Netanyahu faces embarrassment of refusenik nephew

Jonathan Ben-Artzi is due to face a court martial today. His "crime" is that he is one of a growing number of Israelis who refuse to serve in the army. But Mr Ben-Artzi's case will attract an unusual degree of attention because his uncle is Binyamin Netanyahu, the hardline former prime minister and current Finance Minister.

Mr Ben-Artzi has already served 214 days in military prison and has been declared a prisoner of conscience by Amnesty International.

In truth, he is not typical of the "refuseniks", whose refusal to continue to serve in the occupied territories is tying the Israeli military in knots. Mr Ben-Artzi says he is a pacifist, and refuses to serve in the army at all. Most of the "refuseniks" are experienced reservists, some of them combat veterans with distinguished records, who refuse to serve in the occupied territories because they oppose the actions of their army there.

But Mr Ben-Artzi has become a potent symbol of the refusal to serve which is polarising Israeli society. The 20-year-old is refusing to enlist for his compulsory military service. Conscription is at the heart of Israeli society. Everybody has to serve. Men complete three years' service, and then have to do reserve duty for an average of one month a year for about two decades. The only exemptions are for ultra-Orthodox Jews, Arabs with Israeli citizenship and those with specific health problems.

In Israel's early days, compulsory military service was seen as a vital part of forging a national identity in a populations of immigrants from across the world. But increasingly, the idea of army service is being challenged.

The army has sought to obscure the number of refuseniks by punishing a select few and turning a blind eye to the rest, but they are now believed to number in their hundreds. Mr Ben-Artzi is one of few to take on the system so directly.

Young Israelis who do not want to serve tend to feign mental illness. Mr Ben-Artzi appeared before an army board as a conscientious objector, but it rejected his claim. Since then he has been repeatedly sentenced to one-month stints in prison for refusing to report for duty, and now faces a court martial for his persistence.

In a statement to the Israel Defence Forces, he said: "Because of my beliefs, my own country is going to imprison me, in defiance of international laws and fundamental human rights. I will go to prison proudly, knowing that this is the least I can do to improve this country, and the cause of pacifism." Mr Netanyahu is believed to have tried to change his nephew's mind, but failed.