Le service militaire et la condition des femmes en Israël

Résumé 0

Military Service and Women’s Conditions in Israel: Some Elements of ReflectionWomen’s condition in Israel finds his roots in several factors: cultural, socio-economical, religious as a reflection of the complexity of people in this country. The geopolitical situation, linked to the state of war of Israel, also affect women’s life in Israel. Israel is one of the few countries, and the only western country in the world, that drafts women in the army compulsory service. In particular this element creates interesting paradoxes between women’s contribution to the defence of the country, the status traditionally attributed to them and their own path to emancipation in the Israeli society.The Israeli Defence Force (IDF) is a central institution for the Israeli society. IDF draws the societal hierarchy in the State, determines the attribution of resources and it represents a way of access to the political arena in Israel. Responding to the national duties, among which the compulsory service is the highest expression, is what makes one a good citizen. But in Israel a wide cleavage between women and men is perpetrated in the army and into the military organisation itself. By consequence the gender division in the army is reproduced in civil life as well. Women serve in the army for a shorter period of time, their contribution, for most of them, is reduced to female work and, once freed by the army duty, they do not enjoy socio-economical opportunities as men do. Many feminists and that part of the women movements which had more influence in the Parliament, started to focus their attention on the achievement of a wider range of jobs and positions for women in the army. These last decades have seen important changes in the Israeli army that have modified its structure in particular concerning the gender relations and the women’s role in the military. The opening of flight courses for officers to women was an important starting point as well as the opening of combat units. The second Lebanon war has seen for the first time, since the birth of the Israeli Nation, women’s operational participation during a conflict. This marks a big change for the Israeli army, which may lead to a new balance of opportunities between women and men and a transformation of the classical roles attributed to women and their public participation in social and political life in Israel. In order to understand the social and gender implications of the presence of women in the army, the article will start considering the meaning of the compulsory service in Israel at the light of the centrality of the IDF in the Israeli society. How does the Israeli society understand the army experience? What impact has the army and in particular the compulsory service in the lives of Israelis?We will then focus in particular on the compulsory service for women. What is its structure? Which have been the different steps for the achievement of the position women now have in the army in Israel? We will analyse then one of the main concept currently used to define the army service in Israel: rite of passage and rite of citizenship. We will claim that the army service is now understood and lived by individuals in very different ways. The compulsory service is an experience that people coming from different parts of the society live in many different ways. This is especially true for women. The army service as a rite of passage for the majority of its conscripts seems to lose its characteristic of transmutation (the passage from one status to another), but it still remains a rite of institution. In a gender perspective, the army service, as a rite of institution, can be seen as a ritual that distinguishes, once and for all, the female army experience from the male one and finally reinforcing the gender differences. At last we will try to enlighten the impact of the army experience on women in Israel in their path to emancipation and we will claim that the IDF plays a big role in the socialisation and internalisation of gender roles in the Israeli society. We will also claim that other agencies exist, like the national school education and the religious institution, that influence the building of women’s identity and contribute to determine the status of women in Israel. Some of these agencies influence directly the army institution.