Seen many times against Hamas and Hezbollah over the years, disproportionate retaliation was notably formalized as the Dahiya doctrine. What is the rationale behind it?
| This post is part of a reading series on Zionism vs. Democracy, by Philippe Roussel. To quickly access all chapters, open the book title tab on the Authors & Books page. |
The Dahiya doctrine is the brainchild of Israel Defense Forces (IDF) Chief of General Staff Gadi Eizenkot during the 2006 Lebanon War.1 The logic is to cause such difficulties and harm to the civilian population that they will, supposedly, have no choice but to turn against the fighters in their midst, forcing them to stop hostilities.
Of course, one would be hard-pressed to find a rational justification for the hope that using violence far beyond the practical necessity of self-defense will, somehow, deter violence. But the official answer is that this is missing the point. Since Israeli headquarters consider that anti-semitism is the poison fuelling attacks on the country, “teaching a lesson” is not using violence for the sake of violence; it is telling aggressors that, one way or another, their only option is to change course. Due to its particular status as a Jewish state, it is assumed that Israel has no choice but to resort to disproportionate retaliation to keep the beast of antisemitism in check. This is why all of its battles are said to be existential ones.
Yet, though it is true that Hezbollah or Hamas officials have regularly engaged in Holocaust denial and spread anti-Semitic conspiracy theories in the name of their political stand against Zionism, this does not necessarily make them Hitler’s little replicas. Like racism, antisemitism is not a monolith. Some will be antisemitic by the implications of their words or attitude without even noticing, sincerely convinced they are true humanists; others will passively accept bigoted mental schemes because they lack the courage to think for themselves; others still will overtly claim their hatred of Jews. There are degrees in stupidity, and no one could deny that the human psyche is a mixed reality.
Aside from clinical cases of dementia, everyone can always choose to think. Before being a violent cultural undercurrent that has plagued many societies, anti-semitism is simply dumb. Education is the cure. Strangely, however, the Dahiya doctrine tells us that it is not, and that anti-semitism, like cancer, cannot be cured from within the malignant cells; it can only be removed. Which means blasting all possibilities of the anti-semitic cancer to spread. But officially disregarding the rule of proportionality between military targets and civilians as a matter of strategy is a war crime. Lying on the principle that the sacredness of human lives, notably innocent ones, can be disregarded, its justifications are mere pretexts to end a conflict through utter destruction.
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Philippe Roussel has long been interested in studying the power structures defining our increasingly unsustainable and undemocratic world. This website serves as the primary platform where he presents his ideas and findings to an international audience.