European Collusion in Israel's slow genocide
January 31, 2008 10:43 | by Omar Barghouti
The European Union, Israel's largest trade partner in the world, is
watching by as Israel tightens its barbaric siege on Gaza,
collectively puni****ng 1.5 million Palestinian civilians, condemning
them to devastation, and visiting imminent death upon hundreds of
kidney dialysis and heart patients, prematurely born babies, and all
others dependent on electric power for their very survival.
By freezing fuel and electric power supplies to Gaza, Israel, the
occupying power, is essentially guaranteeing that "clean" water --
only by name, as Gaza's water is perhaps the most polluted in the
whole region, after decades of Israeli theft and abuse -- will not be
pumped out and properly distributed to homes and institutions;
hospitals will not be able to function adequately, leading to the
eventual death of many, particularly the most vulnerable; whatever
factories that are still working despite the siege will now be forced
to close, pu****ng the already extremely high unemployment rate even
higher; sewage treatment will come to a halt, further polluting Gaza's
precious little water supply; academic institutions and schools will
not be able to provide their usual services; and the lives of all
civilians will be severely disrupted, if not irreversibly damaged. And
Europe is apathetically watching.
Princeton academic Richard Falk considered Israel's siege a "prelude
to genocide," even before this latest crime of altogether cutting off
energy supplies. Now, Israel's crimes in Gaza can accurately be
categorized as acts of genocide, albeit slow. According to Article II
of the 1948 UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the
Crime of Genocide, the term is defined as:
"[A]ny of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in
whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as
such:
(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated
to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; ..."
Clearly, Israel's hermetic siege of Gaza, designed to kill, cause
serious bodily and mental harm, and deliberately inflict conditions of
life calculated to bring about partial and gradual physical
destruction, qualifies as an act of genocide, if not all-out genocide
yet. And the EU is suspiciously silent.
But why accuse Europe, in particular, of collusion in this crime when
almost the entire international community is not lifting a finger, and
the UN's obsequious Secretary-General, who surpassed all his
predecessors in obedience to the US government, is pathetically paying
only lip service? In addition, what of the US government itself,
Israel's most generous sponsor that is directly implicated in the
current siege, especially after President George W. Bush, on his
recent visit, gave a hardly subtle green light to Israeli Prime
Minister Ehud Olmert to ravage Gaza? Why not blame the Palestinians'
quiet Arab brethren, particularly Egypt -- the only country that can
immediately break the siege by reopening the Rafah crossing and
supplying through it the necessary fuel, electric power and emergency
supplies? And finally, why not blame the Ramallah-based Palestinian
Authority, whose subservient and visionless leader openly boasted in a
press conference its "complete agreement" with Bush on all matters of
substance?
After Israel, the US is, without a doubt, the guiltiest party in the
current crime. Under the influence of a fundamentalist, militaristic,
neo-conservative ideology that has taken over its helms of power and
an omnipotent Zionist lobby that is unparalleled in its sway, the US
is in a category by itself. It goes without saying that the PA, the
UN, as well as Arab and international governments maintaining business
as usual with Israel should all be held accountable for acquiescing,
whether directly or indirectly, to Israel's crimes against humanity in
Gaza. It is also true that each one of the above bears the legal and
moral responsibility to intervene and apply whatever necessary
pressure to stop the crime before thousands perish. But the EU
commands a unique position in all this. It is not only silent and
apathetic; in most European countries Israel and Israeli institutions
are currently welcomed and sought after with unprecedented warmth,
generosity and deference in all fields -- economic, cultural,
academic, athletic, etc. For instance, Israel was invited as the guest
of honor to a major book fair in Turin, Italy. Israeli government-
funded films are featuring in film festivals all over the continent.
Israeli products, from avocados and oranges to hi-tech security
systems, are flooding European markets like never before. Israeli
academic institutions are enjoying a special, very lucrative,
association agreement with the relevant organs in the EU. Israeli
dance groups, singing bands and orchestras are invited to European
tours and festivals as if Israel were not only a normal, but in effect
a most favored, member of the so-called "civilized" world. Official
Europe's once lackluster embrace of Israel has turned into an intense,
open and enigmatic love affair.
If Europe thinks it can thus repent for its Holocaust against its own
Jewish population, it is in fact shamefully and consciously
facilitating the committal of fresh acts of genocide against the
people of Palestine. But Palestinians, it appears, do not count for
much, as we are viewed not only by Israel, but also by its good old
"white" sponsors and allies as lesser, or relative, humans. The
continent that invented modern genocide and was responsible for
massacring in the last two centuries more human beings, mostly
"relative humans," than all other continents put together is covering
up crimes that are reminiscent in quality, though certainly not in
quantity, of its own heinous crimes against humanity.
In no other international affair, perhaps, can the European
establishment be accused of being as detached from and indifferent to
its own public opinion. While calls for boycotting Israel as an
apartheid state are slowly but consistently spreading among European
civil society organizations and trade unions, drawing disturbing
parallels to the boycott of South African apartheid, European
governments are finding it difficult to distinguish themselves from
the overtly complicit US position vis-a-vis Israel. Even European
clich=E9s of condemnation and "expressing deep concern" have become
rarer than ever nowadays. Moreover, Israel's relentless and defiant
violation of Europe's own human rights laws and conditions are ignored
whenever anyone questions whether Israel should continue to benefit
from its magnanimous association agreement with the EU despite its
military occupation, colonization and horrific record of human rights
abuse against its Palestinian victims. If this is not complicity, what
is?
Morality aside, sinking Gaza into a sea of darkness, poverty, death
and despair cannot bode well for Europe. By actively propping up an
environment conducive to the rise of fanaticism and desperate violence
near its borders, Europe is foolishly inviting havoc to its doorstep.
Instead of heeding -- or at least seriously considering -- calls for
boycott, divestment and sanctions against apartheid Israel, adopted by
virtually the entire spectrum of Palestinian civil society, it may
soon have to reckon with uncontainable forces of irrational and
indiscriminate violence and its resulting chaos.
It seems European elites are currently determined never to oppose
Israel, no matter what crimes it commits. It is as if the bellowing --
and increasingly hypocritical -- slogan upheld by Jewish survivors of
European genocide, "Never Again!", is now espoused by European elites
with one difference: the two letter, 's' and 't', are added at the
end.
Omar Barghouti is an independent Palestinian political analyst and
founding member of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and
Cultural Boycott of Israel This article first appeared on The
Electronic Intifada
|
