An activism email for Gaza [Note: Content Warning - discussion of and links to reports on genocide, mass atrocity crimes, violence, and war. Reader discretion is advised]

Note: CONTENT WARNING - some of this content is about upsetting, disturbing or triggering events & attitudes. Seek competent help - including professional - if you need it. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised that linked articles may contains names and/or images of deceased people. READER CAUTION IS RECOMMENDED! For anyone distressed by anything in this post, or for any other reason considering seeking support, resources are available in Australia here, here, and here. In other nations, you will have to do an Internet search using terms such as “mental health support - <your nation>” (which, for instance, may lead to this, this, and this, in the USA, or this, this, and this, in France [biased towards English-language - my apologies]), or perhaps try https://www.befrienders.org/. 

Note: in my “from the news” posts, quotes are shown italicised and blue, my comments are in a different shade of blue, and “good” items are shown in green. I have loosely grouped the posts where such seemed reasonable, but that is subjective (i.e., my opinion - others are free to disagree), and challenging, as some posts belong in multiple “groups”.

Below is an activism  email I sent to my local (Federal) MP this morning: 

*** 

Dear Member for _,

While I am aware that the situation in Gaza is complex (see, for example -  “Facing enormous pressure at home and abroad, how much longer can Israel continue its war in Gaza?”   https://theconversation.com/facing-enormous-pressure-at-home-and-abroad-how-much-longer-can-israel-continue-its-war-in-gaza-227350 ), there are a number of principles which are still, in my opinion, of great importance. 

Decency is one of them. 

In 1795, the German philosopher Kant wrote:

“No State Shall, during War, Permit Such Acts of Hostility, Which Would Make Mutual Confidence in the Subsequent Peace Impossible: Such Are the Employment of Assassins, Poisoners, Breach of Capitulation, and Incitement to Treason in the Opposing State.”

I consider the sentiment can be updated to today’s world in two ways. 

The first is: regarding committing egregious human rights abuses, such as mass atrocities (including genocide), as similar acts that “... Make Mutual Confidence in the Subsequent Peace Impossible” - and I note, for instance, legal cases in recent years over imperial Germany's genocide against the Herero and Nama in what is now Namibia in the early 1900s (see, for instance, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Herero_and_Nama_genocide&oldid=1216620976#Negotiations_and_agreement) - without major, humbling, and costly (not only financially) acts of healing.

This was, in my opinion, probably best exemplified by the Genocide Convention, which Australia enthusiastically supported by adopting the Genocide Convention Act of 1949 (albeit a little too enthusiastically, given the need to introduce division 268 to the Criminal Code in 2002).

Sadly, implementation of the Genocide Convention has been flawed (which I wrote about in a blog post at “Thirty years after Rwanda, some thoughts on genocide [Note: Content Warning - links to reports on genocide, sexual assault, other extreme human rights abuses. Reader discretion is advised]”   https://politicalmusingsofkayleen.blogspot.com/2024/04/thirty-years-after-rwanda-some-thoughts.html), but that leads in to the second way of updating Kant’s sentiment: the importance of being an upstander, rather than a bystander.

This concept has been widely accepted in a range of human rights areas - particularly acts involving bullying in public places (of women, people of colour, etc). However, this principle has only reached a grudging tolerance in international politics (somewhat counter-matched by the attempts by those who resent the intrusion of decency to subvert the principle - something also seen in other areas of application/potential application of this principle, particularly with regards to transphobes who also who resent the intrusion of decency), in my view, but it is incorporated into the Genocide Convention - and thus Australian law via the two Acts I mentioned to above.

In fact, the concept has been further refined in Australian by the adoption of laws allowing Magnitsky style sanctions against key offenders against decency - which is, in itself, a reflection of the development of international law to address the reluctance of nations/key people to take action.

On that reluctance, the news report “Rwanda’s president decries ‘failure’ of international community 30 years after genocide”   https://www.france24.com/en/africa/20240407-rwanda-marks-the-30th-anniversary-of-the-genocide-against-the-tutsis includes: “former US president Bill Clinton, who had called the genocide the biggest failure of his administration”.

Potential future regrets should, I consider, be taken into consideration in a lot of decision making.

(The books by Samantha Power and Carol Orr that I mention in my blog post mentioned above also address what I have termed “reluctance” and other failings.) 

It has, therefore, been particularly gratifying to see Prime Minister Albanese's stronger stance on human rights issues since the tragic killing of several international aid workers, which has been reflected in a stronger line internationally, as reported, for instance, at “Paul Bongiorno: Australia on collision course with Israel after Zomi Frankcom’s death changes everything”   https://www.thenewdaily.com.au/opinion/2024/04/08/paul-bongiorno-israel-gaza-australia (although, as someone who saw the images of starving children in Biafra in the 1960s, which led to the Biafran airlift, I am disappointed that today’s world was unmoved by the images of starving children in Gaza) - and I also note with gratitude the actions you have taken in support of Palestinians for quite some time. 

Thank you - and my thanks also to Prime Minister Albanese.

There are, however, two additional areas of potential action which, in the interests of decency and preventing future regrets, I consider worth considering.

The first is a call for Magnitsky style sanctions on Israeli officials who want to deny aid to Gazans, or are promoting genocide, which is written about in “Israeli officials who want to deny aid to Gaza civilians merit Australian sanctions, humanitarian groups say”   https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/08/israeli-officials-who-want-to-deny-aid-to-gaza-civilians-merit-australian-sanctions-humanitarian-groups-say   

I agree with this call, and urge that it be seriously and genuinely considered. 

The second is the supply of munitions and other military supplies to Israel - see “Gaza war: countries selling Israel weapons are violating international law – legal expert”   https://theconversation.com/gaza-war-countries-selling-israel-weapons-are-violating-international-law-legal-expert-227091  

I urge that we, Australia, objectively review any military aid we are providing to Israel, and give serious and genuine consideration to ceasing such aid - personally, I consider such aid to be immoral, and that it should thus be stopped. 

There are a number of analogies I could draw on to support that point, but it is possibly more instructive to recall that the USA was not always so blindly and vehemently pro-Israel as has been seen in recent decades. This is discussed in the following article: 

• “The USA used to Stand up to Israeli Expansionism: Time for Biden to Show Eisenhower’s Spine”   https://www.juancole.com/2024/04/israeli-expansionism-eisenhowers.html   “The relationship between the two countries was rocky at times. For instance, during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, President Harry Truman slapped an arms embargo on both Israel and the Arab countries as he saw the conflict as a source of instability that might give aid the spread of Communism in the region.   President Dwight Eisenhower was even more stern, when Israel invaded Egypt in October 1956. Eisenhower warned, “Should a nation which attacks and occupies foreign territory in the face of United Nations disapproval be allowed to impose conditions on its withdrawal?”. Eisenhower threatened to call in US loans to Israel and crash its economy if Tel Aviv did not immediately withdraw from the Sinai Peninsula and the Gaza Strip, which it had seized from Egypt. The Israelis completely caved to the angry demands of the former Supreme Allied Commander who had vanquished the Third Reich.”   
  

There is no need to reply to this email: I am satisfied that the points I have suggested will be given due consideration. 

Yours faithfully

*** 

As always when writing such emails,  it is important to consider “Do you fight to change things, or to punish?” (Gandhi)

 

Assumptions / basis 

In writing this, I have assumed / started from the following: 

• this blog states quite clearly that it is about political and human rights matters, including lived experience of problems, and thus I will assume readers are reasonable people who have noted the content warning in the post header;

Possible flaws 

Where I can, I will try to highlight possible flaws / issues you should consider:

• there may be flawed logical arguments in the above: to find out more about such flaws and thinking generally, I recommend Brendan  Myers’ free online course “Clear and Present Thinking”; 
  
• I could be wrong - so keep your thinking caps on, and make up your own minds for yourself.
  

 

If they are of any use of interest, the activism information links from my former news posts are available in this post. 

 

If you appreciated this post, please consider promoting it - there are some links below.

Remember: we need to be more human being rather than human doing, and all misgendering is an act of active transphobia/transmisia that puts trans+ lives at risk & accept that all insistence on the use of “trans” as a descriptor comes with commensurate use of “cis” as a descriptor to prevent “othering”.

Copyright © Kayleen White 2016-2024     NO AI   I do not consent to any machine learning aka Artificial Intelligence (AI), generative AI, large language model, machine learning, chatbot, or other automated analysis, generative process, or replication program to reproduce, mimic, remix, summarise, or otherwise  replicate any part of this post or other posts on this blog via any means. Typo’s may be inserrted deliberately to demonstrate this is not an AI product.     Otherwise, fair and reasonable use is accepted under Creative Commons 4.0 on an Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike basis   https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/