3 - ‘Injured Soldiers’, ‘Just Warriors’, or ‘Monsters’: Emotionality, ‘Morality’, and Militarised Masculinities in Israel

Summary

Chapter III delves into the discursive mechanisms through which former Israeli conscripts in this study understood, justified and/or distanced themselves from the violent regime in which they serve(d) – relating this to the broader context of ‘moralised militarism’ so frequently attributed to the Israeli military. Through analysis of the speech acts, moralisations and emotive articulations by former and current soldiers, I argue that traits of emotional expression, reflection and critique – far from being anomalies of militarised masculinity in this context – are central to its legitimation and idealisation, enabling the soldier, and society more broadly, to retain their sense of humanity amidst enduring violence. Rather than performances of stoicism and emotional control with which ‘traditional’ forms of militarised masculinity are normatively associated, a more philosophical, emotive, and cerebral approach to violence appears to be celebrated and encouraged within Israeli militarism – consolidating the supposed relation between militarism, masculinity, and moralism in the settler-colonial state.