About this time last week we heard about the extra-judicial killing of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the founder of the Palestinian resistance movement, Hamas. For some it was not only a shock but one that was compounded when White House spokesperson Scott McLellan said the US Administration "wasn’t consulted" prior to the assassination.
Zionist sympathisers such as Alan Dershowitz, writing in The Age on Monday, defended the state sanctioned murder as follows, "Last weeks targeted killing … was a moral and lawful instance of pre-emptive self-defense". This is from a man who is a keen advocate of torture who states that democracy demands tough choices and the use of "rough" means can be "justified". He advocates the use of a "sterilised needle under the nail [that] causes no permanent damage" and the drilling of teeth in order to gain information. He says that he is "against all these methods" unless carried out under "democratic control".
I think its important we examine Dershowitz’s comments (and his world view) and expose the specious, racist and dangerous suppositions they contain. That they were made by a professor of law from Harvard University perhaps reflects on the poor state of academic critique and the ideological position of the corporate media who allow such comments to be published.
Firstly, to state that the assassination was a "targeted killing" is to re-introduce us to the Orwellian double-speak that pervades the Israeli propaganda regarding their illegal occupation of Palestine and their, often cold blooded, murder of innocent Palestinian citizens. To utilise this term exposes the fallacy that is perpetrated by the complicit and lazy mainstream media and our even more cowed government and opposition, that in some way Israel is "defending" its territory. As the invader it’s hard to see how it can be defending something that has been stolen by them from the Palestinians with assistance from willing accomplices in Western governments.
The ongoing deaths on both sides are deplorable. However, we should not ignore the fact that in the propaganda peddled by the Zionists and Israeli Fundamentalists, supported by foreign governments such as our own, Palestinians are portrayed as mass of evil, loathsome creatures who are, according to Dershowitz’s diatribe, sub human. How else can he justify his claim that the killing of Yassin was "moral". Only by dehumanising the Palestinian people can the Zionists and their supporters uphold their claims of the moral high ground.
Not only does Dershowitz dehumanise Yassin he claims the killing was acceptable because Yassin was a "combatant". Here Dershowitz grasps at the US administration’s lexical contrivance in order to justify an act of murder. Using his logic, that Yassin was a combatant because he "directed" "acts of terrorism" – none of which is proved in fact OR law, then we should also apply the same logic to Ariel Sharon - who authorised the killing and the US administration – who by their admittance of not knowing about this killing reveal they are usually "consulted" prior to such killings. By using Dershowitz’s own logic George Bush, Ariel Sharon and anyone else who supports the Zionist invasion and occupation of Palestine is also a "combatant" and therefore a "morally acceptable" target. Unless of course you hold to a moral relativity that says killing some (sub) humans is OK – as long as they aren’t the same colour, religion, culture or race as us.
Finally, by attempting to defend this state sanctioned killing as "pre-emptive self defense" Dershowitz opens us all up to the possibility of becoming targets. If the cabinet of a government, behind closed doors, hidden from any public scrutiny or even the opinion and power of its party, can decide who is a threat, then we can forget any such notion as democracy and accept that this is, in fact, totalitarianism. While this claim sounds outrageous, we need to ask ourselves if it’s as far fetched as it seems. Dershowitz and other Fundamentalists understand how dangerous democracy is because democracy is, fundamentally a state of non-control.
We live in a time where, increasingly the "will of the people" is being administered according to the "will of the party ideology". If the views of a few men, gathered together because they obviously adhere to an homogeneous world view, can determine the fate of one, two or indeed hundreds if not thousands of people’s lives, then surely we have no effective form of representative rule. The Israeli government’s actions – and the US admission - reveals that the far right refuses to even acknowledge the possibility of alternative solutions.
We can, if we choose, turn our attention to such weighty questions as "did Thorpe jump or was he pushed?" We can distract our selves by following the minutia of the puerile parliamentary debate over who tells more lies – Howard or Latham. We can even choose to lose ourselves in taking part in marches this coming Palm Sunday. If we do choose to fail to engage with the changing nature of government and the ways our civil rights are being rolled back, the way racist sentiment is failing to abate and the ways in which our thoughts are continually being directed toward our own personal "security" rather than the task of building solidarity and real community, then we should not expect peace and harmony to drop out of the sky.
I have no real idea of whether Sheikh Ahmed Yassin was the leader of a "terrorist" group or not and I have no idea if he was as moderate as his supporters claim. What I do know is that his death will not stop the violence being perpetrated on his people or the people Dershowitz spills tears over. Until people like Dershowitz begin to spill tears at each and every death, our spiral into atomised global totalitarianism will continue. In this condition governments will wage war on whom ever they want - just in case.
Unless we intervene and take back the initiative and reclaim the right to govern and be governed in a humane and just way the next "just in case", pre-emeptive strike could be against us or those we love. Just as Dershowitz argues that Israel was "entitled to kill" Yassin, surely those who view us as enemies can use the same rationale to justify their killing of us.
The will of the people can be fickle and a "controlled" democracy is nothing more than a sham. That Dershowitz met with Phillip Ruddock, the Attorney General, this week we need to consider the future of our society urgently. When a man like Dershowitz who advocates torture and upholds a vehement racial ideology meets with a man who has demonstrated a distinct lack of empathy for those he considers less than human, we should, indeed, be concerned about the Australia these types of men envisage.