Genocide justification

Genocide justification is the claim that a genocide is morally excusable/defensible, necessary, and/or sanctioned by law.^[1] Genocide justification differs from genocide denial, which is an attempt to reject the occurrence of genocide. Perpetrators often claim that genocide victims presented a serious threat, justifying their actions by stating it was legitimate self-defense of a nation or state. According to modern international criminal law, there can be no excuse for genocide.^[2]^[3] Genocide is often camouflaged as military activity against combatants, and the distinction between denial and justification is often blurred.^[4]

Examples of genocide justification include, but is not limited to the Turkish nationalists' claims in regard to the Armenian genocide, the Nazis' justifications behind the Holocaust, anti-Tutsi propaganda during the Rwandan genocide,^[5] Serbian nationalists' justifications for the Srebrenica massacre and the Myanmar government's claims about the Rohingya genocide.

Legality

Several laws against genocide denial also forbid the justification of genocide. In addition, some countries have laws against genocide justification but not genocide denial. For example, in Spain, a law criminalizing genocide denial was struck down as unconstitutional by the Spanish Supreme Court.^[6]

As of now, only 12 nations have criminalized genocide justification, including Andorra, Colombia, Liechtenstein, Macedonia, Rwanda, and Switzerland.^[1] In addition, justification of genocide during ongoing killings may constitute incitement to genocide, which is criminalized under international criminal law.^[7]^[8]

In general

All genocides are considered to go along with rationalizing narratives justifying them in terms of threat and urgency,^[9] and the perpetrators consider their actions right and necessary.^[10]

According to W. Michael Reisman, "many of the individuals who are directly responsible operate within a cultural universe that inverts our morality and elevates their actions to the highest form of group, tribe, or national defense".^[7]^[8] Bettina Arnold observed, "It is one of the terrible ironies of the systematic extermination of one people by another that its justification is considered necessary." She also argued that archaeology and ancient history are sometimes used to justify genocide.^[11] Rationalizing genocide helps perpetrators accept their actions and role in the genocide, preserving their self-image.^[12] Academic Abdelwahab El-Affendi writes that one of the horrors of genocide "is when everyone else, including academics and leading intellectuals, seems to believe the narrative, or at least prevaricate about its plausibility".^[9]

Examples

1804 Haiti massacre

According to the historian Philippe R. Girard, the genocide of French Creoles after the Haitian Revolution was justified by its perpetrators based on the following rationales:

The ideals of the French Revolution justified the massacre.
Atrocities committed by French troops in Haiti permitted revenge.
Radical measures were necessary to secure victory in the war and emancipate the slaves.
Whites were not human.
Black leaders hoped to take over plantations previously owned by whites.

Girard notes that after the massacre, the man who ordered it, Jean-Jacques Dessalines, stated, "We answered these cannibals' war with war, crime with crime, outrage with outrage." For Dessalines, Girard writes, "genocide merely amounted to vengeance, even justice".^[13] Historian C. L. R. James wrote that the massacre was only a tragedy for its perpetrators because of the brutal practices of slaveholding.^[3]

Adam Jones and Nicholas Robinson have classified this as a subaltern genocide, meaning "genocide by the oppressed", and that it contains "morally plausible" elements of retribution or revenge. Jones points out that this type of genocide is less likely to be condemned and may even be welcomed, despite the torture and execution of thousands of women and children on the island.^[3]

Armenian genocide

Justification and rationalization are commonly associated with the Armenian genocide. Perpetrators portrayed the killings as a legitimate defense against Armenians who were perceived as traitors colluding with Russia during a time of war.^[3]^[15] Both at the time and later, it has been claimed that the deportation of Armenians was justified by military necessity.^[16] Historian Hans-Lukas Kieser points out, "To justify genocide, Talaat framed a whole discourse and set of arguments, so that the self-righteous justification for murder and destruction remained entrenched in later memoirs, politics, and historiography."^[17] In an interview with Berliner Tageblatt in May 1915, Talaat stated, "We have been blamed for not making a distinction between guilty and innocent Armenians. [To do so] was impossible. Because of the nature of things, one who was still innocent today could be guilty tomorrow. The concern for the safety of Turkey simply had to silence all other concerns. Our actions were determined by national and historical necessity."^[18] During the trial of Soghomon Tehlirian, several German newspapers such as the Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, the Frankfurter Zeitung, or the Berliner Lokal-Anzeiger published articles and essays, which justified the annihilation of the Armenian people.^[19]

In 1919, Mustafa Kemal stated:

Whatever has befallen the non-Muslim elements living in our country, is the result of the policies of separatism they pursued in a savage manner, when they allowed themselves to be made tools of foreign intrigues and abused their privileges. There are probably many reasons and excuses for the undesired events that have taken place in Turkey. And I want definitely to say that these events are on a level far removed from the many forms of oppression which are committed in the states of Europe without any excuse.^[20]

Historian Erik Jan Zürcher comments, "All the classic elements in the defense of violent aggression are here: they asked for it, it was not really so bad and anyway, others have done the same and worse."^[20]

In 1920, parliamentarian Hasan Fehmi stated:

This deportation business, as you know, has put the whole world in an uproar, and has branded us all as murderers. We knew even before this was done that the Christian world would not stand for it, and that they would turn their fury and hatred on us because of it. But why should we call ourselves murderers? These things that were done were to secure the future of our homeland, which we hold more sacred and dear than our very lives.^[21]

According to Fatma Müge Göçek, "The sentiments of the Turkish state and populace toward these CUP leaders are best captured in one memoir that noted:"

There were no Armenians left in east, central Anatolia and to a certain degree in the western regions. If this cleaning had not been carried out, getting the independence struggle to succeed could have been much more difficult and could have cost us much more. May God be merciful and compassionate toward Enver and Talat Pashas who actualized this [cleaning]. Their foresight has saved the Turkish nation.^[22]

In the interwar era, many Germans believed that the Armenian genocide was justified. Author Stefan Ihrig argues that, in the early 1920s, the Germans who had denied the Armenian genocide switched to justifying it after accepting the historicity of the events.^[4]

The Holocaust

The Nazis preferred to justify the killing of Jews rather than refute it, as seen in Hitler's prophecy, a speech by Hitler where he stated that it was time to "wrestle the Jewish world enemy to the ground",^[23] and that the German government was completely determined "to get rid of these people".^[24]^[25]^[26] Another example of Nazi justification is the 1943 Posen speeches, in which SS chief Heinrich Himmler argued that the systematic mass murder of Jews was necessary and justified, although an unpleasant task for individual SS men.^[27]^[28]^[29]

During the Einsatzgruppen trial, Otto Ohlendorf, responsible for the deaths of 90,000 Jews, did not deny that the crimes occurred or that he was responsible for them. Instead, he justified the systematic murder as anticipatory self-defense against the mortal threat supposedly posed by Jews, Romani people, Communists, and others. Ohlendorf argued that the killing of Jewish children was necessary because, knowing how their parents died, they would grow up to hate Germany.^[30]^[31] Ohlendorf's claims were not accepted by the court, and he was sentenced to death for crimes against humanity, war crimes, and membership in a criminal organization. He was executed by hanging in 1951.^[30]

Since the end of World War II, cases of justifying the Holocaust have also been observed in Iran, the Arab world, and Eastern Europe, in which the alleged behavior of Jews is claimed to cause antisemitism and justify the killing of Jews.^[32] Some Moldovan historians have claimed that the Holocaust in Romania was justified by the lack of loyalty shown by Jews to the interwar Romanian state.^[33]^[34]

Rwandan genocide

The Rwandan genocide was justified by its perpetrators as a legitimate response to the military campaign of the Rwandan Patriotic Front, including by its mastermind, Théoneste Bagosora, who repeated these arguments at the trial which resulted in his conviction for genocide.^[35] Justification attempts include "shifting blame from the government to the RPF forces and an attempt to claim the acts were done in self-defense".^[1]

The cover of the November 1991 issue of *Kangura*. The title states, "Tutsi: Race of God", while the text to the right of the machete states, "Which weapons are we going to use to beat the cockroaches for good?". The man pictured is the second president of the First Republic, Grégoire Kayibanda, who made Hutu the governing ethnicity after the 1959 massacres.

Following the assassination of Hutu President Juvénal Habyarimana, Hutu propagandists exploited the pre-existing stereotype that equated all Tutsi with the RPF. By intentionally merging the Tutsi community with the RPF, they propagated the narrative that Tutsi were responsible for the president's assassination. This narrative is reinforced by the statement, "relying on the easy identification of all Tutsi with the RPF, Hutu propagandists said Tutsi deserved whatever ill befell them because it was they who had launched the war in the first place."^[36]

The emergence of the Hutu newspaper Kangura marked a turning point in the dissemination of anti-Tutsi propaganda, often inciting violence. Established in the early 1990s, Kangura played a pivotal role in shaping public opinion and escalating ethnic tensions in Rwanda. The cover of the November 1991 issue of Kangura is emblematic of this propaganda campaign. Next to a menacing image of a machete, the text poses a chilling question, "Which weapons are we going to use to beat the cockroaches for good?" This dehumanizing language was deliberately employed to justify violence against the Tutsi population. The manipulation of historical figures in such imagery aimed to legitimize the Hutu victimhood narrative and fuel the genocidal ideologies that would later manifest in the tragic events of 1994.

The media landscape of the region, which included a popular radio show Radio Rwanda, played a crucial role in shaping public opinion of Tutsi people. In March 1992, Radio Rwanda warned that "Hutu leaders in Bugesera were going to be murdered by Tutsi", deliberately spreading false information to spur the Hutu massacres of Tutsi. Collusion between various media outlets, including Kangura and the radio station RTLM, strengthened the impact of these false narratives, further reinforcing dangerous ideologies that culminated in the events of the Rwandan genocide in 1994.^[36]

Bosnian genocide

The Srebrenica massacre is justified by Serbian nationalists who argue that it was necessary to defend against the "Muslim threat", or as a justified revenge for the 1993 Kravica attack. However, Serbian nationalists do not acknowledge that genocide occurred in Bosnia despite the ICTY verdict, and argue that the Bosnian death toll is substantially lower than historians and the ICTY have concluded.^[37]^[38] Conducting interviews with Serbs in Bosnia, Janine Natalya Clark found that many interviewees endorsed the idea "that those killed in Srebrenica were combatants and therefore legitimate military targets", alongside beliefs that the massacre was exaggerated.^[39]

Rohingya genocide

Myanmar leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, defends the military's actions during what has been described as the Rohingya genocide in Myanmar, a result of private and structural Islamophobia in Myanmar, as well as increasing tensions and conflict "between Rohingya Muslims and the Burman Buddhist Majority".^[40]^[41]^[42] In 2017, The Intercept reported that she was "an apologist for genocide, ethnic cleansing, and mass rape".^[43] After her December 2019 remarks in the International Court of Justice, American political scientist William Felice wrote that she used "the same arguments that organizers of genocide and ethnic cleansing deployed throughout the 20th century to validate mass murder".^[44] Physicians for Human Rights states that Myanmar "continues to justify their mass extermination [of Rohingya] as a reasonable response to 'terrorist activities.'"^[45] Refugees International said that she was "defending the most indefensible of crimes"—genocide.^[46] The Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) of Myanmar's democratic government were hostile and violent in their persecution and abuse of Rohingya Muslims.^[40] Their actions were justified "through the pretense of operating in the name of a democratically elected regime and not a military dictatorship".^[40]

Gaza genocide

Some authors have criticized justifications of Israel's military actions in Gaza, which they consider amount to genocide. Some of these justifications have come from within the field of genocide studies.^[9]^[47]^[48]

References

^ ^a ^b ^c Pruitt, William R. (2017). "Understanding Genocide Denial Legislation: A Comparative Analysis". International Journal of Criminal Justice Sciences. 12 (2): 270–284. doi:10.5281/zenodo.1034674. ProQuest 1967316575.
^ Scarre, Geoffrey (December 2005). "Excusing the Inexcusable? Moral Responsibility and Ideologically Motivated Wrongdoing". Journal of Social Philosophy. 36 (4): 457–472. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9833.2005.00288.x.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Jones, Adam (2006). "Is genocide ever justified?". Genocide: A Comprehensive Introduction. Routledge. pp. 28–30. ISBN 978-1-134-25981-6.
^ ^a ^b Ihrig (2016), pp. 12–13.
^ Lower, Matthew; Hauschildt, Thomas (9 May 2014). "The Media as a Tool of War: Propaganda in the Rwandan Genocide". Human Security Centre. Archived from the original on 15 April 2024. Retrieved 16 March 2021.
^ Elósegui, María (2017). "Denial or Justification of Genocide as a Criminal Offence in European Law". Racial Justice, Policies and Courts' Legal Reasoning in Europe. Springer International Publishing. pp. 49–90. ISBN 978-3-319-53580-7.
^ ^a ^b Gordon, Gregory S. (2017). Atrocity Speech Law: Foundation, Fragmentation, Fruition. Oxford University Press. p. 289. ISBN 978-0-19-061270-2.
^ ^a ^b Benesch, Susan (2008). "Vile Crime or Inalienable Right: Defining Incitement to Genocide". Virginia Journal of International Law. 48 (3): 506. SSRN 1121926.
^ ^a ^b ^c El-Affendi, Abdelwahab (2024). "The Futility of Genocide Studies After Gaza". Journal of Genocide Research: 1–7. doi:10.1080/14623528.2024.2305525.
^ Zajonc, R. B. (2002). "The Zoomorphism of Human Collective Violence". Understanding Genocide: The Social Psychology of the Holocaust. Oxford University Press. p. 234. ISBN 978-0-19-984795-2.
^ Arnold, Bettina (2002). "Justifying Genocide: Archaeology and the Construction of Difference". In Hinton, Alexander Laban (ed.). Annihilating Difference: The Anthropology of Genocide. University of California Press. ISBN 978-0-520-23029-3.
^ Anderson, Kjell (2017). "Rationalizing killing". Perpetrating Genocide: A Criminological Account. Routledge. p. 229. ISBN 978-1-317-23438-8.
^ Girard, Philippe R. (June 2005). "Caribbean genocide: racial war in Haiti, 1802–4". Patterns of Prejudice. 39 (2): 138–161. doi:10.1080/00313220500106196. S2CID 145204936.
^ Ihrig 2016, p. 109.
^ Hovannisian, Richard G. (1998). "Denial of the Armenian Genocide in Comparison with Holocaust Denial". Remembrance and Denial: The Case of the Armenian Genocide. Wayne State University Press. p. 211. ISBN 978-0-8143-2777-7.
^ Hull, Isabel V. (2004). "The Armenian genocide". Absolute Destruction: Military Culture and the Practices of War in Imperial Germany. Cornell University Press. ISBN 978-0-8014-4258-2.
^ Kieser, Hans-Lukas (2018). Talaat Pasha: Father of Modern Turkey, Architect of Genocide. Princeton University Press. p. 294. ISBN 978-1-4008-8963-1.
^ Ihrig (2016), pp. 162–163.
^ Ihrig (2016), pp. 271–273.
^ ^a ^b Zürcher, Erik Jan (2011). "Renewal and Silence: Postwar Unionist and Kemalist Rhetoric on the Armenian Genocide". In Suny, Ronald Grigor; Göçek, Fatma Müge; Naimark, Norman M. (eds.). A Question of Genocide: Armenians and Turks at the End of the Ottoman Empire. Oxford University Press. pp. 306–316 [312]. ISBN 978-0-19-979276-4.
^ Akçam, Taner (2012). The Young Turks' Crime Against Humanity. Princeton: Princeton University Press. p. xi. ISBN 978-0-691-15333-9.
^ Göçek, Fatma Müge (2015). Denial of Violence: Ottoman Past, Turkish Present and Collective Violence Against the Armenians, 1789–2009. Oxford University Press. p. 267. ISBN 978-0-19-933420-9.
^ Koonz, Claudia (2003). The Nazi Conscience. Harvard University Press. p. 253. ISBN 978-0-674-01172-4.
^ Bytwerk, Randall L. (February 2005). "The Argument for Genocide in Nazi Propaganda". Quarterly Journal of Speech. 91 (1): 37–62. doi:10.1080/00335630500157516. S2CID 144116639.
^ Weikart, Richard (2009). "Justifying Murder and Genocide". Hitler's Ethic: The Nazi Pursuit of Evolutionary Progress. Palgrave Macmillan US. pp. 179–195. ISBN 978-0-230-62398-9.
^ Confino, Alon (2014). A World Without Jews: The Nazi Imagination from Persecution to Genocide. Yale University Press. p. 226. ISBN 978-0-300-19046-5.
^ Cesarani, David; Kavanaugh, Sarah (2004). Holocaust: Hitler, Nazism and the "racial state". Psychology Press. ISBN 978-0-415-27510-1.
^ Midlarsky, Manus I. (2005). The Killing Trap: Genocide in the Twentieth Century. Cambridge University Press. p. 170. ISBN 978-0-521-81545-1.
^ Totten, Samuel; Feinberg, Stephen (2016). Essentials of Holocaust Education: Fundamental Issues and Approaches. Routledge. p. 120. ISBN 978-1-317-64808-6.
^ ^a ^b Wolfe, Robert (July 1980). "Putative Threat to National Security as a Nuremberg Defense for Genocide". The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. 450 (1): 46–67. doi:10.1177/000271628045000106. JSTOR 1042558. S2CID 146521956. Ohlendorf stated, 'I believe that it is very simple to explain if one starts from the fact that [the Führer] order not only tried to achieve security, but permanent security, lest the children grow up and inevitably, being the children of parents who had been killed, they would constitute a danger no smaller than that of the parents.'
^ Ferencz, Benjamin (24 October 2019). "Mass Murderers Seek to Justify Genocide". Benjamin B. Ferencz. Archived from the original on 28 February 2024. Retrieved 31 July 2020.
^
- Gerstenfeld, Manfred (September 22, 2009). "Justifying the Holocaust and Promoting a Second One". Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs. Archived from the original on 29 November 2023. Retrieved 31 July 2020.
- Litvak, Meir; Webman, Esther (2011). From Empathy to Denial: Arab Responses to the Holocaust. Hurst. ISBN 978-1-84904-155-3.
- Lobont, Florin (2004). "Antisemitism and Holocaust Denial in Post-Communist Eastern Europe". The Historiography of the Holocaust. Palgrave Macmillan UK. pp. 440–468. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-48866-0_9. ISBN 978-0-230-52450-7.
- Litvak, Meir; Webman, Esther (January 2004). "The Representation of the Holocaust in the Arab World". Journal of Israeli History. 23 (1): 100–115. doi:10.1080/1353104042000241947. S2CID 162351680.
- Litvak, Meir (2017). "Iranian Antisemitism and the Holocaust". Antisemitism Before and Since the Holocaust: Altered Contexts and Recent Perspectives. Springer International Publishing. pp. 205–229. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-48866-0_9. ISBN 978-3-319-48866-0.
- Larsson, Göran (1994). Fact Or Fraud?: The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. AMI-Jerusalem Center for Biblical Studies and Research. p. 44. ISBN 978-1-888235-10-4. During the Second World War there were frequent contacts between the Nazis and several Arab leaders, the most notorious being the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Hadj Amin Al-Husseini, well-known for his collaboration with Hitler and the Nazi leadership. After the war, Hitler's extermination of the Jews has often been justified in Arab countries, and some Nazi war criminals have found a safe haven there to continue their antisemitic activities. Not surprisingly, The Protocols have been translated into Arabic and have become a bestseller in the Arab world. Antisemitic organisations have often used Arab countries as the base for distribution of antisemitic material...
^ Tartakovsky, Dmitry (August 2008). "Conflicting Holocaust narratives in Moldovan nationalist historical discourse". East European Jewish Affairs. 38 (2): 211–229. doi:10.1080/13501670802184090. S2CID 144672487.
^ Solonari, Vladimir (20 November 2018). "From Silence to Justification?: Moldovan Historians on the Holocaust of Bessarabian and Transnistrian Jews". Nationalities Papers. 30 (3): 435–457. doi:10.1080/0090599022000011705. S2CID 162214245.
^ Krivushin, Ivan (2018). "History as a Justification for Genocide: the Interpretation of Rwanda's Past by Théoneste Bagosora". Istoriya. 9 (5). doi:10.18254/S0002306-5-1. S2CID 158477329.
^ ^a ^b "Propaganda and Practice (HRW Report - Leave None to Tell the Story: Genocide in Rwanda, March 1999)". Human Rights Watch. Archived from the original on 2 September 2013. Retrieved 8 December 2023.
^ Robiou, Marcia (29 March 2019). "What is Genocide? The Ultimate Crime, Explained". FRONTLINE. PBS. Archived from the original on 18 February 2024. Retrieved 31 July 2020. The Serbs' skepticism surrounding the Srebrenica genocide is not a denial that mass killings occurred: the dominant narrative among nationalist Serbs is that war crimes were justified to defend against the Muslims.
^ Nettelfield, Lara J.; Wagner, Sarah E. (2013). "Pushing Back: Denial". Srebrenica in the Aftermath of Genocide. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-139-03496-8.
^ Clark, Janine Natalya (March 2012). "The 'crime of crimes': genocide, criminal trials and reconciliation". Journal of Genocide Research. 14 (1): 55–77. doi:10.1080/14623528.2012.649895. S2CID 73350853.
^ ^a ^b ^c Bakali, Naved (April 2021). "Islamophobia in Myanmar: the Rohingya genocide and the 'war on terror'". Race & Class. 62 (4): 53–71. doi:10.1177/0306396820977753. S2CID 233194481.
^ "Aung San Suu Kyi: Democracy icon who fell from grace". BBC News. 23 January 2020. Archived from the original on 27 July 2024. Retrieved 31 July 2020.
^ "Aung San Suu Kyi defends Myanmar against genocide claims in UN court". Financial Times. 11 December 2019. Retrieved 31 July 2020.
^ Hasan, Mehdi (13 April 2017). "Burmese Nobel Prize Winner Aung San Suu Kyi Has Turned Into an Apologist for Genocide Against Muslims". The Intercept. Archived from the original on 7 May 2024. Retrieved 31 July 2020.
^ Felice, William (25 December 2019). "A Nobel laureate justifies genocide and ethnic cleansing". Tampa Bay Times. Archived from the original on 24 April 2023. Retrieved 31 July 2020.
^ Kine, Phelim (13 December 2019). "'The Lady' is a Liar: Suu Kyi's Genocide Whitewash". Physicians for Human Rights. Archived from the original on 25 September 2023. Retrieved 31 July 2020.
^ Sullivan, Daniel (14 December 2019). "Aung San Suu Kyi's Defense of Genocide". Fair Observer. Archived from the original on 8 December 2023. Retrieved 1 August 2020.
^ Bishara, Azmi (2024). "Gaza - غزّة: Moral Matters in Hard Times". Al-Muntaqa: New Perspectives on Arab Studies. 7 (1): 8–29. ISSN 2616-8073. JSTOR 48775002.
^ Segal, Raz; Daniele, Luigi (5 March 2024). "Gaza as Twilight of Israel Exceptionalism: Holocaust and Genocide Studies from Unprecedented Crisis to Unprecedented Change". Journal of Genocide Research: 1–10. doi:10.1080/14623528.2024.2325804.

Sources

Ihrig, Stefan (2016). Justifying Genocide: Germany and the Armenians from Bismark to Hitler. Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0-674-91517-6.