Over the past five years, photographer Rotem Itzhari has been working on a series of photographs of Israeli female combat soldiers photographed in various locations across the country, in dresses and holding M-16 rifles. Recently, she posted several photos unseen before, creating a constant tension between the women's gaze and the war machines they hold. In the future, Itzhari hopes to exhibit them in an exhibition in Italy.
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Over the years, photographers associated the female body with weapons, creating photos that objectify women, indicating the connection between the phallic weapons and the photographed women as seen with Israeli model Orin Julie. An exceptional example is a beautiful and provocative photo by Helmut Newton, who during one of his visits to Israel in the 1990s, photographed the young model Kim Iglinsky (one of the most successful Israelis in the world living in the United States), holding an M16 rifle and wearing a black bikini, against the background of the Dead Sea landscapes, with IDF insignias and dufflebags laid at her feet.
Itzhari (43) began working on the project about five years ago, when she lived in Bet Shemesh. She shared that she was recovering from heartbreak that shattered her heart into pieces and sought a new project at the time. "The best things come out of pain and difficulty," she said. Although she did not study photography in an orderly manner, over the past twenty years she has photographed documentary projects, such as photographing women from the Ultra-Orthodox society in Jerusalem or older women in the Dead Sea.
Her current project of female combat soldiers is more relevant than ever. Despite claims by politicians that women are not physically able to be combat soldiers, many of them have shown courage in the current war in Gaza. "Women can do anything. Not just in the army, in general," says Itzhari. "And you don't need these photos to know that. Not now and not before October 7. Maybe if they had listened to the female soldiers' warnings, the whole war could have been avoided."
According to her, the current project began with a vision. "I saw in my imagination a fair-skinned girl, with almost translucent skin, walking on soft sandy beaches, with an M16 rifle hanging on her, " says Itzhari. She started looking for female soldiers through friends and an advertisement she posted on Facebook.
"I was looking for beautiful, soft, and delicate women," she emphasized, "and slowly but surely, I also created uniform photos: photos in nature, mostly near the women's place of residence, dressed in second-hand items in a romantic style that I bought at Haredi thrift stores in Bet Shemesh or from my private wardrobe. I rented the weapons from a giant equipment warehouse. At first, I used dummy weapons, but later I only photographed real weapons."
In the past five years, Yitzhari has photographed 16 different female soldiers between the ages 20-30, some of whom are still in military service, others in reserves. For example, she photographed Amit, dressed in a flowery maxi dress, an M16 rifle hanging on her shoulder, and a flower wreath woven into her hair, on the sandy beach.
In another photo, inside an ancient stone cave, the woman looks at the viewer, wearing a pink dress, exposing her shoulders, and holding a weapon in both hands. And there's also Alex, with steel eyes, hugging a short M-16 close to her chest.
So far, Itzhari has not exposed the project in its entirety with the reactions she received being mixed. Recently, she tried to interest the French magazine Marie Claire in showcasing the project but received a negative response. "It's a controversial project because it reminds them of the military and not everyone connects to it or interprets it in a non-militaristic way. I suppose it will be difficult for me to publish it today in the world with the current discourse," she said.