Hope of peace in face of war

Sunday January 11, 2009
Hope of peace in face of war
BY SHAHANAAZ HABIB


After having spent 20 years studying modern humanitarian law, Dr Ameur Zemmali from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) is still surprised by the degree of violence that man is prepared to inflict on his own kind.

THE pictures coming out from Gaza tell a very grim tale ­­— hundreds of children, babies, women and men dead and thousands more injured, some maimed for life.

Many of us were not even born yet when the state of Israel was created in 1948, carved out from Palestine which resulted in Palestinians being forced out of their homes. A few wars later, Palestine ended up being under Israeli occupation, rendering its people without a state.

And 60 years on, the Israel-Palestinian problem still festers like a gangrenous wound that has gone untreated for too long.


Humanitarian effort: The whole raison de etre of the ICRC work is service to victims and relief assistance. – AFP

Yet there are those like Dr Ameur Zemmali who will not give up.

“If I look to the history of war, there are a lot of elements of pessimism but I am by nature an optimist. I think there will be a solution. War is not a finality. It must stop one day or another,” says Dr Zemmali who holds a doctorate in law and is the legal advisor for Islamic Affairs for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

“But while waiting, there are victims and loss of lives. You have people being killed daily – women, children, men. The situation is unbearable. If you read the newspapers or watch TV, you hear of killings, bombings, violence, demolition of houses. If it’s not Palestine, then it’s Lebanon, Sudan or Iraq. It’s the daily bread of the region but really it’s not normal and it’s not acceptable,” he adds.

Hope for resolution

Even though the road ahead for the region is very dark, Dr Zemmali says, “we must keep our optimism.”

“I believe in the humanity of man and the necessity of finding negotiable solutions through dialogue instead of confrontation.

“If you look at history, solutions are possible even in the most terrible of wars and sometimes you can reach a lasting settlement even between the most hostile of enemies,” he says, pointing to Europe during the second World War as an example or how warring countries managed to bury the hatchet and come together in peace and common interest.

“So yes, I believe warring countries can reach long-lasting reconciliation and move from confrontation to co-operation,” says Dr Zemmali who has spent 20 years studying modern humanitarian law. But the fact that the US is undeniably biased towards Israel raises questions if it can ever play the role of honest broker in finding an acceptable solution to both sides.


"I think there will be a solution. War is not a finality. It must stop one day or another"- DR AMEUR ZEMMALI
“But what is the alternative?” asks Dr Zemmali.

Heavy price

“Sooner or later, the Palestine issue must be resolved. The price in terms of humanitarian cost is already very high. The Palestinian people were a sovereign state in their homeland to start with. International law recognises that. But until we reach a solution, the humanitarian price will be heavier and heavier.”

And it will not be just Israel, Palestine and the Middle East that would be paying the price. The plight of Palestinians affects the Muslim psyche in many parts of the world and touches a raw nerve.

The current Israeli attacks and mounting Palestinian civilian casualties are bound to fuel anger among Muslims in particular at largely the US for backing Israel and also the Arab nations for failing to stop it.

It does not help either that all this is happening at a time when there is already a gap between the Islamic world and the West after the Sept 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the US and the subsequent US-led war on Iraq.

Dr Zemmali opines that it is unfortunate that the war on terror is being waged against Islamic parts of the world and that those jailed are Muslims, which in turn gives some movements the “ammunition” to “feed” information of such injustices and get Muslims all worked up.

Like it or not, a sizeable number of armed conflicts are taking place in Muslim countries. Which is the reason why more than two-thirds of the ICRC activities are centred in the Islamic world.

“If you take the map, you will find the major current conflicts are in the Islamic world. That is really clear,” says Dr Zemmali.

He denies this is because Muslims are always fighting.

“The conflicts are a tip of the iceberg. Conflicts are an outcome of something else — the consequence of multiple factors: social, economic, political and cultural — the gap between the Islamic world and the West after Sept 11. There are many external and internal dimensions,” he says.

Hence one cannot isolate problems occurring in the Islamic world from “the regional and international context”.

Even so, Dr Zemmali says that “no country in the world can say all the time that all its problems come from abroad.”

“Islamic countries must not push all the responsibility onto others. They must not ‘escape’ their own responsibility. If they have problems in their countries, they must search for solutions in their countries.

Internal and external factors

“But that responsibility should not be attributed to only one country. We must keep in mind that Islamic countries are part of the world and there are internal and external factors that contribute to armed conflict. Neither Islamic countries nor the West are entitled to put the responsibility on the other side.”

For Dr Zemmali, it is also too simplistic to blame the current tensions in the Muslim world on US president George W. Bush.

“I think the relationship between the Islamic world and the West is more complex than that,” he adds.

And in areas where there is trouble and conflict, the ICRC goes. And at times it pays a very high price — including the loss of lives as in the case of the targeted bombing of the ICRC office in Iraq back in 2003.

Preventing the ICRC staff from risk is one of the organisation’s major challenges, and when one of its staff is targeted, Dr Zemmali notes, “the security effect is terrible for everyone.”

“Our work is humanitarian work but if we are targeted, then we will think more than twice about how to move and how to get to the victims. The whole raison de etre of the ICRC work is service to victims and offering relief assistance. We need to be close to the population in need.

“So by the very nature of the job, we must work during the armed conflict. We cannot run away from our responsibilities. If you ride the sea, you should not fear being shipwrecked,” he says.

In high risk areas, ICRC is very discreet in its movement and in certain places where it is targeted it does not display its emblem.

The ICRC also makes sure that all its staff adhere to its security instructions, study the field very well, weigh all the different aspects when moving around and respect local traditions.

“We are not armed; we don’t fight; we don’t take sides in any part of the conflict but even then, we are sometimes targeted. But we have to stay because we need to be close to the people in need.

“We don’t travel with guards. We refuse a militarisation of the humanitarian action. For us, humanitarian action must be protected by itself. Our ‘weapon’ is neutrality and independence. It’s not guns.

“We refuse to be put under the military protection of anybody, of any state, because this would not be proper of a humanitarian organisation which works for everybody,” he says.

Questioning humanity

Despite having studied humanitarian law, Dr Zemmali is still somewhat taken back by the degree of violence in armed conflicts.

“Law is very comfortable because it’s all theory and rules. But I have a permanent question — has humanity really developed itself?

“Is humanity today better than centuries before? Maybe humanity has made progress in terms of industry and technology but I think that with the new means and methods of war, humanity today is worse off than humanity centuries ago.

“Previously, in the classic wars, the theatre of operation was determined at the beginning and limited to some place even before the waging of war and so atrocities were limited then.

“But now with technology, you find more destructive arms and these are used without limits. Without constraints, the results can be horrible. So I ask myself: ‘Has humanity really developed?’

“There are more laws, provisions, articles... but on the other hand, when you look, you see more violence. But having said that, I think we must still do everything to implement the law because the law is the safeguard for everybody.

“The irony between the law and what happens must not make us lose hope in humanity. We must do everything to see the law is not inked on the sheet but it’s part of reality. We have to work on that.”

Dr Zemmali admits that humanitarian work can be harder than other jobs but stresses that even civil jobs require a lot of effort, involvement and commitment.

“But someone must do this (humanitarian) work with neutrality, independence and with humanity. Man must care for the state of his brother. We cannot abandon victims to the will of belligerence. That would be catastrophic for everybody.

“So even with all the side-effects on our soul and psychology, we have to do this job. It’s a commitment towards humanity.”

Emotionally scarred

Despite being in the field for more than 20 years, Dr Zemmali says he has never cried over the atrocities as it is not in his nature to shed tears.

But that does not mean he has not been emotionally scarred in some ways. He still remembers meeting prisoners of war when he first joined ICRC.

“I saw people half my age looking double their age. That’s not normal. The first time, I could not sleep for four nights, and I couldn’t eat.”