A Rose is a Rose

4/30/2017

In the article “Pope Francis calls refugee centers concentration camps; Jewish group says there’s no comparison” (April 23, 2017) Cleve R. Wootson Jr. from The Washington Post writes:

In Greece, Interior Minister Panagiotis Kouroublis, touring the Idomeni camp on the border with Macedonia, compared it to a concentration camp. Idomeni was where a photo emerged of two Syrian parents washing their newborn baby, Bayan, in a puddle.
“I do not hesitate to say that this is a modern-day Dachau, a result of the logic of closed borders,” he said. “Whoever comes here takes several blows to the stomach.”

I haven't been to any refugee camp or any detention center; yet, I get a blow in my stomach every time I read anything about migrants.

What would happen if they let loose those people? Let everybody go wherever they wish. Our comfort would be perturbed, let it be. Seriously, let hell break loose. This is hell for so many people. Let it be hell for us too. I mean of course I don't want hell for myself. I am no masochist. I want to go on living my life free from hassle. But I want the same thing on behalf of everybody.

Let's not pretend. As Pope Francis says these are “discarded people”.
Say it openly, this is Nazi Germany. This is eugenics. Just of a different kind. Those who were born poor or those who were unlucky enough to have war break where they lived, who had natural disasters, who were targets of racial hatred... they are randomly “killed” by states who have imposed borders and employ border controls. The only difference between a direct genocide and migrant deaths being in the randomness of it, people being “killed” not in concentration camps but while trying to move around the world they were born on, and their being killed by “nature”, i.e. drowning at sea, or suffocating while hiding under trucks... Yet, the main, the root reason for their deaths is the same: Borders. So big big people who are running countries can pretend to be busy doing a serious job: that of protecting their borders and wring their hands off of these deaths. They have the “international laws” on their side.

In fact, the Pope has made a concentration camp analogy to refugee centers. And David Harris, the chief executive of the American Jewish Committee said “Precision of language and facts is absolutely essential when making any historical reference...” Well... I agree with him. But not only when making any historical reference, precision of language and facts is always absolutely essential.

I'm sorry, if you call the death of Armenians a genocide when they were forced from their homes during harsh winter conditions, you have to call what is going on today by the same name. Even if you don't call migrant deaths genocide, killing is killing. Just don't pretend to be doing things according to some “rules” and “laws” you have set. Just don't. The deaths of tens of thousands in the Mediterranean and elsewhere, deaths of migrants are the collateral damage of (Y)our borders. All political leaders of the world have blood on their hands, whether by will or by consequence, makes no difference.