The Gaza War

This open access book opens with a short introduction that provides historical context, positions the volume within the broader field, outlines its aims, and introduces its chapters. The book is divided into two parts, each representing a principal domain in which new conceptualizations are proposed. The first part addresses what was challenged in this war: the principles of the citizen army. Historically, the rise of the citizen army is associated with the emergence of mass conscription in revolutionary eighteenth-century France, and this legacy became the foundation of the Israeli military. It is therefore relevant to begin with an examination of the challenge to this model. The central principle of the citizen army is that citizens serve in it “as citizens,” not merely that citizens serve in the army. This strengthened the identification between soldiering and citizenship, such that military service came to define the boundaries of substantive citizenship. By linking the duty to serve with rights, it established the institution of the “citizen-soldier.” On this basis, informal contractual relations developed between the social group from which the soldier came and the state, grounded in a republican ethos. This ethos regards military contribution, rather than individual achievement, as the decisive criterion for social, personal, and collective rewards. The principles of the citizen army were challenged in multiple ways during this war. The second part addresses militarization and new patterns of violence. Since the Second Intifada (2000), Israeli militarization has assumed a new form that combines seemingly contradictory cultural patterns. At its core stands a secular militarist discourse centered on the army and its networks. Often expressed in “soft” forms, this discourse facilitates its absorption while making resistance more difficult for the secular middle class. Alongside it developed a religious-nationalist discourse that seeks to strip violence of its camouflage and even celebrate its unrestrained application. The concluding chapter by Joseph Soeters, professor emeritus at the Netherlands Defence Academy and Tilburg University, draws broader insights from the Israeli case and situates it within a wider theoretical context of military sociology, and possibly the evolving global order. A reflection on the Israeli field by a foreign scholar promises fruitful analytical avenues, strengthening both the comparative and theoretical contributions of the volume.