Ideology and violence
by
Abderraouf Ounaies
Vulnerable nations are prone to exalt their specific differences and to identify themselves with heroic legends, divine legitimacy and transcendent privileges over the rest of mankind. A legitimate feeling of exaltation, when based on a symbolic act deep-rooted in history or culture, could easily turn into abnormal doctrines and transpolitical strategies. In the Middle East, a chain of events has built up a series of ideologies of that kind. So long as they affect the political culture within the domestic arena, they only breach universal principles and democratic standards, and degenerate into a source of aggression and violence when other nations fall victim to such aberrations.
The Israeli representative to the Peace Process Steering Group, then Deputy Foreign Minister Yossi Beilin, advocated such an ideology when he openly stated, during a meeting in Montebello, Canada, in February 1994, that “the Israeli government was not ready to endorse the principle of equal status for the peoples of the region.” He repeated the same pledge at two successive meetings in Cairo in January 1995 and in Montreux, Switzerland, in May 1995. Within the peace process, this stand prevented the adoption of the Steering Group Guidelines and proceeded also to block the Arms Control and Regional Security (ACRS) Working Group Statement of Principles. The doctrine is not confined to the negotiating table alone. Indeed the Israeli government has enforced it through a number of acts and practices in the field such as:
- denial of political rights, and discriminatory practices against the Palestinians;
- use of fait accompli within the territory of neighboring states;
- annexation of territories and confiscation of aquifers;
- claiming privileges regarding the nature and quality of armaments;
- claiming non-equal status with regard to international conventions and treaties.
We are all aware of the cost to Europe and the world when a European government adopted the principle of non-equality as its basic national ideology. And the more so when this ideology is combined with huge military potential. We are also aware of the consequences of that ideology on the people it concerns as well as the suffering inflicted upon those who fall under the yoke of military occupation by that government.
Whatever its justification--religious, historic or racial--an ideology based on the principle of superiority stems from another era and denies the singular and basic concept of mankind that is the hallmark of our present day civilization. Apart from the fact that it upsets the balance of the ordinary citizen, it implies a series of consequences in the regional and international arena.
The conviction of a transcendent ideology helps to legitimize inhuman violence and the unlimited use of force. Furthermore when this ideology traces its legitimacy to a divine source, it can then provide a plausible justification for the destitution of neighboring peoples, the confiscation of their land and resources, and the crushing of their resistance. It can also be advocated to delegitimize counterclaims for respecting the law and human rights. Only an ideology of transcendence can encompass such strategies, together with the unscrupulous elimination of scores of human beings.
The danger of an ideology of superiority does not lay only in taking over Palestinian and Syrian land and the containment of both peoples, but also in achieving a status of regional supremacy. Two consequences derive from this option: regional domination lays the ground for segregation and confrontation which results in a permanent state of alert and readiness to react to outbursts of anger and acts of resistance. The cost of maintaining and defending such a position is always disproportionately high. Besides its domestic cost, this policy means that the neighboring peoples are required to recognize a “special status” for Israel; it is only at that price that regional normalization will be possible. However, a special status is indeed offensive morally, unrealistic politically and untenable diplomatically.
A special status means not only the pursuit of indefinite confrontation with the neighboring states but, above all, a challenge to the international community. The conflict is not developing in a vacuum; the attempt to impose a unilateral manner of settlement raises--beyond the legitimate resistance of the direct victims--the opposition of the international community, which ought to act in keeping with international law. The belief in transcendent ideology may be a way of asserting national identity; it should not be a way of eschewing international legality.
Respect for other nations and for their specific identity and culture is part of the civilization of our time in as much as those nations comply with recognized, basic and universal principles. It may not substitute international legality, which is basic and binding to all. The principle of equal rights has a fundamental link with international peace and security and clearly illustrates the concept of normalcy and dignity in any civilized society. This was the case for the white community of South Africa after decades of an ideology based on superiority.
National ideology based on religion has become a political substratum for many peoples all over the region. As an expression of religious absolutism, it is inconsistent with a culture of pluralism, tolerance and universal values, which are the premises for mutual respect and regional cooperation among nations of different faiths and cultures. Since the election of the first Likud government in June 1977, religious extremism has expanded from Israel to Iran and thereafter, to other neighboring Islamic and Christian societies, all along the south and north Mediterranean. These movements use violence in their effort to replace secular governments with theocratic regimes determined to fight the rival extremisms and to revive the exclusivist values of their religion, using terror, assassination and sacrifice. Jewish and Arab societies can free themselves from the blind and violent cycle of intertwined dogmatism and archaism. They could develop a political culture based on principles consistent with the universal values of our time.
The challenge to violence in our region relates to the principles of rationality, normality and modernity. This means endorsing international legality, acceding to moral and political rules consistent with the universally admitted values and standards of our time. This means also admitting equal status with other human societies. The insertion of these principles in the ethos of the Middle East would ensure a process of normalization leading to the reduction of extremism and the overcoming of enmity and violence. It would give the region a chance for redemption, harmonious development and mutual respect in keeping with the respective faiths and cultures. Only through the process of normalization can Israeli and Arab societies be appeased and be made to transcend the destructive structure of confrontation and antagonism.
We find in the Barcelona Declaration of November 1995 these simple answers to our regional dilemma: “The Participants undertake to…:
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