On the Necessity of a Civil Society Tribunal for the Gaza Genocide
IN FOCUS, 30 Dec 2024
Prof. Syed Sikander Mehdi – TRANSCEND Media Service
Syed Sikander Mehdi on Richard Falk’s Piece: Why a Civil Society Tribunal on Gaza Genocide Is Necessary
28 Dec 2024 – I have read Professor Richard Falk’s write-up on Civil Society Tribunal on Gaza Genocide very carefully and I am grateful to him for agreeing to lead the Tribunal. All those, like me, who are a bit aware of his life-long struggle against injustice, fascism and violence of all kinds and who have read some of the brilliant and ground-breaking studies authored by him, know that he is a fearless public intellectual and his leadership of the Tribunal will earn worldwide credibility for this very timely initiative.
The tragedy of Gaza needs to be transformed into a powerful force by the peace visionaries, peace educators and peace activists – a kind of force which would announce the irrelevance of the world order and regional order based on military power, benefiting the powerful states and powerful media houses and weapon manufacturing, weapon selling and weapon buying countries. This announcement can be made by the Tribunal on Genocide in Gaza. The Tribunal would also be required to demythologize the division of the world between pro-Israeli and pro-Palestinian/ pro-Arab constituencies or between the West and the rest. Such divisions justify wars, violence and arms race, empower autocratic regimes and legitimize global plundering. All this has to change and the world needs to be told that the real struggle is between the global humans and global anti-humans and as the global humans belong to all regions, religions and cultures so the global anti-humans belong to all regions, religions and cultures.
In this context, it is important that the statements, findings and records of the Tribunal should present in great detail the atrocities committed by the perpetrators of violence in Gaza and in the neighboring territories and countries and condemn the trend of resolving issues through military aggression in the Middle East and elsewhere The Tribunal should also identify the countries which shielded and overlooked the genocide, and the countries which remained more busy in appeasing the aggressor and remaining silent. In addition, it should highlight the civil society constituencies which have been raising voices against war and violence in Gaza and the West Bank, Israel, Lebanon, Yemen, Syria, etc. However, if the Tribunal tries to put velvety covers on the recent events in the Middle East or functions merely as a fact-finding body, suggests that let bygone be bygone and advices all the concerned parties to forget everything and move forward, then the Tribunal would surely miss out a role history is offering to it. Again, if a peace is forced on Gaza and other territories by condoning the military aggression, the peace established would eventually turn out to be what the late Professor and Author David Fromkin called: ‘A Peace to End All Peace’.
Dear Richard! Please ensure that you and your team would recommend a kind of peace that would diminish violence and hatred in the poisoned Middle Eastern and Muslim region and not another false peace. Good luck and good wishes to you and your team, and a Very Happy New Year to all.
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Prof. Syed Sikander Mehdi is the former chairperson of the Department of International Relations at the University of Karachi. Educated at the University of Dhaka and Australian National University, he is a leading peace educator being the first to introduce courses on peace studies in the public and private universities of Pakistan. His works on culture of peace, violence/nonviolence, nuclear weapons, forced migration, and on museums for peace have been published in Pakistan and abroad. Email: sikander.mehdi@gmail.com
Tags: Crimes against Humanity, Culture of Violence, Direct violence, Ethnic Cleansing, Gaza, Gaza Tribunal, Genocide, Israel, Justice, Middle East, Muslims, Palestine, USA, War Economy, War crimes, War of Terror, War on Terror, West
This article originally appeared on Transcend Media Service (TMS) on 30 Dec 2024.
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