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avenger-hawk · 2 years

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(genocide anon again) "the Uchiha genocide is a war crime that must be punished. Sasuke and the others needs therapy. We must help them and give them justice, not by writing fix-it fics but by calling out all those who are ok with this systemic injustice and exploitation of underage characters" that's stupid wtf? Because like... these are Shinobi? The existence of Shinobi like that in a real-world scenario would be unethical. But like beyond that, it's like... So Shinobi literally exist to carry out the "dirty" work of fire country and it's daimyo. And ANBU carry the dirtiest of dirty work. Assassination and Clan Elimination orders are par for course I'd assume, what makes the Uchiha Massacre "special" is that it's a) a pretty large clan, b) one of the main clans c) one of the founding clans of Konoha. (And what makes it a "genocide" is that it meets the UN definition of one but I don't think Narutoverse has a UN or the Armenian genocide, Simele Massacre and Holocaust which led to the coning of the word genocide.)

And like, what makes it "special" and more or less "horrifying" to the people in Naruto was that again, it was against one of the main & founding clans of Konoha. Which means that if this wasn't just "itachi snapping and testing his strength" as was said publicly, that meant that the same could happen to the Hyuuga, to the Inuzuka, to the Nara , to the Ino etc. How much of a bloodline limit, skilset or influence was "too much power" to warrant the elimination of a major clan? That could threaten or even collapse the entire clan system of Konoha. Heck if the hokage (and not Danzo bcs if that happened he'd definitely be killed, either by order of the hokage so he wouldn't have to deal with all the other clans or by assassination by one of the clans) went and 'publicly' (very flexible definition of publicly) ordered the extermination of the Uchiha, he'd probably face an insurrection led by every major clan because that'd be considered an active threat to all of these clans.

The outrage wouldn't be over the fact that it was a clan elimination order, they're shinobi and that's ANBU they've probably carried out similar orders at the request of the daimyo. What would cause the outrage is that it's a major clan and a bit over that it was a clan of konoha. But even then, if the Daimyo ordered the death of a small clan in Konoha and the task was given to one of the ANBU to carry it out, they'd be unhappy about it sure, but they'd understand.

Another sticking point would be that the order was given to someone of the clan to carry it out. This wouldn't normally happen, because that's just inviting treason. If you wanted to inspire disloyalty in your shinobi, that's what you'd do. I'm assuming that the Uchiha were a special case in that they were too powerful as clan to have a non-uchiha carry out the massacre — in that non-uchiha shinobi would've failed and been killed.

But like, yeah, they're shinobi. Assassination and elimination orders aren't all that new to them, that's what they do. That's the job. It's that it's one of Konoha's major clans that makes this event "special".

And like sure, I like to think of Sasuke and even Naruto (the destruction of Uzushio) as survivors/remants of genocide. But that's more on the... loss, loss of people sure but also loss of heritage and those who could teach you it. The disconnect with the 'culture'. The dying traditions... etc.

I like to explore these things.

But harassing people over a massacre in The Ninja Anime is... stupid.

(genocide anon, if that wasn't clear)

*****

Yeah I don’t like to engage in discussions that compare the Naruto universe with the real world and even if you apparently say you don’t either it’s exactly what’s happening here?

Ofc like I said it’s stupid to use real world arguments for a universe where war is normal, children go to shinobi academy and fight in said wars, it’s ok to put an orphan in an apartment to fend for himself and it sure ain’t no therapy or UN (which, since you mentioned, didn’t even recognize all real world genocides, like Ukraine’s Holodomor) and no one cares about what defines a genocide.

I don’t understand why ppl can’t accept the Naruto universe as it is...countries are ruled by Daimyos, that rely on shinobi for protection, espionage, war and whatever else. So ofc shinobi do the dirty work, there are also samurai but they’re less relevant than shinobi, because their universe is more reliant on sneaky manoeuvres, forbidden techniques and so on.

The Uchiha clan was incredibly powerful and probably always feared and thus at some moment the discrimination started, they decided to rebel against this and in this context Danzo used Konoha’s fear and intolerance towards them to convince the other elders and Hiruzen that the only solution was to destroy the whole clan, using Itachi. Maybe because only an Uchiha could kill others, maybe because he didn’t want other Konoha shinobi to get their hands dirty with such a horrible command.

Ofc it’s horrible to lose one’s clan, traditions and identity and Sasuke held tight to what he remembered of them. Naruto didn’t have anything to remember so he suffered for different reasons, like being lonely. Sasuke remembered so he suffered the loss of everything he knew, had and loved.

(It’s very clear who you are...I guess what’s less clear is that I don’t believe anons saying they’re genocide survivors. If in the beginning I told myself to just leave hints of my distrust. Then I tried to give you the benefit of the doubt but the way ‘genocide anon’ became your identity looks like you kinda found the perfect label to be a tumblr special snowflake. Not my problem, but I don’t want to interact with liars. I prefer “simple” nobodys)

#vivalarevolution #also idk. maybe my english is bad and ppl don't understand me?#sorry if I sound harsh but I am triggered by liars right now and I don't want any around #y'all can be triggered by the sight of whatever? I am triggered by fake #also. there are ways to tell a lie in a more convincing way. I know cause I was lied to a lot. this is not convincing #ofc in your own blog you can do whatever you want and invent all the things you prefer...it's just that...with me...it doesnt work

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voices-in-space · 5 years

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Assyrian refugees in Tall Tamr, 1939. Tall Tamr was settled in the 1930s by Assyrian refugees fleeing the Simele massacre. Photos by John David.

#tall tamr #assyrian #refugees #refugee #john david #humanitarian #photography #history

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badmousestuff-blog · 5 years

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Unheard Voices of WANA

PragerU: The most persecuted population in the world are Christians

Prager U is correct.

SUBSCRIBERS: 0

Ok, jokes aside, this is a serious topic, I hope you watch till the end.

Last month CPGB-ML released this reactionary article, it’s been a common trend of their online presence and really stinks, but then I also remind myself I am in a left that is no longer respectful of these vulgar, outdated gestures, and the left of today truly is a very progressive bunch. We fight for the rights of gendered minorities, stand with people at the forefront of racial oppression, far outside simply the economic realms. They say that oppressions align, and when you look at the left of today, you really see that.

But as time goes on, there can be a tendency for our viewpoints to become clouded with a prevailing dogma.

This is a video about one of them.

This is West Asia [or “the Middle East”] and North Africa, a region collectively termed WANA or MENA, it is home to many different ethnicities that are not of Arab Origin. Some you know, some you don’t. Within here are numerous ethno-religious minorities. Assyrian Christians, Coptic Christians, Yazidis, Mandaeans, just to name a few.

2 years ago, Caabu did a study to find out the nature of racial profiling in the UK. Only 1% of respondents listed the Middle East as being linked with Christianity.

Image:https://i.imgur.com/JHYsKPj.png

Source:https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/racial-profiling-british-people-muslims-arabs-support-security-anti-terrorism-attacks-survey-caabu-a7966666.html

The on the ground reality is that millions of Christians live and breathe in the Crescent, it is after all the birthplace of the Yahweh religion.

Contrary to the very bland, pastiche Christianity that tends to fill the Western temples, Christianity in the WANA is distinctive in being very diverse. To the followers, the faith is particularly sacred and, in many times, a physical part of their identity, in a similar way to how Irish Catholicism in the north might be.

Images to use:

http://www.just-images.com/media/k2/items/cache/768cfd00cdf8b0455e0493699392583d_XL.jpg?t=-62169984000

There are maybe somewhere around 16 million Christians in West Asia, a number that has been gradually decreasing throughout the 20thcentury, and largely this is due to a considerable amount of persecution and repression, including genocide, and within all this, they have very little access to representation.

Source:https://harpers.org/archive/2018/12/the-vanishing-christians-in-iraq-syria-egypt/

Which to PragerU’s credit, they’re right, when we’re talking about religious minorities, Christians are one of the most highly persecuted. But I know that these people are being insincere here. Dennis and his entourage represent, or at least promote, is what could only be described as the white man’s Christianity, the collective Western tradition of Imperial, Crusading, Nation conquering religion of Manifest Destiny and Got Miht Us [what is this? Couldn’t find anything on google]. Malcolm X was not wrong when hecalled Christianity a white man’s religion - that was all he could see at the time. And all of these people’s religious conceptions would appear highly unorthodox if they were to ever go and visit these groups.

Yet how often is it that you see right-wing commentators and outlets picking up on Christian oppression in the global south to regurgitate their hatred and vitriol and encourage further discrimination against Muslims in the west [Show following tweets]:

https://twitter.com/PrisonPlanet/status/953302360637493248

https://twitter.com/KTHopkins/status/1058426287948218368

https://twitter.com/StefanMolyneux/status/993593881341059072

Just a quick search on Breitbart, and you’ll see how many times they’ve covered the plight of Assyrians and Copts alike [show screenshots]:

https://i.imgur.com/VM3DnAg.png

https://i.imgur.com/CMi3eyo.png

And when right-wingers do resort to the lowest of the low of arguments (whataboutism) in order to get their points across, the Left responds in a very appropriate and effective manner… (gurning)

“What about the crusades?”

I can’t be the only one thinking this…

There’s a contradiction here that we need to talk about.

On the one hand, we’re advocates of intersectionality and dynamics of oppression, looking out for the nuances of thought and removing ourselves from binary choices and assumptions. But on the other, we can’t help getting away from very Euro-centric conceptions of various topics. In other words, we do choose binaries here.

Christian = Oppressor

Muslim = Victim

Many Western leftists tend to look at religion through this lens. They incorrectly view Christianity as a global oppressor, completely overlooking the many cases where this isn’t the case and thus ignoring many groups who are severely marginalized, particularly when it comes to some indigenous groups like Assyrians and Copts.

When discourse gets going, it picks up like a steamroller. And after a while, we forget about the fact that we’re just regurgitating a dogma.

For us, “Islamophobia is racism” might be fine to say, because we realize that in Western society, Islam is heavily racialized and so those that may “look Muslim” are also targeted. But often, expressing this to a WANA Christian can rightly come off as reductionist, especially when that’s the few times they’re given attention here in the West. Add this onto the fact that when WANA Christians want to speak up about their oppression, they’re often accused of being racist themselves, along with other accusations of bad faith.

how the criticism and mentioning of muslim persecution towards christians [?] is all seen as islamophobia = racism which to them is fine but to us its scrutiny - the wording of the first line

Just as Islam has largely been racialized in the west, the same formula applies to Muslim majority nations regarding how Christianity is viewed. When attacks are caused in the west by Islamists, Muslims in the area are rightly quite terrified and anxious about upcoming reprisals that might be made against them. We do not, however, see why an attack from a White Supremacist against Muslims would also result in a similar effect to Christians in the East. Even though Religion might not even be uttered in these atrocities, Anti-West rhetoric has been heating up over the last 70 years, and with it the false assumption that Christianity is intrinsically Western. The result has been the demonization of WANA Christians as 5thcolumns to western Imperialism.

The effects of the Left’s lack of vigour can be observed. quite harshly.

Assyrian Christians are one of those ethno religious minorities indigenous to the region and have faced over a century of persecution and genocide.

Many of us know about the Armenian genocide of 1915 by the Ottomans – which is still denied by Turkey today, and still not recognized in the UK and US . But what many of us don’t know is that at least 300,000 Assyrians were also victims, alongside the Armenians.

· Images:https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/images/large/5ff06342-7a14-4ce6-89d2-c59a04deb676.jpg

A book that discusses the 1915 Assyrian genocide in detail is Year of the Swordby Joseph Yacoub:https://global.oup.com/academic/covers/pop-up/9780190633462

In 1933, in the village of Simele in Iraq, after waves of anti-Assyrian propaganda, the Iraqi Army slaughtered 6,000 Assyrians and decimated over 60 villages.

Image: https://i0.wp.com/www.nationalreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/simele-massacre-survivors.jpg?resize=789%2C460&ssl=1

Sources:

https://medium.com/@DeadmanMax/the-simele-massacre-in-iraq-a-legacy-of-trauma-and-british-neglect-ae21d96afe4d

https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/07/simele-massacre-1933-assyrian-victims-still-seek-justice/

Both the atrocities of 1915 and the Simele Massacre in 1933 is what prompted Polish lawyer Raphael Lemkin to later coin the word ‘genocide’.

Image of Lemkin:https://www.ushmm.org/m/img/2453436-700x468.jpg

After the assassination of Iraqi Prime Minister Abdul al-Karim Qasim (KASIM) in 1963, the following decades saw the rise of Saddam Hussein and his Baath Party in Iraq, and what came with it was a new wave of violent anti-Communism. Many communists were killed and imprisoned, effectively culling the Iraqi Communist Party – of which a sizable percentage at the time were Assyrian. In fact, the party’s first secretary was an Assyrian named Yusuf Salman Yusuf, who was found hung over a decade prior, on 14thFebruary 1949.

Image of Qasim:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abd_al-Karim_Qasim

Image of Yusuf:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yusuf_Salman_Yusuf

Source:https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/alexander-a/2008/xx/iraqcp.html

With this, and general increasing repression towards their identity, thousands of Assyrians fled the country between the 60s and 70s.

The most recent mass exodus was from the Iraq War. In 2003, there were around 1.5 million Assyrian Christians in Iraq. That number is now less than 275,000. It was only five years ago [2014] that IS committed a genocide. Christian homes were marked with the Arabic letter “N” [show image] for Nazarene, to denote Christians, followers of Jesus of Nazareth.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/for-christians-symbol-of-mideast-oppression-becomes-source-of-solidarity/

The population of Assyrians is now between 2 - 4 million, with most of them in the diaspora. There are half a million across Europe, Australia and Canada, and around 400,000 in the US.

https://unpo.org/members/7859

The lack of vigour in the west to understand their plight and the plight of other minorities can be felt severely.

A large portion of the diaspora in the US were supportive of Donald Trump during the 2016 election, a politician who appears to be completely against their interests, the very group that would be the first on the pecking order of deportation. And in due course, that is what the reality has been for them, now after putting in their pledge to live and work, they are now thrown asunder and betrayed by whom they thought they could trust.

Yet just as the opportunity might arise for a show of solidarity, left wingers from across the spectrum were largely silent, and many liberals even said they deserved to get deported, effectively defending their genocide. Did anyone even think about asking their story?

[show initial tweet, and responses to it]

https://twitter.com/VivianHYee/status/882599546244747264

and the comments here:

[show article, then the comments]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2017/06/27/detroit-judge-halts-deportations-of-more-than-1400-iraqi-nationals-nationwide/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.46e259345883#comments

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2017/09/michigans-iraqi-chaldean-community-is-fighting-to-protect-dozens-of-people-from-deportation.html

We [western leftists and liberals] further egg on this anti-Christian backlash in the way we discuss these topics via previously mentioned binaries. For instance, take a look at the travel ban. Eventually, it hurt everyone in the region, regardless of its initial intent to target Muslims. Liberals, instead of taking on a general anti-xenophobic stance, instead increased anti-Christian sentiment by mocking the insertment of preferences towards Christians (which again, never materialized). Take a look at the way that John Oliver and Stephen Colbert discussed the travel ban, for example. And while trying to mock Republican politicians, Colbert inadvertently mocked Syriac patriarchs and made off-handed comments about them and their language.

“While his administrationhas reducedMuslim refugee arrivals 93 percent compared to the final months of the Obama administration, it has still slashed Christian refugees 64 percent. He has also cut Syrian Christian refugee arrivals by 94 percent and those from Iraq by 99 percent. He has admitted just 20 Syrian Christians in all of Fiscal Year 2018.”

Source:https://www.cato.org/blog/trump-has-cut-christian-refugees-64-muslim-refugees-93

Source 2:https://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2018/08/13/trump-admits-only-23-christian-refugees-from-mideast-in-2018/#175295838dd7

The right has been the stickler when it comes to appropriating leftist talking points, as I’ve spoken about numerous times. The EU used to be a more conservative tradition, opposed by many factions of the left including Tony Benn, but after sections of the Right-Wing discourse took it by their shoulders all the left could seem to do was go “No, EU good” in response. The EU is an undemocratic monolithic entity that controls large hegemony over the continent. This is what the left has always been against, and how we seem to have been shuffled into the Pro-EU corner to own the Right is baffling, how dare we allow them to take charge of the narrative.

Many on twitter were stunned a while back with the revelation that Alt-right youtuber Braving Ruin, formerly EdgySphinx, was of Egyptian descent, in other words he’s not white, in a movement almost entirely made up of White Nationalists this seems like a baffling contradiction. It’s not.

He’s a Copt. Another Christian minority native to Egypt that have been increasingly targeted in recent years <quickly show various screenshots of articles from NPR and others about this to prove the point>.

In November 2018, seven Copts were killed by gunmen and 19 more were wounded. “All but one of those killed were members of the same family, according to a list of the victims’ names released by the Coptic Orthodox church, which said among the dead were a boy and a girl, age 15 and 12 respectively.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/nov/03/egypt-attack-gunmen-kill-coptic-christians-bus-ambush

It was from Braving Ruin’s own testimony that we find what led him towards the right was very much so a conflict of his knowledge.

Because for all we try and ignore the issue, these groups are dying. There isn’t that convenient option for the displaced, vulnerable diaspora, coming to a place where they no longer fear being lynched. For them, when they arrive to see a Left whose only regurgitated knowledge has been Eurocentric, they gravitate towards the side that is saying “The Left hate Christianity”. While this might sound silly to you, these minorities don’t have that privilege. And when the right-wing are the only ones talking about their issues, with mostly silence or dismissal from the left, what more would you expect?

We’re not even presenting faux dramatizations of anger. We’re completely turning our back to their voices in favour of pleasing narratives.

One of those narratives that has sprung up in recent years been the conflict in Northern Syria. There can be a good case made for Kurdish autonomy, and this is in part something that has galvanised support from Leftists in the West towards the issue. Yet it ignores that there are serious issues with the new governments and hegemonies that have taken root, going far beyond US funding.

You may have seen the images below of protests breaking out in Northern Syria against the school closures. (Show Images)

PYD authorities ordered the closure of Assyrian schools that refused to teach the DFNS-Rojava curriculum on August 7th, 2018. Members of the Assyrian security force, Sutoro, opened fire to disperse the crowds, but were overwhelmed. (Show Video)

https://www.assyrianpolicy.org/news/assyrians-in-syria-protest-pyd-s-closure-of-schools-in-qamishli

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOS5VKckUpA

Western leftists, rather than question the establishment, instead drew attention to the flags that they were holding. Those are Syrian government flags yes, but it does not mean they are fanatical supporters. In the essence of oppression, anti-Imperialism requires the use of certain representatives as a rallying cry, which is the very reason why Assad still has so much support.

https://www.assyrianpolicy.org/news/kurdish-self-administration-in-syria-release-assyrian-journalist-souleman-yusph

http://www.asianews.it/news-en/Christian-journalist,-betrayed-by-the-indifference-of-the-West-over-Syria-45312.html

Despite the oft claimed assertion of the progressive and inclusive constitution, we should know by now that on paper does not always mean in practice, actual reports from the ground level by Assyrians are skeptical to a high degree. The school protests have come after a series of attempts to impose an aggressive series of actions largely targeted at minority groups, including seizure and occupation of property, forced reparation payments, and all manner of targeting and assaults.

On paper, the MFS (Syriac Military Council) are allied with the PYD. But were you aware that the council is mostly made up of Arabs and Kurds, not Assyrians? And that the groups claimed to have been showcased as examples of Syriac-Kurdish unity are in fact on the fringes of Assyrian opinion?

In a similar situation, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq have forcibly removed mayors and are occupying Assyrian towns. Assyrians have protested consistently, to, again, little coverage or outrage on an international level.

Image:https://www.worldwatchmonitor.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Assyrians-outside-the-Kurdisch-Regional-Government-office-in-Stockholm-protest-against-the-removal-of-the-Assyrian-mayor-of-Alqosh-north-Iraq-e1501247282519.jpg

Source:

http://www.aina.org/reports/erasingassyrians.pdf

We can talk romantically about the Kurds. But why should their self-determination come at the expense of Assyrians?

As Westerners we have this privilege, we can pick what we like from the orient, but ignore the darker sides of the conflict. Anti-Imperialism is a no brainer, but there can be a tendency amongst some leftists to end up ignoring how imperialism often affects the most vulnerable – indigenous and minority groups. It’s not “too complicated” to talk about this. There’s also the case of generally just needing to listen women and minorities without an immediate assumption they all have an alternative, reactionary agenda. They do have a voice, big and small, and the least we could do is respect that in line with our standards.

And we may also want to even look at our standards in how we might engage with folks who have not regretted their participation in butchery vs the coverage of the Yazidis who who have faced a very recent genocide.

There was recent discussion surrounding a British ISIS bride who was extensively interviewed by a variety of Western outlets, portraying her as a victim. Yet she had no regrets for what she did to communities ISIS subjugated via violence. Western narcissism gave this ISIS bride more coverage than to victims of genocide like Yazidis, who recently protested outside the White House [show tweet]. Again, the only coverage given to them was except from far-right outlets [show breitbart article].

https://twitter.com/Free_Yezidi/status/1106623531939438597

https://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2019/03/19/trump-admin-yazidi-protest-outside-white-house-youre-not-forgotten/

I don’t make this video with the intention of bringing about more hatred towards Muslims, yet I can’t help but feel disheartened that this is even assumed. There arenuances we need to start to come to terms with, that will include understanding the different power and privilege dynamics outside of the West, and how that might affect the mindset of the diaspora. Some leftists say this is too complicated to discuss, but it never stopped you before.

You must be able to breach the topic of understanding both Western Islamophobia, and Islamism in the Middle East, without caving into a Western reactionary narrative or allowing right-wingers to continue to fill up the void in these discussions, which they already have done so quite successfully.

So, it’s time we as leftists take back these narratives and rectify our ignorance on the situation instead of continuing to allow the right-wing to dominate this. It’s simply not right to ignore this problem because “conservatives already talk about it”, when we know their intentions are not for the betterment of all, especially when it comes to the oppressed. We cannot grow as a movement when we are pushing so many people away.

So how can we help? The first thing would be to remove Eurocentric understandings of race and religion from our mind, to realize how dynamics work in the global south. And as with everything else, keep up with what’s going on in the region, discuss these issues with your friends, family, comrades. Use your platform to raise awareness. Reach out to and listen to these people and don’t speak over them or use them as props for ideological or partisan fighting.

It may feel good to say, “Jesus was a brown Jewish socialist from the Middle East!” as a “gotcha” to the Conservatives, but we know they don’t really care about that, and more to the point what are you doing for the Christians of the region right now?

Organize with them, declare statements of solidarity, make this a part of your activism. Let them know you’re there for them when they need it. These are marginalized, oppressed people with real, pressing concerns, and deserve more than token appreciation.

The left has brought about, in recent times, a grand spectrum of inclusivity to more oppressed groups. If it wishes to continue this line, then we must start strengthening ourselves and asking the difficult questions. There need not be any slander of groups here. 1 can be split into 2, and we must break away from our Eurocentric understanding of global geo-politics in all aspects if we are to build ourselves and our credibility to the larger world.

Like I said, its never stopped you before.

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rojinfo · 2 years

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Un couple arménien refuse de quitter leur village de Tall Tamr malgré les attaques turques

Malgré la poursuite des bombardements turcs sur les villages syriaques de la vallée du Khabour, un couple arménien restent fidèles à leur maison du village de Tall Juma’a, dans la campagne de Tall Tamr. S’adressant à l’agence de presse syriaque, le couple a déclaré : « Nous n’avons nulle part où aller. Nous avons été témoins de trois massacres; le massacre de Simele en Irak, les massacres de…

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americanjewishhistoricalsoc-blog · 6 years

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Armenians, Assyrians, Jews, and the Origins of “Genocide”

Preface: On Wednesday January 10, at the Center for Jewish History, human rights lawyer Philippe Sands will explore how personal lives and history are interwoven in his book East West Street. In this work, Sand connects his own work on crimes against humanity, to an untold story at the heart of the Nuremberg Trials. A conversation with Douglas Irvin-Erikson, author of Raphäel Lemkin and the Concept of Genocide, will follow. He will discuss the ongoing consequences of the concept of genocide, from the Armenian killings of 1915, to the atrocities perpetrated on the Yazidi and Rohingya communities a century later.

CONVENTION ON THE PREVENTION AND PUNISHMENT OF THE CRIME OF GENOCIDE. ADOPTED BY THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE UNITED NATIONS ON 9 DECEMBER 1948

THE CONTRACTING PARTIES,

HAVING CONSIDERED the declaration made by the General Assembly of the United Nations in its resolution 96 dated 11 December 1946 that genocide is a crime under international law, contrary to the spirit and aims of the United Nations and condemned by the civilized world ;

RECOGNIZING that at all periods of history genocide has inflicted great losses on humanity; and

BEING CONVINCED that, in order to liberate mankind from such an odious scourge, international co-operation is required,

HEREBY AGREE AS HEREINAFTER PROVIDED

So begins the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, ratified by the United Nations in 1951.

The first inklings of the Convention took form not during World War II, but in the head of a Polish Jewish teenager named Raphael Lemkin (1900-1959), who opened a newspaper one day in 1915. Staring back at him from the page was news of the Armenian Genocide: the 1915 mass murder of approximately 1.5 million Armenians by the Ottoman Empire and its successor state, the Republic of Turkey.

Lemkin would not have another intellectual encounter with this form of mass murder until 1933, when he learned of the Simele Massacre: the Iraqi mass murder of Assyrian Christians.

In the years between these two encounters, Lemkin studied linguistics at the University of John Casimir in Lvov, philosophy at the University of Heidelberg, and law back at John Casimir. He graduated with his legal degree in 1926. Lemkin worked as Public Prosecutor for the district court of Warsaw and, while doing so, wrote about law and worked on the team codifying the penal codes of Poland.

It was the plight of the Assyrian Christians which drove Lemkin to bring together his intellectual encounters with mass murder with his work as a lawyer. In October, 1933, the Legal Council of the League of Nations held a conference on international criminal law in Madrid. Lemkin attended, and there presented to the delegation his first attempt to enter recognition of mass killings aimed against a specific group of people into the international legal lexicon.

He urged the Council to accept his proposal that the “destruction of national, religious, and racial groups” should be declared “an international crime,” and proposed a ban on mass murder. The Nazi delegation to the conference greeted the proposal—introduced by a Polish Jew, of all things—with laughter. The proposal failed. When Lemkin returned to Poland, the Polish Foreign Minister reprimanded him for his remarks. Under pressure, Lemkin resigned from his public position in 1934 and went into private practice.

Five years later, mass murder came to Raphael Lemkin. When the Nazis marched into Poland, Lemkin joined up with a group of partisans in the forest. He escaped into Lithuania when the opportunity presented itself. The majority of his family—with the exception of his brother Elias, Elias’ wife, and their two sons—would die in the war between the machinations of Hitler and Stalin.

From Lithuania, Lemkin made his way to Sweden. There, in addition to lecturing on international finance at the University of Stockholm, Lemkin persuaded Swedish officials to give him copies of the Nazi directives issued to occupied nations. Soon thereafter, Lemkin’s friend and colleague, Duke University law professor Malcolm McDermott, invited Lemkin to join him as a professor at Duke. Directives in hand, Lemkin made his way east—via Russia and Japan—to the United States. He arrived in 1941.

Lemkin’s 1946 War Department ID

Lemkin presented the confiscated Nazi directives to the Department of State and the Department of War. When the United States entered Second World War, the military took him on as a teacher and consultant.

It was during this period that Lemkin completed what was quite possibly the most important work of his career, Axis Rule in Occupied Europe: Laws of Occupation, Analysis of Government, Proposals for Redress. In chapter 9, Lemkin, introduced the term and concept of “genocide,” combining the Greek “genos,” or, “race,” with the Latin “cide,” or, “killing.” In this, Lemkin created an entirely new legal conception of killing, one based on the deliberate destruction of a national, racial, ethnic, religious, or political minority by the majority or dominant group. With this piece of writing, Lemkin completed the work he began in Madrid nearly ten years previously.

In 1945, Lemkin advised US Supreme Court Judge Robert Jackson during the proceedings of the Nuremberg Trials. Over the course of the trials Lemkin fought to have the word “genocide” introduced into the record, but the British prosecutors objected on the grounds that the word was not listed in the Oxford English Dictionary.

In 1946 the UN General Assembly convened in Lake Success, NY. Lemkin, determined to have the act of genocide condemned by the highest international legal body, presented a draft of the Genocide Convention to three UN member states: Cuba, India, and Panama. He persuaded them to sponsor the Convention. With the support of the United States, the resolution to ratify the Convention went before the General Assembly. The General Assembly approved the draft of Resolution 96 (I) on December 11, 1946.

Over the next two years, the UN hammered out the wording and details of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment on the Crime of Genocide, with Lemkin regularly consulting on the articles of the treaty. In December 1948, the draft of the Convention went before the General Assembly at the Palais de Chaillot in Paris. Lemkin, despite his money problems and ill health, was in attendance when the UN adopted the Convention on December 9, 1948. The United States was the first Member State to provide the signature needed for UN treaty adoption.

However, it was also necessary for each signatory state to ratify and adopt the treaty. When the Convention was introduced to the US Congress in 1949, the combination of domestic ideological factors and international policy interests came together to block US ratification of the Convention. In April 1953, Secretary of State John Foster Dulles withdrew all human rights treaties from consideration.

Though devastated by the decision of his adopted country, Lemkin would spend the rest of his life working towards the goal of US ratification of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment on the Crime of Genocide.

Raphael Lemkin died of a heart attack at the age of 59, in 1959. He is buried in the Hebron Cemetery in Queens. The headstone reads: “The Father of the Genocide Convention.”

The United States would not ratify the Convention until 1988.

His papers are held in the archives of the American Jewish Historical Society. be hyperlinked) http://findingaids.cjh.org/?pID=109202

Though the United States would not ratify the Convention during Lemkin’s lifetime, it did have immediate impact. One of the first accusations of genocide to be submitted to the United Nations was a 1951 petition submitted by the Civil Rights Congress titled “We Charge Genocide: The Crime of Government Against the Negro People.” It charged that the United States was party to hundreds of genocidal legal and extra-legal murders and abuses of Black Americans. However, the petition failed in the maelstrom of racism and Cold War politics which characterized US politics in the late 1940s and 1950s.

The Convention was enforced for the first time in September, 1998 when the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda found Jean-Paul Akayesu guilty of nine counts of genocide, and convicted Jean Kambanda on genocide charges. The first state to be found in breach of the Genocide convention was Serbia. In Bosnia and Herzegovina v. Serbia and Montenegro, the International Court of Justice ruled that Belgrade had breached international law in failing to prevent the 1995 Srebrenica genocide, and in failing to transfer persons accused of genocide to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.

To learn more about the American Jewish Historical Society, please visit us at our website, or email us at [email protected]. You may also find us on facebook, twitter, and instagram.

#genocide #raphael lemkin #american jewish history society #genocide studies #human rights

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yhwhrulz · 4 years

Link

#middle east

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facondevie · 6 years

Text

1915 Armenian Genocide

1.5 million killed

Mass killings

Rape

Robbery

Food deprivation

Still denied today, many claim it was just war or that genocide is too strong a word

Last Armenian village Vakifli in Turkey stays silent

Armenians in Turkey prefer not to talk about their identity in public

Armenians in Turkey are faced with discrimination

Loss of identity

Hrant Dink & Sevag Balikci killed for drawing attention to genocide

Americans reluctant to refer to it as genocide

Turkey spends millions lobbying with US not to say genocide

1914 Greek Genocide

350,000 - 1 million killed

Deportation

Boycotting of their businesses

Forced labor

Rape and torture

Death marches

Burning of villages

Massacres

Death from lack of food and diseases

Thousands displaced

Greeks in Turkey dealing with issues of basic human rights and religious freedom

1914 Assyrian Genocide

250,000 - 400,000 killed

Deportation

Massacres

Deaths from famine and disease

Forced marches

Kidnapping

Sexual slavery

Pillaging of property

1933 Simele massacre killed 3,000

2003 thousands displaced, bombings, torture, kidnappings, harassment

2014 thousands displaced living in unsanitary conditions

Assyrians in Turkey face threats and discrimination

Assyrians in California face oppression

1910 Stolen Generations

Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander children removed from homes

Forced to live with white families

Forced to work as manual laborers or domestic servants

Received low level of education

Psychologically, physically, and sexually abused

Forbidden to speak native language

Loss of culture

Many parents who did not know how to cope turned to alcoholism

Many did not learn parenting skills and many of their own children ended up in state care

Loss of identity

2008 National apology saying they should be treated equally with equal opportunity

Still tension within communities

At the bottom in education, employment, life expectancy and morality

1932 Holodomor Genocide

6-7 million killed

Forced collectivization

Land and livestock confiscated

Families evicted from their homes

Thousands deported

Concentration camps

Cut food rations

Many resorted to cannibalism

People who tried to help were executed

Forced to keep silent

Crime to teach or mention the genocide until 1991

2006 genocide recognized by the Parliament of Ukraine

Russian government continues to deny the genocide

Tensions between Russia and Ukraine today

Russia still sees Ukraine as “Little Russia”

2014 Putin invaded Ukraine - 10,000 died, 2 million fled their homes

Political problems now traced back to earlier genocide

1937 Great Purge

1 million killed

Forced labor camps

Death from starvation or disease

Criminal gangs terrorized prisoners

Burning of villages

Russians don’t know their history

Survivors still carry the trauma with them today

1944 Chechen Genocide

Deportation centers

Anyone against it was executed

Anyone deemed too weak to travel was slaughtered

Many died on the trains from suffocation

Many in the centers died from starvation and disease

Homes and land were taken

2004 Chechens killed and seeing refuge elsewhere in Europe

20% of population today are suffering from illness

2017 Chechnya gay purge - at least a hundred were forcibly disappeared

Detention centers where they are tortured and starved

Families expected to kill if not done by government

1933 Holocaust

6 million killed

Concentration camps

Forced labor

Mass killing centers with gas chambers

Forced death marches

Many died from disease in the camps

Denial of Holocaust

Thousands displaced

Many survivors have poor psychological well-being, post-traumatic stress symptoms, and psychopathological symptoms

Holocaust is mandatory teaching in Germany

Anti-semitism in Germany today

Anti-semitism incidents spiked in America after Holocaust and recently in 2017

1937 Nanking Massacre

200,000 - 300,000 killed

Torture, rape, and sexual assaults

Stores were looted

Buildings set on fire

Still taboo to talk about it in Japan today

Political issue in Japan

Japan government doesn’t deny the massacre but doesn’t agree with China about the facts or how many were killed

Japan hotel carried book denying the atrocities which has caused more tension with China recently

#Genocide

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dougielombax · 10 months

Text

Just leaving this here.

Since today is Assyrian Martyr’s Day.

Like I said earlier.

Please reblog the shit out of this.

And this too.

Also this.

Please reblog the shit out of this.

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olderthannetfic · 2 years

Note

https://at.tumblr.com/olderthannetfic/im-here-to-rant-a-little-but-basically-im-in-a/77791yy6vt2h

People guessing The Owl House, MDZ and GOT... fear. People who guessed Naruto, correct! Specifically, the Uchiha Massacre (yes, it does fall under the UN's definition of the crime of genocide, no Narutoverse doesn't have a UN or a genocide convention or a holocaust, armenian genocide and simele massacare to prompt Lemkin — who doesn't exist in Naruto — to coin the word genocide) just because I think a lot of people kind of gloss over the more overaching implications of the massacre (and that it does parallel quite nicely with the Simele Massacre) and writing about trauma is cathartic. Also Uzushiokagure and the fact that an entire hidden village got wiped out, but that's for later.

Yes, the people who said shit like that or tried to send me articles on "how to approach genocide" were in fact white american gentiles, and I think it's quite telling how none of them were Jewish. One was a friend who was well aware of my indigenous status, so that was less cool, but we cope and live so whatever.

Seeing the listed fandoms though... thank fuck I'm not in any of them. I would've gone crazy.

I imagine the pattern is because nobody who knows Jewish history could think there's only one important genocide in human history.

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brookstonalmanac · 2 years

Text

Events 8.7

461 – Roman Emperor Majorian is beheaded near the river Iria in north-west Italy following his arrest and deposition by the magister militum Ricimer. 626 – The Avar and Slav armies leave the siege of Constantinople. 768 – Pope Stephen III is elected to office, and quickly seeks Frankish protection against the Lombard threat, since the Byzantine Empire is no longer able to help. 936 – Coronation of King Otto I of Germany. 1461 – The Ming dynasty Chinese military general Cao Qin stages a coup against the Tianshun Emperor. 1479 – Battle of Guinegate: French troops of King Louis XI were defeated by the Burgundians led by Archduke Maximilian of Habsburg. 1485 – Wars of the Roses: The army of the future King Henry VII of England lands at Mill Bay in Milford Haven, Wales to gather support for the Tudor cause before making its way to England and confronting the incumbent King, Richard III of England, at the Battle of Bosworth Field. It has been hypothesised that their arrival here introduced a hantavirus to the British Isles that would go on to cause the first confirmed outbreak of sweating sickness in England. 1679 – The brigantine Le Griffon, commissioned by René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, is towed to the south-eastern end of the Niagara River, to become the first ship to sail the upper Great Lakes of North America. 1714 – The Battle of Gangut: The first important victory of the Russian Navy. 1743 – The Treaty of Åbo ended the 1741–1743 Russo-Swedish War. 1782 – George Washington orders the creation of the Badge of Military Merit to honor soldiers wounded in battle.[13] It is later renamed to the more poetic Purple Heart. 1786 – The first federal Indian Reservation is created by the United States. 1789 – The United States Department of War is established. 1791 – American troops destroy the Miami town of Kenapacomaqua near the site of present-day Logansport, Indiana in the Northwest Indian War. 1794 – U.S. President George Washington invokes the Militia Acts of 1792 to suppress the Whiskey Rebellion in western Pennsylvania. 1819 – Simón Bolívar triumphs over Spain in the Battle of Boyacá. 1858 – The first Australian rules football match is played between Melbourne Grammar and Scotch College. 1890 – Anna Månsdotter, found guilty of the 1889 Yngsjö murder, became the last woman to be executed in Sweden. 1909 – Alice Huyler Ramsey and three friends become the first women to complete a transcontinental auto trip, taking 59 days to travel from New York, New York to San Francisco, California. 1927 – The Peace Bridge opens between Fort Erie, Ontario and Buffalo, New York. 1930 – The last confirmed lynching of black people in the Northern United States occurs in Marion, Indiana; two men, Thomas Shipp and Abram Smith, are killed. 1933 – The Kingdom of Iraq slaughters over 3,000 Assyrians in the village of Simele. This date is recognized as Martyrs Day or National Day of Mourning by the Assyrian community in memory of the Simele massacre. 1942 – World War II: The Battle of Guadalcanal begins as the United States Marines initiate the first American offensive of the war with landings on Guadalcanal and Tulagi in the Solomon Islands. 1944 – IBM dedicates the first program-controlled calculator, the Automatic Sequence Controlled Calculator (known best as the Harvard Mark I). 1946 – The government of the Soviet Union presented a note to its Turkish counterparts which refuted the latter's sovereignty over the Turkish Straits, thus beginning the Turkish Straits crisis. 1947 – Thor Heyerdahl's balsa wood raft, the Kon-Tiki, smashes into the reef at Raroia in the Tuamotu Islands after a 101-day, 7,000 kilometres (4,300 mi) journey across the Pacific Ocean in an attempt to prove that pre-historic peoples could have traveled from South America. 1947 – The Bombay Municipal Corporation formally takes over the Bombay Electric Supply and Transport (BEST). 1959 – Explorer program: Explorer 6 launches from the Atlantic Missile Range in Cape Canaveral, Florida. 1960 – Ivory Coast becomes independent from France. 1962 – Canadian-born American pharmacologist Frances Oldham Kelsey is awarded the U.S. President's Award for Distinguished Federal Civilian Service for her refusal to authorize thalidomide. 1964 – Vietnam War: The U.S. Congress passes the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution giving U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson broad war powers to deal with North Vietnamese attacks on American forces. 1969 – Richard Nixon appoints Luis R. Bruce, a Mohawk-Oglala Sioux and co-founder of the National Congress of American Indians, as the new commissioner of the Bureau of Indian Affairs. 1970 – California judge Harold Haley is taken hostage in his courtroom and killed during an effort to free George Jackson from police custody. 1974 – Philippe Petit performs a high wire act between the twin towers of the World Trade Center 1,368 feet (417 m) in the air. 1976 – Viking program: Viking 2 enters orbit around Mars. 1978 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter declares a federal emergency at Love Canal due to toxic waste that had been disposed of negligently. 1981 – The Washington Star ceases all operations after 128 years of publication. 1985 – Takao Doi, Mamoru Mohri and Chiaki Mukai are chosen to be Japan's first astronauts. 1987 – Cold War: Lynne Cox becomes the first person to swim from the United States to the Soviet Union, crossing the Bering Strait from Little Diomede Island in Alaska to Big Diomede in the Soviet Union. 1989 – U.S. Congressman Mickey Leland (D-TX) and 15 others die in a plane crash in Ethiopia. 1990 – First American soldiers arrive in Saudi Arabia as part of the Gulf War. 1993 – Ada Deer, a Menominee activist, is sworn in as the head of the Bureau of Indian Affairs. 1995 – The Chilean government declares state of emergency in the southern half of the country in response to an event of intense, cold, wind, rain and snowfall known as the White Earthquake. 1997 – Space Shuttle Program: The Space Shuttle Discovery launches on STS-85 from the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida. 1997 – Fine Air Flight 101 crashes after takeoff from Miami International Airport, killing five people. 1998 – Bombings at United States embassies in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania and Nairobi, Kenya kill approximately 212 people. 1999 – The Chechnya-based Islamic International Brigade invades neighboring Dagestan. 2007 – At AT&T Park, Barry Bonds hits his 756th career home run to surpass Hank Aaron's 33-year-old record. 2008 – The start of the Russo-Georgian War over the territory of South Ossetia. 2020 – Air India Express Flight 1344 overshoots the runway at Calicut International Airport in the Malappuram district of Kerala, India, and crashes, killing 21 of the 190 people on board.

#Events

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