The Strategy of Terrorism

 After writing eleven volumes of his book The Story of Civilization, American philosopher Will Durant was asked what he had learned from such a thorough history study. "The greatest lesson we learn from history is that we don't learn from history," he stated. How apt.  This truth is best illustrated by Israel's ongoing genocide in Gaza. The arguments advanced in support of Israel's heinous genocide of Palestinians are nearly identical to those used by Nazi collaborators against Jews. The same rationale applies to genocide as self-defense against an existential threat. Hitler claimed that Jews, a small group of German citizens at the time, posed an existential threat to the German people and nation. Israel claims it faces an “existential threat” from Hamas, a tiny “terrorist” organization with 20,000 fighters, according to Israel intelligence.

 Israel has a total of 626,000 soldiers, including 170,000 active soldiers and 465,000 reservists. With nuclear weapons, advanced aircraft, drones, tanks, etc. backed by an annual budget of $37.4 billion, among the largest in the world.  In fact, in per capita terms, Israel’s defense spending is double that of the USA, the biggest spender in the world.  Not to mention that the United States of America provides Israel with $30 billion in funding for its war against Hamas since October 7, 2023. Israel is supported by Middle Eastern nations like Jordan and Egypt in addition to receiving funding from the UK and the EU. By any stretch of the imagination, it is absurd to assert that the minuscule Hamas poses an existential threat to Israel. The barbaric and sadistic violence with which Israel bombs Palestinians and starves Palestinians renders Hitler's pogrom insignificant. Leaving the SS to carry out the genocide against Jews, many German officers refused to carry it out. German citizens were only indirectly complicit in the Holocaust, which was conducted in concentration camps away from them.  It is beyond my comprehension that a civilized people such as the Israelis and their highly civilized allies in the United States and Europe can commit this genocide in Gaza in front of our very eyes. It is then that I remember that all genocides I have read about have been carried out by these very same “civilized” people.

 For instance, these "civilized people" committed genocide against native Americans, Canadians, and Australians. Like Israelis today, the settlers came and exterminated the local population and robbed their land.  These "civilized people" were responsible for hundreds of massacres and pogroms, the Congo genocide by King Leopold of Belgium, the Nama and Herero people of Namibia, the Banyoro people of Uganda, the Shona and Ndebele people of Zimbabwe, and the Kikuyu people of Kenya. Sven Lindquist, a Swedish travel writer, demonstrates in his book Exterminate all the Brutes that the "Enlightenment" was the source of the intellectual justifications for these colonial genocides. Their arguments were presented in Western societies' most prestigious venues, such as parliaments, universities, think tanks, and books. Contrary to popular belief, Hitler was not an anomaly. Lindquist demonstrates that his thoughts and deeds were in line with what these "civilized people" taught, heard, learned, believed, and did to native peoples in other parts of the world. The difference between Hitler and other European leaders of the time is that he chose to carry out his genocide in continental Europe and against fellow Europeans of Jewish faith and ethnicity.  Basically, he held a mirror in front of Europeans for them to see themselves, and they didn’t like what they saw.  In this sense, therefore, Hitler was the least racist of the Europeans.  He did not believe that having white skin exempted one from genocide.  The extermination of indigenous peoples in Africa, North and Latin America, Australia, and other places was acceptable to all of his contemporaries, who could then rest comfortably. Today, evil men like Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Amin, and others are mentioned, but King Leopold, who killed 20 million Congolese, is not mentioned. The presidents of the United States who were responsible for the extinction of over 70 million Native Americans are not mentioned. There is no mention of any of the leaders of France, the UK, the Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, etc., under whose leadership native peoples in other parts of the world were exterminated.  This selective indignation is the real racism we see in our world today.

 This brings us back to Israel's heinous acts of violence and genocide in Gaza and how they relate to historical lessons. In 1975, David Fromkin published in the Foreign Affairs journal an article titled “The Strategy of Terrorism,” from which the title of this column is derived.  Fromkin examined three "terrorist organizations": the Irgun, which opposed British rule in favor of Israel's independence; the FLN, which opposed French rule in favor of Algeria's independence; and another, which opposed British rule in favor of Ireland's independence. Interestingly, Israel employed terrorism to gain her statehood, just as Hamas is doing.

 The major point by Fromkin is that “terrorism is violence employed to create fear, but it is aimed at creating fear so that the fear will, in turn, lead someone else—not the terrorist—to embark on some quite different program of action that will accomplish whatever it is that the terrorist really desires.”  In short, terrorism seeks to elicit action from the government.  It is the reaction of the government that enables the terrorist to achieve their aims.

 For instance, Fromkin argues, an ordinary murderer will kill someone because he wants that person dead.  However, the terrorist will shoot someone even though the individual's life or death is completely irrelevant. The terrorist would shoot somebody to provoke a brutal government reaction.  It is this reaction that will mobilise public opinion against the government.  This is what Osama Bin Laden lured the USA into on 9/11.  The USA overreacted by invading Afghanistan and Iraq and bombing Pakistan, etc.

 After October 7, Jo Biden flew to Tel Aviv and advised Benjamin Netanyahu not to overreact like the USA had done.  Instead, the Israeli Prime Minister overreacted in a manner that was worse than what the United States had done. The result is that the entire world has forgotten October 7 as they witness this merciless, sadistic genocide in Gaza.  The Palestinian cause has never been more popular anywhere in the world than it is today. Hamas has unquestionably achieved a strategic victory here.