by Ahmed E. Souaiaia
The Ukrainian war, from day one, has exposed the latent and not-so-latent racism, bigotry, discrimination, and double standard. From the media coverage to the treatment of persons displaced by the war, the West has shown that, in the eyes of Westerners, white, European, blue-eyed people are entitled and deserving of exceptional treatment. Mainstream Western journalist and political leaders are telling us quite explicitly that war and violence inflicted on Afghans, Iraqis, Syrians, and Yemenis are normal. But violence against blue-eyed white people is not normal and should not be allowed to happen. Other peoples could be subjected to violence, torture, displacement, genocide, discrimination, and war; but not white people. Moreover, these narratives deliberately avoided stating who incited or started these wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, and Yemen and whose weapons and tools killing and destruction are used in these wars. Then, when silence was not enough, a clear declaration of innocence was made: European armies commit no abuses.
Responding to a question about alleged abuse of Russian soldiers at the hands of his troops, Volodymyr Zelensky said: “We are a European army, and we do not mock our prisoners.” Almost word for word, Mr. Zelensky was channeling an Australian politician who, during a parliamentary debate over the ratification of the UN Genocide Convention, argued that “to ratify the treaty was an affront to Australians and other Anglo-Saxon nations because it deals with a crime of which no Anglo-Saxon nation could be guilty.” Civilized people do not commit crimes against humanity or genocide, it was and still is argued. Zelensky’s words expose Western leaders’ tone-deafness when it comes to historical injustices and their treatment of others.
Mr. Zelensky, and all those who subscribe to his argument that clears “civilized” people of any abuse charges, should be reminded of just few historical events including the genocide against Indigenous peoples in Africa, the Americas, Australian, and Asia, the indiscriminate firebombing of Dresden in 1945, the detonation of two nuclear weapons in the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the killing of 1.5 million Algerians and poisoning of their land with nuclear material, the treatment of South Africans by Europeans and the crime of Apartheid they invented and executed, the torture of prisoners in Abu Ghraib and other secret prisons, the killing of civilians in mosques in Falluja, the indefinite detention of people in Guantanamo, the illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003 which has resulted in the death of more than 600,000 people, and occupation of Palestinian lands and discrimination against the Palestinian people… these and many other human rights offenses were carried out by self-described “civilized people.”
Of course, Mr. Zelensky might feel untouchable by accusation of being racist or supremacist because of his Jewish background. In fact, Western media has used that absurd logic on his behalf when responding to Mr. Putin’s demand that the Ukrainian government purge itself from right-wing extremists. The media and many commentators dismissed the presence of neo-Nazis as non-sense since, the mainstream media outlets including CNN and NPR (see screen captures below) insinuated that since the head of government in Ukraine, Zelensky, is Jewish, he and his government cannot be or could not include right-wing extremists.
The idea that European and Anglo-Saxon people could not commit human rights crimes because they are “civilized” is textbook definition of racism. To argue that a person or a group of people, because of their race or ethnicity, are incapable of doing something or are capable of doing only bad things is the classic definition of racism and the foundational principle of the Eugenics movement.
Those Europeans who say that it is absurd to think that a Jewish person could be a white nationalist or a right-wing extremist need to look in their back yard: one of the most extreme right-wing nationalists who could be the next president of France is a Jew who was sued for Holocaust denial. Eric Zemmour has defended Nazi-collaborators, and embraced far-right conspiracy theories on Muslim immigration has been convicted of using hate speech including one instance in which he said that unaccompanied child migrants were “thieves, killers, they’re rapists. That’s all they are. We should send them back.” In the US, under the Trump administration, one of the architects of the anti-immigration policy that separated children from their migrating parents and placed them in cages, Stephen Miller, is also Jewish. Arguing that a Jewish person cannot undertake or promote a policy that targeted other Jews in the past is racist in and of itself.
The war in Ukraine and the speeches and actions of Volodymyr Zelensky unveiled the ugly faces of supremacy that produce and justify inequity. Like any other war, the war in Ukraine, too, will end. Its role in exposing the West-Rest divide on issues related human rights, social justice, and equity must be closely examined to learn more about racism and supremacy and their connections to human rights abuses.
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* Prof. SOUAIAIA is a member of the faculty at the University of Iowa with joint appointment in International Studies, Religious Studies, and College of Law. Opinions are the author’s, speaking on matters of public interest; not speaking for the university or any other organization with which he might be affiliated.
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