The real problem with Israel’s ‘collective punishment’
Al JazeeraThe use of the term, while well-intended, ends up suggesting that it’s only the ‘collective’ bit that’s the problem. According to Article 33 of the 1949 Geneva Conventions, “no protected person may be punished for an offence he or she has not personally committed.” Indeed, on the surface, “collective punishment” appears to be a pretty apt description for flattening entire villages, saturating a country with millions of cluster bombs, and sending an attack helicopter to slaughter children in the back of a pick-up truck. The implication remains that it is merely the “collective” part of the punishment that’s the problem, and that Israel is still entitled in principle to mete out non-collective punishment in Lebanon. Speaking of occupation, jump across Lebanon’s southern border to occupied Palestine and you’ll find no shortage of collective punishment charges levelled against Israel by United Nations experts, Human Rights Watch, and the like. According to the Israeli government, the bloody affair was a “preemptive” act against the Palestinian Islamic Jihad group – which perhaps raises the morbid possibility of a new category of “preemptive collective punishment”.
History of this topic
Is ‘total’ Gaza blockade a collective punishment against Palestinians?
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‘Collective punishment’: Israel demolishes Palestinian homes
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