UGLY TIES BIND GENOCIDE PAST AND PRESENT
By Amy Klein, Religion Editor
The Jewish Journal of greater L.A, CA
March 15 2007
Genocide.
The word evokes different, powerful references, depending upon who
hears it.
For Jews, the primary thought is the Holocaust, officially recognized
in the United States as the first genocide.
For Armenians, it refers to mass killings by the Ottomans in Turkey
in 1915, though many countries, including the United States, have
not recognized those as such.
These days the word immediately points to Africa — to Rwanda, Darfur
and other recent bloodbaths that have involved ethnic cleansing.
But genocide is not a modern invention, and although the term has
legal connotations — specific conditions must apply in a conflict
for the U.S. government to officially use the designation — acts of
genocide can be traced back to the Bible. Some scholars argue that
there have been 15 or more additional occurrences that could qualify
in the 20th century. And while the motives of the perpetrators, the
identity of the victims and the region of the carnage have changed
over time, genocides almost always share one common thread: Religion.
"Whenever genocide takes place, religion is involved — before,
during or after — in one way or another," said John K. Roth,
founding director of the Center for the Study of the Holocaust,
Genocide and Human Rights at Claremont McKenna College and the author
of "Approaches to Auschwitz: The Holocaust and Its Legacy."
Roth spoke last month at a conference titled "Genocide and Religion:
Victims, Perpetrators, Bystanders and Resisters," a collaboration
between the Simon Wiesenthal Center and Pepperdine University School
of Law, Institute on Law, Religion and Ethics.
The Feb 17-19 symposium, which was open to the public and attended
by a few hundred students, scholars, rabbis and community members,
aimed to broaden the discussion beyond the usual focus on a single
genocide, such as the Holocaust — the subject of many books, studies,
films and classes.
It also went deeper than many such conferences by examining as
many as possible of the various groups involved in a genocide —
the perpetrators, the victims, the bystanders and resisters — all
of whom can be found in every such conflict, past and present.
"We didn’t want it to be just another conference on perpetrators’
responsibility," said Roger Alford, an associate professor in the
law school at Pepperdine, who organized the conference with professor
Michael Bazyler, of Whittier Law School in Costa Mesa.
"We wanted to basically focus on the issue of how law and genocide and
religion connect with one another: Is there a religious motivation,
why are certain groups targeted, why is it the resisters try to resist,
is there a religious component to that, what is it about bystanders and
why do they not do more?" Alford said of the three days of lectures
by academics, legal scholars and government officials from around
the world.
There are four motivations for genocide, Roth said: To implement a
belief, a theory or ideology; to eliminate threat; to spread terror
among enemies; and to acquire economic wealth.
"Religion can be an agitating factor in genocides," he said, noting
that it is impossible to understand the numbers of people affected by
the devastation, which has effects for generations to come, because
it destroys cultures and traditions. "The effects of genocide have
not stopped. On the contrary. Genocide has gone on and on. It might
continue to do so."
Religion plays a role in conflicts today, said Sandra Bunn-Livingstone,
of the State Department’s Office of International Religious Freedom,
Bureau of Human Rights. "The less religious freedom, the higher the
religious persecution, and it sets the stage for possible genocide."
Today, she pointed out, "there is higher religious persecution in
countries with Muslims."
Of 143 countries monitored for the highest level of persecution, 40
percent had a Muslim majority, versus 3.9 percent with a Christian
majority.
On speakers’ and audience members’ minds was the role that Islam plays
in world conflicts today — conflicts that have not been designated
as genocide, but which involve terrorism, murder and group persecution.
Is there something inherent in Islam that is responsible for the
terrorist tactics we see being perpetrated around the world today?
"We have to be very careful about demonizing religion," Bazyler said
in an interview. "We in the Jewish community have to be careful not
to do that; it doesn’t serve us well."
Instead of condemning the entire community or religion, we should
"criticize individuals in the Muslim communities for not condemning
enough the extremist elements, and we can reach out to what we believe
are moderate Muslims."
Others at the event lamented a climate in academia in which there’s
"a fear of political incorrectness," in the words of Israel Charney,
executive director of the Institute on the Holocaust and Genocide at
Hebrew University in Jerusalem. Although Charney is against those who
completely vilify Islam, such as Daniel Pipes and Arianna Fallaci —
"who are so inciting they inflame the process I’m against," he said —
he allowed that "the violent position has prevailed" many times in
Islamic society, and he said that it’s important to tell it like it is.
Of Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s call to eliminate Israel,
Charney said, "I don’t think you send that to a committee for
discussion; you treat it as incitement, you treat that as a call to
kill, you add that to your evaluation to what it means that they’re
seeking nuclear weapons, and unless you’re a complete jerk, you start
looking for what actions to take, but you don’t do nothing and say, ‘We
don’t really know if he means it, we don’t know if he has influence,’
That’s been the rationalization [so] that you don’t have to respond
to stop him."
Others at the conference were less certain.
"How Islam is to be interpreted," Roth said, is still up for
discussion. "If you go back to the Hebrew Bible or other traditions,
you can see there’s a struggle taking place" between the injunction
against murder and the allowances for it.
"Maybe we haven’t seen the end of the struggle in Islam," he suggested,
hopefully.
Much of the conference focused on academic issues, including taking
a historical perspective, but there were a few voices asking for help
in current crises.
"Intervention is not prevention," said Pierre Prosper, former U.S.
ambassador at large for war crimes and former war crimes prosecutor
on the UN international criminal tribunal for Rwanda.
Prosper was among the first prosecutors to arrive in Rwanda, where
1 million people were killed in 100 days.
"Prevention means stopping it before it begins — not stopping it in
its tracks," he emphasized. "It means really taking the hard steps
so that this truly does not happen."
People of a society must feel they have recourse or redress, and the
international community should focus all its attention on creating
legal systems in those societies and looking at early-warning systems
of genocide before they occur.
"It’s not enough to compare this nation and its courage against other
nations in the world," said Bruce Einhorn, a U.S. immigration law
judge. "We have a special obligation," he said, not to be the world’s
policemen, but to take action against the perpetrators of genocide.
"Will the international community and the U.S. make the war against
genocide as proactive as the war against terror?"
The program was part of the Pepperdine Institute’s new International
Human Rights Program, where law students spend their summer working for
humanitarian causes around the world. In 2006, 10 students worked on
almost every continent, focusing on issues such as human trafficking,
HIV and religious liberty, said program director Melanie Howard,
associate director of the Institute on Law, Religion and Ethics. "They
said it was life-changing," she said of the students, noting that 100
have expressed interest for this summer. "The program fits with the
overall mission of the law school — purpose, service and leadership,"
Howard said.
Darfur is an example of action taken.
"It was the Jewish community to bring Darfur to the forefront and
keep it on the forefront. We keep hearing so much about Darfur …
because of Jewish leaders," said conference founder Bayzler, referring
to Rabbi Harold Schulweis, founder of Jewish World Watch, who spoke
at the conference.
"Why is the Jewish community talking so much about Darfur? Because
of the experience of the Holocaust. It’s really the theme of ‘never
again.’ Not just for our own people, but never again for other people,"
Bazyler said.
Many speakers argued that while religion can be an agitator, it can
also offer salvation.
"What tools of religion can we use to combat the potential for
genocide?" asked Michael Berenbaum, professor of theology and director
of the Sigi Ziering Institute at the University of Judaism.
"If we look at Christianity, we have a perfect model of what we can
do to get out of this quagmire [of religion causing genocide].
Christianity has de-emphasized the teachings [that might] have led
to genocide, especially against the Jews."
Religion can play a positive role, not only in preventing genocide,
but afterward, as well.
"Survivors in its aftermath have done something profoundly religious,
biblical in proportion," he said, by deepening responsibility and
pleading for the future. "The meaning of survival is not found in the
accident of survival but what you do among the aftermath of survival."