It’s easy defending criminality when you’re not the victim, By Owei Lakemfa

The different reactions reinforce my position that the world could be a better place if only decent human beings did not create evil rationality. But it is quite easy to blame criminality, if you are not a victim. To people like that, I usually say, please put yourself in the victim position and see if you will still hold the same position.

I expected the reaction when on February 3rd I published the piece, “Making the Holocaust in your own image.” It came as expected. The different reactions reinforce my position that the world could be a better place if only decent human beings did not create evil rationality. But it is quite easy to blame criminality, if you are not a victim. To people like that, I usually say, please put yourself in the victim position and see if you will still hold the same position. But the demand is usually a tall order because many are seen in the way, or are socially or religiously indoctrinated. It can be explosive, potentially dangerous or almost impossible to ask someone who has religious beliefs about something, to rethink their position.

Of course, there are many who support my simple act of drawing attention to the problems in Palestine, especially the ongoing genocide and calling for a resolution for a two-state solution, where Israel and Palestine will live together in safety. bordering on peace and raising his family as a good ladder. The famous African novelist, Chinua Achebe wrote: “Let the kite reach and the eagle too – If one does not speak to the other, its wings are broken.”

There are people I won’t waste time explaining things to because they’ve gone out of their way or benefited directly from evil. For example, why would I waste precious time and space persuading Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to end his philistine or Nazi-style approach to the genocidal Palestinian issue when it is political oxygen? Why would Netanyahu allow peace when violence, so-called ‘security’, is the bait used to fish in Israel’s political waters? Now, it is this criminal tactic that has saved him and his wife, Sara, from prison, after being indicted, more than three years ago, on charges of bribery, fraud and breach of trust.

However, there are decent people who I think should solve the problem, because there is a possibility to rethink the way and work for the better of humanity. I will limit my reaction to the international platform that belongs to me, but will not mention names because I have not asked for permission to do so.

One measured response was: “Using terms like genocide and extermination is so far from the truth that it is defamatory.” This thought continues: “What is happening between Israel and Palestine is not a genocide. It is more complicated than that. Yes, you are right about the displacement of Israel there. But it is not on a large scale like what is happening elsewhere in the region… which causes casualties and more damage…

There is no point in waiting until people are thrown out before we agree that there is genocide. The French massacre of approximately two million Algerians to stop the country’s independence and assimilation was no less than the Nazi massacre of six million Jews or the Belgian massacre of 15 million Congolese. The first genocide of the 20th century involved 100,000 people in Namibia.

A serious mistake in this type of analysis is to assume that genocide is based on the number of victims, not the act itself. The Oxford dictionary defines genocide as “the deliberate killing of a large number of people of a particular nation or ethnic group with the intention of destroying that nation or group.”

There is no point in waiting until people are thrown out before we agree that there is genocide. The French massacre of approximately two million Algerians to stop the country’s independence and assimilation was no less than the Nazi massacre of six million Jews or the Belgian massacre of 15 million Congolese. The first genocide of the 20th century involved 100,000 people in Namibia. But it was a genocide because the Germans exterminated more than 60,000 out of a total of 80,000 Herero people; that eliminates 80% of people. It also killed more than 10,000 Nama people. The number may seem ‘small’ but 50% of the Nama people.

In order to distinguish the Turkish genocide against the Armenians, he tried to rationalize it like this: “The difference with Israel is also about security. It is a small country that also feels threatened. Much has been done in the last 75 years without security. It is extraordinary! So Israel wants security, but deny security to Palestinian neighbors? The truth is, both people need security and one cannot be secured by denying security to the other.

Regarding the ongoing theft of Palestinian land, including East Jerusalem, which has seen Israel’s illegal settlements increase from 115,700 in the 1993 Peace Agreement to more than 350,000 in 20 years, a rationalization is provided: “They want to separate Palestinian land in the West Bank. with Israeli settlements in the between because it also prevents the future state of Palestine from consolidation and may be a threat. So, the plan to deny the Palestinians a state in their native home.

The current state of Israel is just a European enclave. What the Europeans have done is to create a new country in the Middle East in the name of Israel and systematically nibble Palestinian land by creating illegal settlements, hoping in the future that the indigenous people will have no land.

While Israel brings in foreigners, especially Europeans to settle, it denies Palestinians forced abroad the right to return home. A person who cried for centuries for his homeland, should not deprive others of his homeland, which is what Israel is doing.

The current state of Israel is just a European enclave. What the Europeans have done is to create a new country in the Middle East in the name of Israel and systematically nibble Palestinian land by creating illegal settlements, hoping in the future that the indigenous people will have no land.

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Of course, Israel has fought and defeated great armies, but only an uncritical person would give spiritual reasons and believe that the Israelites are “God’s Chosen People”. The truth is that all human beings – Jews and Gentiles, Christians and Muslims, African traditional religions and Buddhists – are children of God. So in reality, the Euro-Israelis are the chosen people of God who at the birth of the new state on May 14, 1948 told the indigenous Jews that God had done too little in their lives to deserve a mention in the new constitution. country.

As for Israel apparently invisible on the battlefield, a more critical mind will look beyond the brilliance of the General and ‘spiritual’ for the enormous military and intelligence back up received from the mother of the continent and the United States. For the blind people, especially in Africa, who consider the current state of Israel as God’s promise, they should think again because Israel is not a Christian state. Indeed, almost all of the people who make up the current state of Israel are atheists. These included the founding father, David Ben-Gurion and former Prime Ministers Moshe Dayan and Golda Meir. We must build peace in Palestine, a country where three great religions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam – meet. We need a new world where everyone is born free and equal.

Owei Lakemfa, former secretary general of African labor, is a human rights activist, journalist and author.