The Law Of Terror
By Harsh Dobhal
22 October,
2008
Combat
Law
Ever since its inception, Israel has implemented some of the most stringent counter terror measures having, perhaps, the most experience in this area than any other country in modern times. Soon after its establishment, the Jewish state enacted the Prevention of Terrorism Ordinance which, and subsequent enactments, produced the dreaded intelligence agency like Shin Bet, gave authorities immense prosecutorial powers to detain individuals and question (read torture) them, permitted the targeting of suspected terror areas and centres, and allowed the bombing of such areas (collateral damage became an acceptable norm), thus inflicting enormous damage on civilians. This ordinance was amended later to make it even stronger so that even sympathising with what the authorities perceived as terror groups was deemed illegal. Despite these severe measures in place, Israel lives in the shadow of dread and there is no respite from the barrage of lethal attacks that routinely take lives. In this tiny country, periodically in the grip of nation-wide fear, there is hardly anyone whose someone – an associate, a friend, brother, uncle, a distant relative, a close friend's colleague or a neighbour--has not been a victim of these attacks. Strong laws have demonstrably had no effect in stamping out terrorism.
If anything, Israeli citizens have paid a high personal price by accepting a drastic dilution of their basic liberties in this ineffectual fight against terrorism. They are often subjected to a high degree of surveillance over their daily lives. Searches of individuals and their belongings, screening, security checkpoints, CC TV cameras and constant monitoring of public and private spaces are routine. Such is the security mania in the country that at Tel Aviv airport all foreigners have to face a rigorous interrogation by security personnel and disclose all manner of personal details on travel plans, purpose of visit, contacts in Israel (and with Palestinians if any), sources of income and, if you happen to be a research student, the topic of your thesis, the reason for choosing the topic and even the chapterisation and conclusion of the study. If all such queries are not answered to the satisfaction of the security personnel or if they think they detect any nervousness, a more intensive grilling follows that could last for hours. This is the anatomy of everyday life in a besieged country that has gone to extraordinary lengths to cultivate an enemy.
Despite a zero tolerance approach to terrorism and an ostensibly near
foolproof mechanism in place for decades, which has earned it international
opprobrium, Israeli citizens continue to face terrorist threats on
a daily basis
Israel's human rights violation record and its anti-terror policies
have been condemned world-wide and the country is still struggling
to fight its isolation in international forums, including at the United
Nations. The state has indulged in gross human rights violations of
unparalleled magnitude against Palestinians, using coercive and ruthless
methods of interrogation to gather information on terror activities
and conducted assassinations of Hamas leaders in Palestine and of
other targets even in other countries. Israel has often been accused
of anti-Arab profiling. Democratic opinion across the world has repeatedly
condemned the Israeli policies of economic sanctions, restrictions
on Palestinian mobility, segregation of cities from cities, villages
from villages and imposing immense hardships on ordinary Palestinians,
crippling their economy, paralysing everyday life through the use
of disproportionate force, including the deployment of tanks and missiles
for destroying Palestinian civilian structures.
Despite such a zero tolerance approach to terrorism and an ostensibly near foolproof mechanism in place for decades, which has earned it international opprobrium, Israeli citizens continue to face terrorist threats on a daily basis. Not everybody in the country is an obsessive xenophobe or Arab hater. There is a whole generation that has only seen violence, like their parents have, and who want to carry on life in a normal way, in peace and harmony, without any suicide bombings or any draconian laws that pervade society and intrude into their daily lives. Though the Israeli state is an unabashed coloniser, what is generally lost sight of is the fact that ordinary people in the country want peace for themselves and with Palestinians, while their leaders, cutting across the political spectrum, continue playing on their fears for domestic political dividends. Even a left-of-centre party like Labour partakes of the same truculence as its more right wing counterparts, because the terms of politics in security matters are set by the latter. India is moving on a somewhat similar pattern.
While there cannot be any comparison between the political situation in West Asia and India, for Israel has been in conflict with the Palestinians since its establishment over issues like land, water and the future of millions of Palestinians, there is a family resemblance in the way in which enemies are perceived and how they are dealt with. The social pathologies of amplified fear are used to engineer a similar environment of extreme insecurity to politically validate the suspension of constitutional liberties and the targeting of innocents in the name of combating a menace that is permanently in the air. A chorus of demands from within civil society for harsh laws to empower the police and security forces to dangerous levels of lawlessness and vendetta can quite easily be orchestrated in an atmosphere of terror-induced insecurity. Therefore, the amplification of the perceived threat through official exaggerations and incessant re-runs of gruesome spectacles in the visual media can potentially lead to a grotesque Hobbesian contract by which society voluntarily surrenders its liberties and its freedoms to create an intoxicated Leviathan. This is where the parallels between India and Israel lie and these are surely not coincidental.
Post 9/11, post December 13, 2001, post 7/7 2005, post-September 2008,
the Israeli model of fighting terror has increasingly gained currency
among the mainstream of the international community, so much so that
it is now the accepted global model
During the late 1990s, especially after the NDA government came to
power, Indo-Israel strategic cooperation (including in the field of
anti-terrorism) intensified, culminating in the visit of then home
minister L K Advani and Jaswant Singh to the Jewish state in 2000.
The composition of Advani's delegation had drawn much attention from
media as it comprised heads of intelligence agencies, RAW, IB, and
central police organisations fighting terrorism. Advani formalised
Indo-Israeli cooperation in his meetings with the Mossad chief and
Israeli ministers dealing with security. Israel was keen to support
India's anti-terrorism efforts. There was a newly discovered convergence
in threat perception shared by the two countries. Hence, the symmetries
in the security environments of the two countries have a certain tangible
kinship.
Advani's cabinet colleague Jaswant Singh, who had also visited Israel days before Advani, made energetic efforts to cement the growing ties between the two countries but reiterated New Delhi's continued support to the Palestinians for their "inalienable rights to reside in internationally-recognised territories." Singh also made a controversial remark in reply to a question at the Israeli Council of Foreign Relations on why India took so long to establish diplomatic relations with Israel. He blamed it on India's past politicians and their urge to cling to office with the backing of the Muslim votes saying that India's Israel policy became captive to domestic policy that came to be unwittingly an unstated veto on India's larger West Asia policy.
Jaswant Singh's remarks signified an obvious shift in India's West Asia policy and its increasing fondness for Israel. Long before he became a cabinet member of the government that enacted POTA, Jaswant Singh had, in his 1988 article, "Beleaguered State" in the journal Seminar, offered the following trenchant criticism on the use of stringent laws in Punjab--
"Unfortunately, [the Indian] government is a classic example of proliferating laws, none of which can be effectively applied because the moral authority of the Indian government has been extinguished, and because the needed clarity of purpose (and thought) is absent. Not surprisingly, therefore, [the government] falls back to creating a new law for every new crime . . .''
There is something predictable but diabolical about Jaswant Singh’s paradigm shift, who during the hijack of the IC-814 flight to Kandahar had personally escorted three terrorists in exchange for the lives of the hostages. Since then India has witnessed a spurt in terror attacks over the years and the recent sickening and morally repugnant explosions have generated an extraordinary climate of fear in a society conditioned to accepting the globally dominant narrative of terror and the overriding necessities it demands.
Stringent laws have not solved the problem of terror attacks. Not
in Israel, not in India. The solutions have to be found elsewhere
Post 9/11, post December 13, 2001, post 7/7 2005, post-September 2008,
the Israeli model of fighting terror has increasingly gained currency
among the mainstream of the international community, so much so that
it is now the accepted global model. The central tenet of this doctrine
is that terror attacks are perpetrated by irrational, hate-filled
Muslim youth fanatically pursuing the dream of global jehad. The stereotype
is now cast in stone, and like all stereotypes it relies on caricature
and results in hate. It justifies retribution and repression and fulfils
its own nihilistic prophecies, setting in perpetual motion an endless
cycle that cannot be terminated by special laws.
Yet, today in India there is a deafening demand for enacting new, more stringent legislations to tackle terrorism. Such laws, curtailing fundamental rights, are driven by political expediency. Those demanding such laws should not forget that TADA, POTA, MISA had all to be repealed. Most of these laws already had their run without ending the threat of terror attacks or even minimising them. While more and more innocent persons have become victims of unrestrained police action, the conviction rate under even a draconian law like TADA has been abysmally low, below 2 percent in fact. The number of killings in response to terrorism, on the other hand, is exceptionally high. Tough laws encourage a corollary moral environment in which the threshold of tolerance for impunity by the state is raised, because the imperatives of the situation are deemed to require it. In effect, what it means is that the special law does not prevent terror and rarely punishes the guilty. If tougher laws could solve the problem, then why did it not prevent the terror attack on Parliament despite the fact that POTA was in place? Why did MCOCA fail to prevent 7/11 in Maharashtra? Why does militancy in northeast not subside despite 50 years of AFSPA. Why does Jammu ad Kashmir periodically burst into flames?
Stringent
laws do not lead to superior intelligence nor to efficient prosecution.
They just permit prolonged detention without proof of guilt. We rarely
get to know who the perpetrators of such crimes are. As the BJP's
Jaswant Singh, no less, pointed out 20 years ago, stringent laws have
not solved the problem of terror attacks. Not in Israel, not in India,
not anywhere else. We have to look for solutions elsewhere.
