. What I did is unforgivable. There is no atonement for it.”
Crime near Salah al-Din Road
Regarding Yuval's crimes, Haaretz reports that the incident occurred near Salah al-Din Street. A unit spotted suspicious figures via drone, and Yuval's force rushed in to attack. He says, "I fired like a madman, just as I learned in unit training. When we reached the target, I saw that they weren't terrorists. It was an elderly man with three children, probably boys. None of them were armed. But their bodies were riddled with bullets, their internal organs spilling out. I'd never seen anything like it up close. I remember there was complete silence; nobody said a word. Then the battalion commander arrived with his men, and one of them spat on the bodies and shouted, 'This is what happens to those who mess with Israel, you sons of bitches!' I was in shock, but I kept quiet because I'm a nobody, just a pathetic coward."
He is contemplating suicide
Regarding the attacks he experiences today, Yuval says: “I have removed the mirrors from the house, and I cannot look at myself. I am not committing suicide just because I promised my mother, but I do not know how long I can hold out.”
Haaretz reveals that three months later, Yuval was discharged from the army. He went on a two-week leave and then returned to his job. He recalls, “They threw me a party when I came back, applauded me, and called me a hero. But I felt like a monster, and I couldn’t stand the words they said to me. I felt they didn’t understand that I wasn’t a good person, quite the opposite.”
The newspaper reports that for months he tried to cling to his job and escape the weight on his heart, but he eventually gave in. Since then, the shame that haunts him has intensified. He says, “I try not to leave the house, and if I do, I wear a hoodie so no one recognizes me. I even got rid of the mirrors; I can’t bear to see myself. I have a deep fear that someone will take revenge on me for what I did, even though I know it’s impossible. Who in Gaza could find me? Who even knows me? Maybe somewhere I want to die; I want to end this.” Two days after his interview with Haaretz, he was admitted to a psychiatric ward.
Israeli soldier Yuval: “I removed the mirrors from the house, and I can’t look at myself. I’m not committing suicide just because I promised my mother, but I don’t know how long I can hold out.”
A tsunami of testimonies
Over the past year, Haaretz published several testimonies from soldiers who fought in the Gaza Strip and suffer from “moral injuries.” These include a sniper who shot at civilians seeking aid and now speaks of severe nightmares, and drone operators responsible for killing innocent people who testified to having scars that refuse to heal.
The Hebrew newspaper reveals that what began as a few testimonies has turned into a veritable tsunami in recent months. It reports that mental health experts are describing a disturbing and widespread phenomenon occurring far from the public eye.
Haaretz quotes Professor Gil Zaltzman, head of the National Council for Suicide Prevention, as saying: “We are seeing moral injuries on a much larger scale than we have seen before. We see them in trauma clinics and in private clinics. We even see them among the children of reserve soldiers who have heard stories and are worried about what their parents have done. It has reached the second circle.”
The newspaper explains that the Israeli army and the state do not provide official figures on the phenomenon, but, according to Zaltzman, there has been an increase in the number of people seeking treatment for moral injuries since the ceasefire in October.
The newspaper points out that, despite the overlap and similarity, some of these soldiers were diagnosed as suffering from “post-traumatic stress disorder,” although this is a fundamentally different condition from cases of “crisis of conscience” or “moral crisis.”
Israeli soldier “Maya”: “The Palestinian was sitting in a cage, handcuffed and blindfolded, freezing from the cold. Suddenly, one of the soldiers started urinating on him while saying: This is for the Be’eri settlement, you dog… this is for the party, and everyone didn’t stop laughing. Maybe I laughed too.”
Confessions of a female soldier
As for the soldier “Maya”, she says in this regard: “The Palestinian was sitting in a cage, handcuffed and blindfolded, freezing from the cold. Suddenly, one of the soldiers started urinating on him while saying: This is for the settlement of Be’eri, you dog.. This is for the party, and everyone didn’t stop laughing. Maybe I laughed too.”
In the Haaretz report, Professor Yossi Levy-Pelz, head of the Suicide and Psychological Pain Research Center at the University of Haifa, explains: “Post-traumatic stress disorder is a fear-based response resulting from exposure to a traumatic event that poses a real danger to the person or those around them. Moral injury, on the other hand, stems from exposure to events perceived as a profound violation of basic moral values, of oneself or others, and is mainly accompanied by feelings of guilt, shame, anger, disgust, self-alienation, loss of confidence, shattered identity, and a sense of broken humanity.”
Levi-Bells adds that timing is also important: “After the war ends, the fighter returns home, and suddenly the world seems more complicated to him. The black-and-white divide breaks down, and he can look back and understand that things happened there that contradict what he believes in.”
Two separate worlds
According to Haaretz, Maya lives in central Tel Aviv, studies philosophy, and is interested in the writings of Michel Foucault. But during the war, she did something completely different, spending hundreds of days serving as a personnel officer in an armored battalion.
She says: “There is no connection between my daily life and the service I performed. They are two different worlds with different people. The truth is that I also act and speak differently, it’s like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Throughout the war I witnessed the killing of innocent people, terrible things that if I had read about them in the newspaper I would have screamed in protest, but in the reserves they passed by me as if they were nothing.”
She adds that one incident left a lasting scar on her, and it occurred at a military outpost located between the Netzarim axis and Salah al-Din Road. She says: “I was in the operations room when suddenly the observers spotted five Palestinians crossing the prohibited line towards the northern Gaza Strip. The commander gave the order to eliminate them with gunfire, even though no weapons were seen on them. A tank came out and began firing at them with machine guns. Hundreds of bullets buried them in the sand. Four of them were killed, and one survived.”
She continued: “Hours later, a bulldozer arrived. When I asked why, they replied: ‘So the dogs wouldn’t eat them and spread disease.’ The survivor was placed in a cage at the site to await the Shin Bet interrogator.” That night, no one came. She said: “I stayed at the site, unable to sleep, and I was the only girl there. Suddenly, some soldiers called me, so I went with them toward the cage. The Palestinian was there, handcuffed and blindfolded, and he looked frozen.”
The next day, a Shin Bet investigator came. “He stayed with him for ten minutes and said he was just a young man trying to get home to the north, that he had no connection to Hamas, so they released him. They didn’t even arrest him,” she says. Weeks later, she was discharged, but what she had seen stayed with her. “I felt like a hypocrite, like I was dirty, and I showered three times a day. The sight of his helplessness is still vivid in my mind. How could I have stood there and done nothing? Me, who claims to be moral and volunteers with refugees, how could I have accepted this? I have no answers.”
"It's murder... just murder."
Haaretz confirms that Maya is not alone. It quotes Yehuda, who served at the same location at another time, as saying: “My platoon used Humvees as an intervention force. There was another Humvee driven by an officer with an American title who had served there for many months. He was strange and suspicious. It wasn’t clear whether he had lost his mind in the war or had always been like that, but he did his job and no one questioned him.”
He continues: “One evening, a Palestinian approached the site. We went out in my two Hummers, me driving one and the American driving the other. We reached the Palestinian, and he immediately raised his hand. It was clear he was unarmed. The officer approached him, waited a few seconds, and then simply shot him. Without asking any questions. I was in shock. I went back to the operations room and watched the recording with other officers. One of the senior officers said, ‘This is murder, just murder,’ but they decided to do nothing, swept the matter under the rug, and informed the general that a ‘terrorist’ had been killed. Not even an investigation was opened.”
happened there that contradict what he believes in.”
Two separate worlds
According to Haaretz, Maya lives in central Tel Aviv, studies philosophy, and is interested in the writings of Michel Foucault. But during the war, she did something completely different, spending hundreds of days serving as a personnel officer in an armored battalion.
She says: “There is no connection between my daily life and the service I performed. They are two different worlds with different people. The truth is that I also act and speak differently, it’s like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Throughout the war I witnessed the killing of innocent people, terrible things that if I had read about them in the newspaper I would have screamed in protest, but in the reserves they passed by me as if they were nothing.”
She adds that one incident left a lasting scar on her, and it occurred at a military outpost located between the Netzarim axis and Salah al-Din Road. She says: “I was in the operations room when suddenly the observers spotted five Palestinians crossing the prohibited line towards the northern Gaza Strip. The commander gave the order to eliminate them with gunfire, even though no weapons were seen on them. A tank came out and began firing at them with machine guns. Hundreds of bullets buried them in the sand. Four of them were killed, and one survived.”
She continued: “Hours later, a bulldozer arrived. When I asked why, they replied: ‘So the dogs wouldn’t eat them and spread disease.’ The survivor was placed in a cage at the site to await the Shin Bet interrogator.” That night, no one came. She said: “I stayed at the site, unable to sleep, and I was the only girl there. Suddenly, some soldiers called me, so I went with them toward the cage. The Palestinian was there, handcuffed and blindfolded, and he looked frozen.”
The next day, a Shin Bet investigator came. “He stayed with him for ten minutes and said he was just a young man trying to get home to the north, that he had no connection to Hamas, so they released him. They didn’t even arrest him,” she says. Weeks later, she was discharged, but what she had seen stayed with her. “I felt like a hypocrite, like I was dirty, and I showered three times a day. The sight of his helplessness is still vivid in my mind. How could I have stood there and done nothing? Me, who claims to be moral and volunteers with refugees, how could I have accepted this? I have no answers.”
"It's murder... just murder."
Haaretz confirms that Maya is not alone. It quotes Yehuda, who served at the same location at another time, as saying: “My platoon used Humvees as an intervention force. There was another Humvee driven by an officer with an American title who had served there for many months. He was strange and suspicious. It wasn’t clear whether he had lost his mind in the war or had always been like that, but he did his job and no one questioned him.”
He continues: “One evening, a Palestinian approached the site. We went out in my two Hummers, me driving one and the American driving the other. We reached the Palestinian, and he immediately raised his hand. It was clear he was unarmed. The officer approached him, waited a few seconds, and then simply shot him. Without asking any questions. I was in shock. I went back to the operations room and watched the recording with other officers. One of the senior officers said, ‘This is murder, just murder,’ but they decided to do nothing, swept the matter under the rug, and informed the general that a ‘terrorist’ had been killed. Not even an investigation was opened.”
happened there that contradict what he believes in.”
Two separate worlds
According to Haaretz, Maya lives in central Tel Aviv, studies philosophy, and is interested in the writings of Michel Foucault. But during the war, she did something completely different, spending hundreds of days serving as a personnel officer in an armored battalion.
She says: “There is no connection between my daily life and the service I performed. They are two different worlds with different people. The truth is that I also act and speak differently, it’s like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Throughout the war I witnessed the killing of innocent people, terrible things that if I had read about them in the newspaper I would have screamed in protest, but in the reserves they passed by me as if they were nothing.”
She adds that one incident left a lasting scar on her, and it occurred at a military outpost located between the Netzarim axis and Salah al-Din Road. She says: “I was in the operations room when suddenly the observers spotted five Palestinians crossing the prohibited line towards the northern Gaza Strip. The commander gave the order to eliminate them with gunfire, even though no weapons were seen on them. A tank came out and began firing at them with machine guns. Hundreds of bullets buried them in the sand. Four of them were killed, and one survived.”
She continued: “Hours later, a bulldozer arrived. When I asked why, they replied: ‘So the dogs wouldn’t eat them and spread disease.’ The survivor was placed in a cage at the site to await the Shin Bet interrogator.” That night, no one came. She said: “I stayed at the site, unable to sleep, and I was the only girl there. Suddenly, some soldiers called me, so I went with them toward the cage. The Palestinian was there, handcuffed and blindfolded, and he looked frozen.”
The next day, a Shin Bet investigator came. “He stayed with him for ten minutes and said he was just a young man trying to get home to the north, that he had no connection to Hamas, so they released him. They didn’t even arrest him,” she says. Weeks later, she was discharged, but what she had seen stayed with her. “I felt like a hypocrite, like I was dirty, and I showered three times a day. The sight of his helplessness is still vivid in my mind. How could I have stood there and done nothing? Me, who claims to be moral and volunteers with refugees, how could I have accepted this? I have no answers.”
"It's murder... just murder."
Haaretz confirms that Maya is not alone. It quotes Yehuda, who served at the same location at another time, as saying: “My platoon used Humvees as an intervention force. There was another Humvee driven by an officer with an American title who had served there for many months. He was strange and suspicious. It wasn’t clear whether he had lost his mind in the war or had always been like that, but he did his job and no one questioned him.”
He continues: “One evening, a Palestinian approached the site. We went out in my two Hummers, me driving one and the American driving the other. We reached the Palestinian, and he immediately raised his hand. It was clear he was unarmed. The officer approached him, waited a few seconds, and then simply shot him. Without asking any questions. I was in shock. I went back to the operations room and watched the recording with other officers. One of the senior officers said, ‘This is murder, just murder,’ but they decided to do nothing, swept the matter under the rug, and informed the general that a ‘terrorist’ had been killed. Not even an investigation was opened.”
happened there that contradict what he believes in.”
Two separate worlds
According to Haaretz, Maya lives in central Tel Aviv, studies philosophy, and is interested in the writings of Michel Foucault. But during the war, she did something completely different, spending hundreds of days serving as a personnel officer in an armored battalion.
She says: “There is no connection between my daily life and the service I performed. They are two different worlds with different people. The truth is that I also act and speak differently, it’s like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Throughout the war I witnessed the killing of innocent people, terrible things that if I had read about them in the newspaper I would have screamed in protest, but in the reserves they passed by me as if they were nothing.”
She adds that one incident left a lasting scar on her, and it occurred at a military outpost located between the Netzarim axis and Salah al-Din Road. She says: “I was in the operations room when suddenly the observers spotted five Palestinians crossing the prohibited line towards the northern Gaza Strip. The commander gave the order to eliminate them with gunfire, even though no weapons were seen on them. A tank came out and began firing at them with machine guns. Hundreds of bullets buried them in the sand. Four of them were killed, and one survived.”
She continued: “Hours later, a bulldozer arrived. When I asked why, they replied: ‘So the dogs wouldn’t eat them and spread disease.’ The survivor was placed in a cage at the site to await the Shin Bet interrogator.” That night, no one came. She said: “I stayed at the site, unable to sleep, and I was the only girl there. Suddenly, some soldiers called me, so I went with them toward the cage. The Palestinian was there, handcuffed and blindfolded, and he looked frozen.”
The next day, a Shin Bet investigator came. “He stayed with him for ten minutes and said he was just a young man trying to get home to the north, that he had no connection to Hamas, so they released him. They didn’t even arrest him,” she says. Weeks later, she was discharged, but what she had seen stayed with her. “I felt like a hypocrite, like I was dirty, and I showered three times a day. The sight of his helplessness is still vivid in my mind. How could I have stood there and done nothing? Me, who claims to be moral and volunteers with refugees, how could I have accepted this? I have no answers.”
"It's murder... just murder."
Haaretz confirms that Maya is not alone. It quotes Yehuda, who served at the same location at another time, as saying: “My platoon used Humvees as an intervention force. There was another Humvee driven by an officer with an American title who had served there for many months. He was strange and suspicious. It wasn’t clear whether he had lost his mind in the war or had always been like that, but he did his job and no one questioned him.”
He continues: “One evening, a Palestinian approached the site. We went out in my two Hummers, me driving one and the American driving the other. We reached the Palestinian, and he immediately raised his hand. It was clear he was unarmed. The officer approached him, waited a few seconds, and then simply shot him. Without asking any questions. I was in shock. I went back to the operations room and watched the recording with other officers. One of the senior officers said, ‘This is murder, just murder,’ but they decided to do nothing, swept the matter under the rug, and informed the general that a ‘terrorist’ had been killed. Not even an investigation was opened.”
