Some words to lose your shit over

Occupation! Apartheid! Antisemitic! Genocide!

Why do these words generate so much outrage, debate and denial in recent times? They were fairly well defined and understood a mere seven months ago, but something’s changed, and it’s not the meaning.

I looked up the definitions through a simple Google search. In order to be be completely above board, will cut and paste the search result without changing anything. You can of course dispute the definition if you find something contrary to what I’ve pasted below.

Occupation:

It’s a fairly innocuous word when applied to a person who takes legal ownership of a property such as a house after purchasing or renting it. However, when applied to someone who takes ownership by force, especially of the military type, it has negative connotations.

When Israel dispossessed Palestinians in 1948 of land they had lived on for not only generations, but hundreds, if not thousands of years, it signified an abhorrent disregard for their property rights. Worse, when Israeli settlers continued to forcibly occupy land since 1948 in the West Bank that the remaining Palestinians owned, it also became a violation of their human rights. While the term has been used extensively by legal experts, even in the United Nations, it has recently resulted in smug outrage and vehement denial.

Apartheid:

When the word was coined and applied to South Africa’s policy of race based discrimination, it was hardly ever in dispute. Apartheid was fairly well understood. However, when applied to Israel’s system of ethnic discrimination, colonial settler occupation, it is claimed there is no comparison because some Palestinians enjoy some freedoms and rights as Israelis.

It was almost precisely the same with South Africa. Indians and Coloureds (mixed races) were after many years allowed some rights, including participation in a tricameral parliamentary system, but it was fundamentally still racially divided. Some Native Africans were allowed to live in artificially created separate Provinces called Bantustans, but they still didn’t enjoy equal status as the ruling White population, and considered inferior.

There are in fact activists and scholars who claim that Israel’s system of apartheid is actually worse that South Africa’s version of it, such is the extent of dehumanization of the affected Palestinians.

Antisemitic:

This is a particularly nasty type of discrimination which has probably been around as long as the Jewish nation. Like Islamophobia, it is mostly directed at people because of their religious and ethnic identity.

However, since the latest Palestinian conflict erupted, the word has become extremely weaponized largely by political interests, with the collusion of mainstream media. Any criticism of Zionism (a political ideology which has cult-like connotations) and the Israeli people is falsely, disingenuously, and corruptly labeled as antisemitic.

There have even been absurd efforts by the US Congress to change the meaning of the word through corrupt legislation. Needless to say those who are trying desperately to change the definition, seem not all disturbed by the fact that Palestinians are also Semites, like the Jewish peoples. All that matters to them is that is serves their hateful political and economic agendas.

There have been further attempts to disingenuously use the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) non-legally binding working definition of antisemitism to label any and all criticism of Israel and Zionism as antisemitic.

Genocide:

Genocide is a war crime. I don’t believe there’s much dispute over that much. The controversy seems to be mainly over intent. Naysayers have unilaterally determined that only a court can decide when a war crime is a genocide. That’s fair enough.

We’ve had genocides before. The systematic extermination of six million Jews during WW2 is undoubtedly the most heinous example of this war crime we know about. The Nazis made their intent known publicly, and to their eternal shame, Western governments, especially the US did not do as much as they should have to take in Jewish refugees. The resultant massacre, known as the Holocaust will blight human history forever.

Since WW2, the International Court of Justice has ruled on only three other genocides since the ratification of the convention in 1951 – Rwanda in 1994, Bosnia (and the 1995 Srebrenica massacre), and Cambodia under the 1975-9 Pol Pot regime. In all these cases, not as many Jews were massacred as in WW2 by the German army. The court also did not have the benefit of modern live-streaming technology and social media to make its ruling.

Why then, do the apologists for Israel’s conduct of its war activities in Gaza, still insist on using the Holocaust as a reference for genocide? Realistically, do six million people have to be killed before we can call it a genocide? Every human being with eyes to see can now watch on various media as a genocide unfolds, sometimes live, broadcast by the actual victims.

Bonus Words: Smear Merchant:

Smear merchants started to proliferate long before the current conflict in the Middle East escalated in October last year. They have become particularly prominent since then. There isn’t any form of media, whether it’s the press or broadcast television or YouTube of some other social media, that is not infested with smear merchants, trying vainly to mangle the meaning of the words I described above.

Their intentions are clear, and some of them are becoming very well known, but fortunately are also being vigorously challenged and exposed by those who still care about common decency and humanity.

Like racism, these words have already been adequately defined. It’s not for me to determine whether you’re a racist or not. You do!