I struggle with something that Israel supporters say: Well you did it to the Native Americans, who are you to tell us not to do it? Some of these hasbarists even show up wearing Indian headdresses and war paint to try and rub it in– you’re as racist as we are. Recently a liberal American-Israeli Zionist even made the dig personally, saying, You live on ethnically-cleansed land. And it’s true, I look out my window and see a hickory tree whose nuts Native Americans made liquor from. But they’re not here anymore. And my awareness of the ethnic cleansing here sometimes stops me.
Last week I went to a forestry lecture at Columbia University’s Earth Institute where I learned a fascinating fact. Lecturer Matt Palmer put up a power-point graphic showing how much of the earth’s forests are old growth, never cut down. Around the world old growth constitutes about a third of world forests. In Asia, it’s about 15 percent. In Europe, it’s 25 percent. In Africa it’s about 10 percent (the sub-Saharan rain forest area). In North and Central America it’s about 40 percent (think of those untouched Canadian and Rocky Mountain firs). And in South America it’s 75 percent.
So 2/3 of the forests in the world were either planted by humans or regrown after being harveste; and environmentalists spend a lot of energy these days trying to stop that figure from getting larger because of the environmental consequences.
The focus is South America, because their reservoir is so large. Rapacious western colonial culture got there relatively late, and the continent is relatively unpopulated.
South Americans can argue, hey, you did it to your forests, why can’t we do it to ours? And they’d have a point. They are being held to a higher standard. But history changes, ideas change, notions of justice evolve. It’s essential that we behave differently from our ancestors because this issue poses a global crisis. People have now woken up, and carrying on the same activity today will have dire consequences. I believe this argument extends to ethnic cleansing in Palestine. The settlers of my property got away with racism. The global political consequences of such actions today are potentially explosive.
It’s the “now it’s our turn” argument. I once heard an Israeli Likud politician use it about corruption: Ben-Gurion’s Mapai party was thoroughly corrupt, and all of a sudden, now that we’re in power, kickbacks and embezzlement are no longer OK? NOT FAIR!
It’s a pretty threadbare argument which says that because genocide and ethnic cleansing occurred in the past, then it is fine for us to do it. It’s almost a boast amongst these people, such is their perversion of history and reason. Perhaps they would also like to proudly compare their policies to Southern racial discrimination, Jim Crow, the Klan and public lynchings, since that is a more accurate parallel to what they are doing now.
Please, enough of the guilt for the acts of our forefathers.
Slavery was legal at one time. Pushing indiginous people out of the way of modern “progress” was acceptable back then (though not to everyone). Does the logic of “others did it before so we can do it too” provide justification for Israelis to subject Palestinians to a holocaust, to slavery, or to a future mass ethnic cleansing?
Of course not.
More importantly, as a direct result of what happened to the Jews and others during and prior to WWII, a set of international laws were set down in writing to prevent such actions in the future: the Geneva Conventions of 1949, which were signed by Israel but violated repeatedly since.
What is being judged here are the actions of a modern nation, created by the United Nations, which is flaunting and violating modern international laws it agreed to abide by. Ironically, Israel flaunts and violates international laws created because of the oppression of Jews and intended to prevent future oppression of Jews and others who might be subject to oppression (like the Palestinians).
Yet again while having validity we see what I think is the wrong perspective on this Israeli argument.
Yes, sure, Phil and others say with that measure of validity, we *used* to do those things but don’t anymore. But the jibe still resonates.
Seems to me the added retort ought to be “so if you want to behave like ethnic cleansers and racists of old go ahead, but don’t then pretend you’re something else just to get American money and support.”
Laws change, even if not everyone changes with them. It is no argument to say, “We can do it today because you did yesterday.” The Holocaust (let it be emphatically remembered) was LEGAL in Germany when it occurred. It was probably legal internationally. (The genocide convention is dated 1951.) If Israelis want to use the “it was legal before so its legal now” argument, let them argue with that!
When USA killed-off and pushed-off the Native Americans, it was not yet regarded as a crime. Force and violence were normal tools of statecraft. (Indeed, the Nazis thought this was still the case when they began WWII. They were quite affronted by the victors-justice of the Nuremberg trials which made war-crimes of aggressive warfare.) Most of it happened before 1900. But in 1945, the UN Charter forbade use or threat of violence to acquire territory or settle international disputes.
Although the PLANS for Zionism may have started while colonialism (and even expulsive-colonialism) was still in vogue among the militarily-dominant races, by 1948 (and even by 1945 when the Jewish terrorism which started the British withdrawal began in good earnest) the law was changed.
The UN Charter had come into effect (forbidding acquisition of territory by use or threat of war) and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (and the four Geneva Conventions of 1949) were being debated, all in the aftermath of the Nazi attacks on most of Europe and the Holocaust.
By 1967 the Fourth Geneva Convention had been signed by Israel (06.07.1951) and its strictures as to settlements were well known. (Israel’s argument that the convention does not apply to the OPTs has no support whatever. Israel is a clear scofflaw. The USA supports this by use of its UNSC veto.)