In Conscientious Objectors in Israel, Erica Weiss examines the lives of Israelis who have refused to perform military service for reasons of conscience. Based on long-term fieldwork, this ethnography chronicles the personal experiences of two generations of Jewish conscientious objectors as they grapple with the pressure of justifying their actions to the Israeli state and society--often suffering severe social and legal consequences, including imprisonment.

While most scholarly work has considered the causes of animosity and violence in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,...