It looks obvious

How should we interpret Ahmadinejad’s statements, calling for the destruction of Israel? What weight do they carry? These are the questions that Daniel Koffler attempt to answer in a very insightful article:

Now, none of this suggests for a moment that the narrow semantic values of Ahmaghinejad’s declarations of the impending destruction of the state of Israel completely exhaust the messages he was communicating (that’s the first lesson of practical linguistics). And the upshot of the fact that Ahmaghinejad, strictly speaking, fastened his attacks on the Israeli “regime” rather than Israel or the Israelis, and that he never explicitly signed on to the project of bringing about the destruction of that “regime,” isn’t that Ahmaghinejad was really talking about flowers and candy and has gotten a rough break in the Western press. On the contrary, it simply goes to show that a politician is a politician no matter where he’s from, and what distinguishes even deranged racist ignoramus politicians from deranged racist ignoramus non-politicians is that the former will speak calculatingly, as the politicians that they are. So even though Ahmaghinejad isn’t literally pledging the Iranian state to a policy of genocide, he is personally endorsing an event - the destruction of the Israeli government - that would very likely entail the slaying of large numbers of Israelis.

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That’s why fretting over Ahmaghinejad’s remarks about Israel is a waste of energy, even as it’s good to stay alert to the casual antisemitism that excuses such remarks but would never countenance equivalent incitements against other groups . Maybe - maybe! - there are some irredentists in Gaza or the West Bank whose Shi’ism is strong enough to overcome the hatred of Persians they’ve been taught since childhood, who don’t recognize what a laughingstock Ahmaghinejad is in Iran, and who take the clear message of his remarks to heart. But how many such people could there be, who will engage in terrorism against Israel because of Ahmaghinejad, but wouldn’t have otherwise? I strongly doubt it would take very many hands to count them all.

As for the significance of Ahmaghinejad’s remarks for the Iranian government and Iranian society, it’s basically non-existent. Despite the fact that his title is “President” - as I’ll continue to point out again and again - Iranian state power is completely in the hands of the small circle of clerics around Ali Khamenei. Any power Ahmaghinejad exercises is at Khamenei & co.’s discretion, and can be rescinded on a whim. Indeed, as observers of the Iranian political scene well know, Khamenei’s loathing of Ahmaghinejad is nearly as strong as that of educated Iranian society at large. Khamenei has barely tolerated Ahmaghinejad’s presence in the government because he represented a significant, boorish segment of the Iranian “electorate” — a term I bracket with scare quotes both because the pool of Iranian voters is not representative of the country, and the elections in which they vote do not have any practical effect on the composition of the real leadership. And now that Ahmaghinejad’s buffoonery has destroyed whatever popular support he enjoyed, Khamenei and the clerics were swift to exclude him from the government in every respect except nominally.

In the long run Iran and Israel has much more common interests than reasons to fights. I do not think that this alone is a reason to not be careful about Iran’s intuitions. however, Israel, and the west, need to develop a strategy that accept the fact that that several countries in the middle-east will have nuclear capabilities and that will exploit this situation, rather than fighting the unavoidable.

The question of just war was, and still is, a source for many philosophical discussions. It was not only a theoretical question but a question that leaders considered practically, even if only for the purpose of legitimacy. It was also the justification establishing the league of nations and its younger, and equally failure, the UN.

My observations over the years brought me to believe that there are many more benefits for limited intervention or limited activism. My natural suspicious approach toward central planning, and the ability of central power to manage one country successfully, are in order of magnitude higher when a country tries to centrally manage the rest of the world.

The question I’m straggling with, without a good answer, is the question of moral obligation. Are there cases when a country must intervene in foreign war? The immediate answer is, obviously, a country should be obligated to stop cases of genocide. But this, as it usually is, isn’t as simple as we might have wish.

I believe that government only role, and justification, is to protect the human rights of those under its sovereignty. Is sending one to fight a none defensive war serve this purpose? Is this a justified expanding of the powers the government assume? I am not sure. Morally I would rather individual making a decision for themselves if, and how, they want to contribute to a struggle against evil around the world - but there is a valid question of practicality. Can an NGO stop a genocide without the backing of a state?

But even if we put the question of the state role aside there are many other, more practical questions. What level of genocide justified intervention? Why Darfur but not Congo? Is it a question of size or that wars between different groups? Should we stop a tribal war? What should we do in cases when the state kills its own people like in Cambodia? Or only certain segments of its population - like what have been done to women in Afghanistan?

If it was justified to stop Nazi Germany genocide why didn’t the world go to war to stop the killing in USSR under Stalin? Was it morally different?

Growing up I used to look at the pictures of my grandparents relatives that the german murdered in the holocaust. I used to imagine how would it be to belong to a big family, as it should have been if they would not have been murdered. It was obvious to me that it was immoral and evil to ignore the genocide. But I have no good answers what should be the right approach. I know the anger and pain of a nation that was the victim of such genocide, and the unanswered question: “How could you let this happen”? But I don’t know what should be the answer.