Artur Troost: The number of Palestinians killed during the Israeli intervention in Gaza has already exceeded 30,000, the vast majority being civilian casualties. How fresh is specified escalation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?
Lech Nijakowski: This is simply a chronic conflict that has lasted for decades, in fact since the establishment of the State of Israel, which had already chased out Palestinians at the outset. Palestinians themselves call it Nakba and consider the expulsion of respective 100 1000 people from their settlements and homes as genocide. I'm not in or out. Anyway, from the researcher's perspective, fresh events in Gaza are nothing new. This is another chapter of the conflict that unfortunately unites Israelis and Palestinians.
Today, the charge of genocide is increasingly repeated.
There are very different ways to talk about genocide, but the legal discourse is dominant, which is based on the definition of the UN Convention on the Prevention and punishment of Genocide Crimes.
From this point of view, Israel’s actions should not be considered genocide. It's a hard case, due to the fact that you usually interpret specified crimes morally, but we have the exact Legal definition of genocide: it's not just about killing, it's about killing a peculiar group, eliminating it as such. The creator of the concept of genocide Rafał Lemkin besides wrote about cultural genocide, but it never saw formal codification. In my opinion, this is simply a mistake, but legal acts are what they are, and on the basis of them it is hard to regulation on genocide.
However, there was a request from South Africa to the global Court of Justice, straight accusing Israel of genocide. Unwarranted?
Of course, there have been many crimes. You can calculate war crimes or crimes against humanity – they are already defined precisely, due to the fact that it is simply a category that was introduced during the Nuremberg trials and utilized to convict Nazi criminals.
As far as genocide is concerned, I don't think anyone can be charged with it right now. It is evident that the Israelis in this conflict for years sought to make hard surviving conditions, but did not deliberately kill to destruct the full group. Of course, they assumed that many Palestinians could be the victim of this conflict, and that did not worry them.
Maybe cultural cleansing would be a better word here.
Probably the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is closer to that logic. From the very beginning, 2 nations have been fighting for territory, and from this point of view, it is possible to talk about clearing occupied lands from another people, from strangers. So in this case, Palestinians.
As a result, there are crimes and this is uncontested. If we call it a secondary case. I would not say that genocide is taking place due to the fact that there is no intention of the citizens and the authorities of Israel. The South African proposal, of course, cites many arguments, but it is only ideology. Israel is not about genocide, especially erstwhile we call on the efforts of the various states that wanted to destruct a certain group. Genocide must pay the state, even in a twisted logic, and Israel knows that the planet would not accept it.
What about the concept mentioned earlier Cultural genocides? In Gaza, we have many cases of deliberate blowing up universities, destroying historical monuments, etc.
Some researchers straight cited Israel’s conduct toward the Palestinians as an example of cultural genocide, I think that many of the actions taken since the beginning of the State of Israel have indeed been of this nature, aimed at destroying the Palestinian Group on a symbolic, cultural level.
But as you explained, cultural genocide cannot be held accountable. What about the another crimes of Israel, is there any punishment?
In my opinion, no, due to the fact that this is simply a political matter, as always. It is not whether Israel commits crimes or whether it has committed crimes in the past, for example erstwhile it drove Palestinians out of their settlements in 1948. No substance what we call it, the question is whether a tribunal will sue Israel. In practice, it is besides crucial a state, primarily for the United States, so no 1 will put Israeli politicians and commanders before any court. This is simply a very sad, political fact.
In this context, what are Israeli leaders aiming at? Is war a goal in itself?
The Israelis want to preserve 1 nation and live in peace. No country wants war and Israel's actions are justified by these 2 basic aims. He finds war a sad necessity. any politicians may want that, but they do not flaunt their goals.
In practice, this leads to Palestinian suffering, but many Israeli citizens do not care. So here's the problem, man. What to do with citizens, civilians who endure during the war? due to the fact that they've always suffered and will suffer. There's no question about that. The conflict has been going on so long that common perception has changed. It was written by Daniel Bar-Tal, an Israeli social scientist whose book on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is yet available in Polish.
However, speaking of Israeli citizens, there is already a large Palestinian community (not counting Gaza and the West Bank), which besides leads to interior conflicts. Is there any chance that the conflict between the 2 groups in the areas controlled by Israel could be resolved?
I don't see a chance for reconciliation. This has already gone besides far – at this point the conviction that the another side must be killed is gaining strength. due to the fact that it would not look good on the global forum, alternatively you can crowd the another side in certain zones and let it vegetate there. For years we have had a very bad treatment of the Palestinians by Israel, a mostly spiritual state. And the reverse actions, the activities of muslim radicals, who have the support of people surviving in specified terrible conditions – not all but most.
We besides see the rations of both sides: Palestinians who want to live under human conditions, and Israeli citizens who want to live in peace. They don't want rockets falling on them. But so what? Even if we clearly see that any concessions must be made, I do not think that this will happen in the foreseeable future.
Since there is no specified conciliation initiative from within and will not be, does the global community have the chance to influence Israel and Palestine at all?
Who would do that? Since the six-day war, arabian states have in fact no longer been applicable as a origin in Israel's policy towards Palestine. Meanwhile, the United States doesn't see any interest in it. This is about what is called a "great policy", or alliance between the United States and Israel, on whose altar the Palestinians are laid. It has been, and it will be a long time.
But within Western societies We see expanding support for the Palestinian cause, besides in the US, where many Democrats criticize president Biden. Can specified force affect ruling policies?
I don't think so. If politicians were paid for an independent Palestinian state, they would have done it by now. It doesn't pay off and that's why he's gone. From a geopolitical point of view, it is clear that strong, militant Israel who has a strong army, pays for crucial global actors. Until this changes, nothing will change in the Palestinian situation, regardless of the protests.
The fact that extremist Hamas dominates Gaza is besides frequently utilized against Palestine. For this reason, before 7 October Israel tolerated Palestinian Islamists and even helped them to any extent, thus weakening the power of the Palestinian Authority.
It's clear. Radical Association on the 1 and the Other. They service each other. A extremist policy on the Palestinian side has always helped radicals on the Israeli side, in the earlier stages of the conflict. It besides works today, and in my opinion quite a few bad things have come from the fact that we now have specified a right-wing government in Israel. Netanyahu has a extremist policy, which, however, has large support from the Israelis.
In the chronic conflict, people can be persuaded to do this, as a result, intergroup perception changes, there is another psychology. Otherwise, we look from the outside at these events, or the people inside, Palestinians and Israelis see them. We can express our opinions, but the citizens of Israel and the Palestinians will specify the ongoing conflict in a very different way.
What, then, is the real intent of the ongoing intervention for the Israelites? The government talks about the defeat and disarmament of Hamas, but at the time of taking over the full Gaza zone, will Israel not decide to maintain, for example, a permanent military presence there?
Israel now has reason for very extremist action. It is hard to foretell the future, but Israel may argue that a permanent military presence is politically justified, militarily, etc. That's what I'm afraid of, due to the fact that that would be the beginning of a conflict for years.
To date, it has been more convenient for Israelis to separate the wall from the Gaza Strip. If they had mastered it, they would gotta start caring for people surviving there, for example, to deal with the terrible condition of the hospitals there. At least I hope they had to.
I don't think they want it, they wash their hands off akin duties to Palestinians, they'd alternatively leave Gaza alone. possibly that will change due to the fact that they're about to decide to have a military presence. There is surely very large possible for any solution that the Netanyahu government decides to do.
It can be said that he has a free hand in the country and internationally.
Surely the Israeli government would be criticized for certain actions, but alternatively without any serious repercussions, and Netanyahu is enough. So I fear that he will introduce any further regulation on the rights of the Palestinians and there will be no real force willing to halt him, because, in fact, long ago, Palestinians were laid on the altar of political relations.
What can Poland do in this context, if it can do anything at all?
It's terrible to say that, but Poland means very little. Of course, we think we're very important. No, we're not. The United States will not look at Poland in implementing its policies. We can say a lot, but nobody truly listens.
However, I think the minimum we can afford is humanitarian aid. There is no request to make any hard political decisions. You just gotta aid people. It's inactive possible and that's what we should be doing on a larger scale.
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Lech Nijakowski – Dr. hab., prof. of the university at the Faculty of Sociology of the University of Warsaw, permanent advisor to the Commission of National and cultural Minorities of the Sejm of Poland since 2001 associate of the editorial board “Humanistic Review”, “Social and Political Studies. fresh series’ and ‘Reviews’. He late published: The pleasance of revenge. Historical Sociology of Genocide Mobilization (Scientific Publishing Scholar, 2013), The planet after the apocalypse. Society in the light of post-apocalyptic texts of popular culture (Scholar technological Publishing, 2018) and Genocide. past and sociology of human destructiveness. Popular Introduction (Iskry Publishing, 2018)
