Perceptions and Meanings Attributed by Candidates for Military Service in Israel to the Possibility of Posthumous Sperm Retrieval

This study examines the perceptions and meanings that Israeli candidates for military service attribute to the possibility of posthumous sperm retrieval after their death. Posthumous sperm retrieval is a relatively new and rare practice worldwide, in which testicular tissue is taken from a deceased man to preserve his sperm and enable his relatives to use it for fertilization after his death. The study is situated against the backdrop of the expansion of this practice in Israel following the October 7 massacre and the Swords of Iron War. It focuses on how young men prior to enlistment encounter this possibility in relation to their own potential death, and what meanings they ascribe to such an act being performed after their death.

The study seeks to contribute to an emerging understanding of this phenomenon at a substantive level and, as a derivative of that understanding, to provide an ethical foundation for the development of future policy in this field.

This is an exploratory, qualitative-interpretive study based on semi-structured in-depth interviews with twelve Jewish male candidates for military service in Israel, aged eighteen and above. The interviews were analyzed using thematic analysis, within an interpretive-phenomenological orientation, and in relation to Terror Management Theory and Martin Heidegger’s concepts of finitude and presence.

The findings yielded three central themes, each structured as a tension: willingness to acknowledge the finality of death versus avoidance of direct engagement with it; the perception of posthumous sperm retrieval as symbolic continuity versus the perception of parenthood as an active and multidimensional practice; and processes of self-formation shaped by a search for differentiation and separation from parents versus reliance on familial bonds. The study points to the complexity involved in confronting candidates for military service with the question of their continuity after a death during military service. It suggests that the ethical discussion should not be framed solely in terms of free will and consent but should also address the intimate dimensions of the issue: how such a proposal enters, reshapes, and affects the private and relational world of these young men. In doing so, the study also raises the question of how this encounter may influence their decision-making processes.