The skeletons in Belgium's closet and Ariel Sharon

The skeletons in Belgium's closet and Ariel Sharon

By Gerald A. Honigman
February 18, 2003

Arik's no war criminal.

Belgium wants to try Ariel (Arik) Sharon for war crimes under its 1993 universal jurisdiction law after he's out of office. This is a bit interesting, to say the least, coming from a country whose human rights abuses during its colonial regime in Africa rank among the worst.

Hundreds of thousands of Black Africans were forcibly conscripted and virtually enslaved into building the railroads, working the rubber plantations and mines, torn from their families, tortured when "disobedient," forced to kill their own countrymen who dared to resist, etc. And all to make the Belgian White Man rich. Listen to this quote from the Library of Congress's Country Studies on Zaire/Congo:

"...the peoples...were subjected to a staggering sequence of wars, repression...the impact of this colonial experience was...devastating...ruthless exploitation of human and natural resources...reputation for brutality was well established..."

And then there was Belgium's less-than-glorious behavior during the Holocaust, a la its Vichy French counterparts. While there were some examples of courage, Belgium still deported about half of its 70,000 Jews to death camps and helped steal fortunes in property. In Prime Minister Verhofstadt's own toned-down words, "there were too many collaborators in Belgium."

Perhaps all of this - and lots more - helps explain Belgium's insistence on making a villain out of Israel's Sharon. Like others in a guilt-ridden Europe and elsewhere, it helps in exorcising their own demons if they can paint the eternally victimized Jew and/or Jewish State in the role of the Nazi oppressor. It's the "see, our crimes are no worse than yours" syndrome.

No doubt about it. Arik is indeed hated in the Arab world... but not for the reasons that you think.

Muslims kill Jews, and we're told it's the Jews' own fault. How dare they want an existence beyond the perpetual wandering, "deicide people" in the West or their "kelbi yahudi" - Jew Dog - status in the East!

Muslims kill Christians, then Christians kill Muslims... and that's also the Jews' fault. Pick your problem. It's the Jews' fault. Hate communists? Blame Karl Marx. Hate capitalists? Read the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. And our Saudi Arab friends will gladly provide you with a copy.

And so, on that fateful, tragic day when Arik gave the go ahead to his Christian Lebanese allies to enter into the twin Palestinian refugee camps to seek out those who were murdering their own people, no one knew exactly what would next transpire.

Arabs have a long history, unfortunately, of using their own non-combatants as human shields, a practice which is in blatant violation of the Perfidy clause of the Geneva Conventions. Arafat, Hamas, the PFLP, etc. typically set up shop amid schools, hospitals, apartment buildings, etc. Saddam is undoubtedly doing the same right now in anticipation of the coming fireworks.

So, when Sharon gave the green light, he knew only too well what the Christian forces would be up against. Israel had entered Lebanon in the first place only because of the non-stop terrorism coming across the border from Lebanese soil which the latter's government was unable/unwilling to stop.

But Arik did not expect the massacre which followed. Should he have anticipated "problems"? Possibly. It's easy to be the Monday morning quarterback. Sharon's "crime," for which he was punished by Israel itself (just like the Arabs would do to fellow Arabs if the situation was reversed, right?), was wanting to say "yes" to one of the few allies Israel had in the region.

In the heat of battle, things go awry. Arabs like to cite the Deir Yassin incident involving the Irgun and Stern Gang during Israel's War of Independence. But, truth be told, innocents were killed because Jews were fired upon from those very same homes as in the Jenin experience over five decades later. This is not the same thing as deliberately seeking out innocents for incineration and disembowelment a la the Arafat/Hamas good cop/ bad cop team.

Yes, Arik is hated. He's hated because Arabs know that he sees through their lies and doublespeak to an all-too-willing-to-believe West. Arabs prefer the breed of Jew more willing to bare the neck for the sake of empty, vaporous promises... or less. And apparently, observing the behavior of Belgium, France, and too many others, so does much of the West. Israel indeed has that variety, which can be found too often in the Diaspora as well. But the results of Camp David 2000 and Taba turned that breed, at least in Israel, into an endangered species.

Arik is hated because he has been a first class warrior, feared by his enemies, in defense of his nation and people. He has played a higher than average role, even by Israeli standards, in foiling repeated attempts on the life of his sole, miniscule, resurrected nation by Arabs who gained most of the 22 states they now call their own by conquering and forcibly Arabizing millions of native, non-Arab peoples and their lands. They hate him for his crushing raids and actions against their military... not his deliberate assaults on innocents. That's, unfortunately, an Arab specialty.

So, Belgium wants to try Arik for "war crimes." I guess his trial will be like the one it conducted for Arab butchers and gassers of Kurds in Syria and Iraq. You know, the one they had after reading the Kurdish nationalist Ismet Cherif Vanly's book, The Syrian 'Mein Kampf' Against the Kurds (Amsterdam 1968). You didn't miss that one, did you?

Maybe it's like the one Brussels called for after the majority Berber language and culture were outlawed in much of "Arab" North Africa. Or similar to the one it conducted due to some two million Black African Sudanese being killed and many more maimed, enslaved, etc. in the name of the Arab nation? Where were you all when all of these were going on?

Yeah, right. And while you're trying to figure this all out, where were you when you missed the trials of the Belgians themselves when they had to account for their crimes against Black Africans and Jews?

In fairness, Belgium has taken the lead in some areas of human civility over the past few centuries. Its endeavors to end the African slave trade were commendable. But it would have been more so had it not virtually replaced it with its own local colonial variety. This smelled too much like it was simply eliminating Arab and other competitors for the available Black African merchandise. Belgium's recent work in eliminating land mines deserves praise as well.

But there are far too many skeletons in Brussels' own closet for it to be pointing its hypocritical, double standard finger in the direction of Israel's Sharon.