"They Let Me Feel Like I Was Not So Different": Lesbian Soldiers in the Idf During the 70s and the 80s

• In Event: Queering Jewish and Israeli Identities

Abstract

Service in the Israel Defense Force (IDF) is perceived by the Jewish-Israeli society as a "rite of passage". It is a significant stage in entering adulthood and citizenhood in the life of the majority population. However, the "Melting pot" considered as shaped within the IDF is composed of many minorities, each having complex relations with the organization and the narratives it represents. This paper wishes to focus on one – Jewish lesbian soldiers who served in the IDF during the 70s and the 80s of the last century.
Using methods of Oral History, this paper will ask what place the IDF's 'role' as a rite of passage to society had in two main issues: First, the ways the IDF policed and allowed the presence of lesbian soldiers. It will argue that the commitment of the IDF (theoretically at least) to The People's Army concept has had a crucial part concerning the attitudes of military personnel who regulated the sexualities and behaviors of lesbian soldiers. Second, the ways lesbian soldiers understood their presence on military bases given their sexual identity. It will show that in addition to the struggles lesbian soldiers encountered during their service, they also found opportunities to present their best "self" precisely because of the distinctive part the IDF held in Israeli society. These arguments take place in broader research, discussing the roles of lesbian women within the Jewish Israeli society in the 20th century's last decades.

Author

• Eliya Amsalem, Tel Aviv University