Who has the right to self-defence, occupier or the occupied? | New Straits Times | Malaysia General Business Sports and Lifestyle News

Who has the right to self-defence, occupier or the occupied? | New Straits Times | Malaysia General Business Sports and Lifestyle News John Whitbeck writes: Transmitted below is an excellent article by my Palestinian-Australian distinguished recipient Ali Kazak in which he addresses a fundamental question that is not being addressed by Western politicians and media -- whether an occupying state has a "right to self-defense" against the people whose land it illegally occupies and/or whether an occupied people have a right to self-defense against their occupiers. Having lived in France since 1976, I have in recent days sought to transpose and apply the French government's publicly expressed attitude toward the martyrdom of Gaza to France's own experience during the Second World War. To be consistent, the French government would have to concede that the occupied French people had no right to fight back against their German occupiers, that French resistance fighters were "terrorists" and that Germany's "right to self-defense" against the French resistance was absolute, with no limits on the permissible savagery of its responses. The massacre of 643 civilians committed by German forces in the French village of Oradur-sur-Glane (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oradour-sur-Glane_massacre) as collective punishment for resistance activity in the area is generally considered to be the worst atrocity committed by German forces in France during the Second World War. However, anyone who believes that the month-long and continuing massacres of innocents committed by Israeli forces in Gaza since October 7 are justified must, to be consistent, concede that the massacre in Oradur-sur-Glane was justified. Of course, as all decent people recognize, both massacres were and continue to be horrific and totally unjustified and the Gaza massacres must not simply be "paused" for a few hours but definitively ended. A black and white letter e Description automatically generated Who has the right to self-defence, the occupier or the occupied? by Ali Kazak 10 Nov 2023