Uighurs
Good Junta last night, I’ll leave it to Rindy to post some of the highlights, but for me that was what the Junta was all about: a bunch of dudes sitting around drinking and having good, engaged conversation about real topics.
Relevant to last night, and other Junta topics, is the continued rioting in Xinjiang. I’ve enjoyed reading about how the tone-deaf Chinese government tried to set up a PR tour through Urumqi. Apparently they didn’t learn anything from when they tried to usher journalists around Tibet when there was rioting there. Hahaha, I like the opening paragraph from the Gawker story below about this:
http://gawker.com/5309212/china-learns-the-yin-and-yang-of-pr
Anyway, I am following this story with mixed emotions. On the one hand, I love seeing the Chinese government, and generally the Han Chinese, getting their comeuppance. What they are doing in Xinjiang, just as in Tibet, is cultural genocide. The government provides incentives for Han Chinese to move to these frontier states, which have historically been independent as much as they have been a part of China, overtly favors the Han with jobs at the cost of the locals, and doesn’t provide anywhere near the proper safeguards to protect local culture. The clear goal is to change the fundamental character of these places. This is just a more patient, and very Chinese, form of ethnic cleansing and I really feel sympathy for the Uighurs and the Tibetans.
On the other hand, China is not Serbia or Kosovo. It is the only major economy that is growing and it’s stability and continued growth is absolutely essential to any sort of incipient recovery to the global economy.
So, I’m hoping that the rioters get their message out, possibly affect a change of policy, and that China loses huge face. But I also hope that it doesn’t get too bad. Maybe that can work out?
I would be interested to know if Jeremy considers the Israeli government to be committing “cultural genocide”, as I think one could basically change “Han Chinese” to “Israeli Jews” and “Uighurs” to “Palestinians” in his above paragraph and perfectly describe the settler movement out there. I assume he does not enjoy seeing the Israelis “getting their comeuppance” when Palestinians carry out suicide attacks, so why is it ok for Uighurs to burn buses and beat up Han?
A flawed analogy, truly. Israel is in “the Palestinian territories” because it had been invaded on numerous occasions and it hoped to acquire strategic depth (Israel, remember, is the size of New Jersey). It has since them been the victim of a wrong-headed attempt by religious extremists to expand the state of Israel. But that has played out under the microscope of the most intense international scrutiny and most Israelis accept that they will eventually leave these terrorities. Israel also does not restrict the rights of the Palestinians to practice their religion or teach or do other things in Arabic. It doesn’t compel Palestinians to eat during Ramadan as the Chinese do. It is not attempting to co-opt Palestinian identity. The Chinese on the other hand have no plans at all to consider even the possibility of even meaningful autonomy for Xinjiang, much less the independence that the Uighurs probably deserve. Their treatment of the Uighurs is barbaric and genocidal and they will reap what they sow eventually, it is just a pity that the world won’t call them out further on it.
Do “most Israelis accept that they will eventually leave these territories”? The election of Netanyahu is indicative, to me, of a general move rightward for the Israeli population. They are planning on expanding settlements, not dismantling them. There are American consultants crafting marketing plans to sell this idea to the US population as well.
Sample: “Persuadables won’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. Show empathy for BOTH sides!”
Israel may not ban Islam – but neither, technically, does China. Both governments have destroyed mosques, certainly. The Israeli government still treats Palestinians as second-class citizens, and makes life hard for them on a daily basis with the ubiquitous checkpoints, the paperwork required to move around, the constant reminder of who has the power. The settlements are a strategic move to exploit valuable resources, most importantly water – in the same way that Xinjiang holds massive hydrocarbon deposits that China will never give up.
The analogy holds.
I don’t want to be in a position to defend the Israeli occupation–I don’t like it and want it to end. But I still say this analogy doesn’t work.
The election of Netanyahu isn’t indicative of an Israeli shift towards rejecting the two-state solution. It is the reaction of a tiny state to another round of violence and the return to reality that it is surrounded by rejectionist enemies that seek it’s destruction. Israel is still reeling from the withdrawal from Gaza and the subsequent takeover by Hamas and the resulting war. Netanyahu and the right-wingers are just playing to the fears of the costinuency. And while there are groups that are media savvy and try to shape the message out there, it is also in reaction to the anti-Semetic hate that the country has to deal with.
The occupation is a bad thing, I want it to end, and detest that Israelis are put in a position of occupier and that they do indeed make life for the Palestinians very difficult. But I still say that this is a much different situation than in Xinjiang. The Israelis don’t restrict access to the mosques, they don’t stop Palestinians from the doing the Haj, they don’t force people to eat during Ramadan, and they don’t stop Palestinians from teaching in Arabic. The Chinese try to say that they respect Uighur culture by celebrating, say, Uighur dance. But really they are trying to essentially co-opt these people and destroy their ethnic identity. The Uighurs haven’t attacked China and as a result had the Chinese occupy their areas to neutralize a threat, as is the case in the Palestinian territories. It is a classic colonialist situation and the only reason the world tolerates it is the rising global power of China and it’s economy.