gil@cornell.UUCP (11/22/85)
From: gil (Gil Neiger)
Recently there have been a number of allegations in this newsgroup
about Israel's aid to various third world countries such as South
Africa, El Salvador, etc. However, there have been some in this group
who objected to these on the grounds that they have nothing to do with
racism. I'm not sure why we were restricting ourselves to racism here,
but assuming we were, one writer (Louis Steinberg) warns against
equating cries of racism with "things one doesn't like." His
contention that while we may or may not find Israel's ties to
neo-fascist governments in Latin America and Africa reprehensible, we
should not gratuitously call them racist. Frank Silverman says "I've
heard many criticisms of these governments [those such as that in El
Salvador and Somoza's Nicaragua], but I've never heard that they were
racist."
Let's set this straight. Israel is not nearly so pro-Nicaragua now
that the Sandinistas are in power, so let's look at a nearby Central
American nation: Guatemala. Since the CIA-organized coup of 1954,
Guatemala has been run by the military. Most of its presidents since
them have been army generals and colonels, although there have been
brief civilian presidencies during which the army retained control of
the country (we are about to enter such a period).
A great majority of the Guatemalan population is Indian, mostly Mayan.
As is the case in much of Central America, the elite (military,
government, business classes, and large landowners) are primarily of
European descent (mainly Spanish). The Indian population remains very
poor, and functions often as a source of cheap agricultural labor. All
of this is especially true in Guatemala, where Indians form much
greater proportion of the national population than elsewhere in the
region.
The Guatemalan army is in the midst of a massive Indian extermination
campaign. Entire villages have been wiped out. Thousands upon
thousands of Indian peasants have been slaughtered. Tens of thousands
of Indians have fled to refugee camps in nearby Mexico - camps that are
still raided by Guatemalan border patrols. Thousands of others have
left their villages for the mountains of central Guatemala - some to
join the guerrilla resistance, but many simply to find a safe place to
live. It is difficult to believe, but those Indians who do try to make
a life for themselves in the mountains live in greater poverty than
they did before.
The situation of the Indians in Guatemala has been depicted in a recent
BBC documentary called "The Hidden Holocaust." What is going on there
cannot be called anything other than genocide. The Indian population
is being decimated and its culture destroyed.
It was such "abuses of human rights" (as these murders are
euphemistically called) that led the Carter administration to suspend
aid to Guatemala. Non-military aid to the country has been restored
since Reagan was elected, and the U.S. administration now wants to
resume military aid. It is likely that such an aid package will be
passed by Congress soon. Why? Not because the massacres of Indians
have abated, but because the country will soon have a civilian as
president.
Where does Israel fit into this? Israel has maintained close relations
with Guatemala since the 1950s. Not only has Israel been providing
military aid, with no stoppage because of "human rights violations,"
but Israeli advisors have given extensive training to Guatemalan
troops, especially in the army's "counterinsurgency" program. This
program is supposed to be an attempt by the army to control growing
guerrilla movements throughout the country (although such movements
include Indians, they are not exclusively Indian). However, this
program often leads again to the destruction of Indian villages, and to
the rape, torture, and murder of those Guatemalans not sympathetic to
the army.
Israel's role here is overt and direct. The Guatemalan army is
carrying a genocide that is, relative to the populations of the
countries, greater than Hitler's. It is doing so with Israel's
complicity. Guatemala's leaders acknowledge they could not have done
what they have, that they might not have reached their positions of
power, without the aid of Israel.
If the destruction of an entire race of people and their culture is not
racism, what is?
--
Gil Neiger
Computer Science Department
Cornell University
Ithaca NY 14853
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