When a wrong was done to one group of people there is no automatic get out of jail card given that allows for them to engage in behaviour that is murderous against others. Israel is not immune to accusations of ethnic cleansing or genocide because of … history.
Immune to genocide accusations?
Israeli officials have called the lawsuit “blood libel” ( so antisemitism?) and the United States has dismissed it as “completely without any basis in fact whatsoever.”
Nonetheless, an increasing number of states have voiced support, including the 57-member Organization of Islamic Cooperation, the Arab League, Brazil, Turkey, Malaysia, Jordan, the Maldives, Bolivia and Namibia. France has indicated it will support the court’s decision.
UN experts, international organizations and numerous Canadian and international legal scholars have warned that Israel’s war risks becoming — or has already become — genocide.
Such a stance suggests Israel should be shielded from accusations of genocide. (Because history) Yet as South Africa argued, no atrocity can justify genocide. It also ignores how structural conditions of apartheid and unlawful occupation set the stage for genocide to occur.
Israel had a choice to undertake a more restrained security operation, get their hostages back, target specific Hamas leaders. They didn’t. Israel has opted to displace the masses and destroy the homes of countless people. In an operation that amounts to ethnic cleansing- the dead in Gaza, as of today is nearing 30,000. Mostly women and children. With thousands of others buried under the rubble of all those building demolished by Israel in a massive bombing campaign
Lawyers for Israel put forth their rebuttal to South Africa’s charge that it was committing genocide in the Gaza Strip, and said the case before the International Court of Justice cheapened a term that was coined to describe the destruction of the Jewish people.
But Israel also advanced an overarching argument that the court should not abuse a term, genocide, reserved only for the most extreme cases.
Israel’s concern is for the cheapening of terminology. Yet, isn’t Israel cheapening terminology on a daily basis. Presenting this action as justified because of October 7/23. Comparing ISIS to Hamas. Smearing every Gazan as Hamas. Name calling. This is the most common form of propaganda during war. And Israel is waging war on millions of unarmed people, they’ve labeled as terrorists, this is not targeting Hamas. This is killing and displacing Palestinians en masse. This is mowing the lawn/grass on an industrial scale. An Israeli practice for a very long time.
Israel’s confidence that it could go on indefinitely “mowing the lawn” without seeking a political solution may seem accurate. But the mowing may not merely be perpetual, but self-perpetuating.
As Efraim Inbar and Eitan Shamir first approvingly put it in a 2014 article for the Jerusalem Post, Israeli strategists see the wars as “mowing the grass” in a lengthy struggle of attrition in which a political solution is unlikely.
Israel’s concern is for the words being used. They are avoiding dealing with the real harm caused by their war of choice. Israel is obfuscating the reality of their military operation and the effect it’s having on a massive population.
Also, thinking psychologically about this situation.. When the abused becomes the abuser – Is this about the cycle of abuse?
Or is this a case of the abuser playing victim?- Victim hood as covert abuse
Israel’s argument appears to hinge on the fact that because Jews suffered previously- no one else’s suffering is legitimate or as legitimate, because, history.
2 replies on “Israel wields it’s genocide shield- When the abused become the abuser”
It seems like Israel’s legal stance is ‘justifiable revenge’ on an industrial scale.
What a barbarous, primitive species we are.
It would appear that Israeli ground forces are curtailing operations and some withdrawn after sustaining significant losses. But the pilots and the artillery men are still safely working overtime propelled by the blind fury of righteousness. It’s easier to kill when you can’t see the carnage up close. Above, quietly circling, drones record the slaughter for the demented voyeurs at Jerusalem, Washington and London.
Israel faces a real threat from Hezbollah in the north and the brave Yemeni, doing what they can from their strategic war torn wasteland. This despicable story has a bloody ways to go before the final chapter.
justifiable revenge? Is that a new international law?
This of course means that justifiable revenge can be directed at Israel as well. How would Israel argue against that when this is their own ideology.
What really jumped out at me was the semantics (words, their meaning and context) argument while ignoring the reality of their operation.