On its official TikTok page, the IDF has posted videos of beautiful female soldiers lip-syncing to Dua Lipa’s “Levitating” or marching in fatigues and doing dances to military music. “There is a long history within Israel of military iconography favoring the beauty in uniform as a nationalist symbol,” explains Stein. “The military is using it in new ways to meet the needs of the digital moment.” All of these thirst traps can create a disorienting experience for a young, horny, American progressive with pro-Palestinian sympathies — which, of course, is exactly the point.
