Pots, kettles and human rights

International organisations documenting human rights violations issue both periodical and extraordinary statements focusing on one state, military group, or non-state actor violating the numerous international human rights conventions in place.

It is natural for countries with undemocratic governments to be displeased by the findings of these reports. Democratic countries that are often not spared from these reports sometimes object to them too, though their violations cannot be compared with that committed by dictatorial regimes.

The main difference between the two, however, is that tyrants not only object or reject these human rights reports, but also often go on the offensive against the organisations in question, while coming down on those who cooperate with them domestically, and even accuse them of treason.

The tyrants' mouthpieces, and local and regional lackeys, then start competing with one another in exposing the alleged conspiracy against the people's "steadfastness", the state's "immunity", the regime's "stability", and society's "values" and so on, in the form of statements, editorials, or even trials.

By contrast, democratic states may express reservations or criticism of reports that concern them, and add some references to practices that could be avoided in the future.

However, what is repugnantly duplicitous, is that many tyrannical regimes - and on many occasions - have no qualms whatsoever about quoting human rights reports and statements. They may even commend them when they happen to attack a rival country or political opponents.

In that case, the conclusions of human rights organisations occupy the regimes' media outlets. The regimes' "advocates" among paid-off writers show no shame in pointing out the work of these organisations, and in praising their newfound objectivity.

The best example of this moral cognitive dissonance endemic to the Arab region is how Human Rights Watch or Amnesty International reports, or reports from other organisations, are praised when it comes to Israeli policy in the occupied territories.

The golden rule

If you have no shame, and if you hold political, military, and religious power, then do as your please.

This seems to be the golden rule that tyrants respect. However, the painful question raised here, which could be tantamount to playing with fire, is this: Does this rule not also apply to political or armed opposition factions active in the raging political or military scenes in the Arab region?

Does so-called revolutionary legitimacy justify violations by some who speak in the name of revolution?

Does so-called revolutionary legitimacy justify violations by some who speak in the name of revolution, against people's rights, lives, and cultures?

Is there a single moral justification that allows those who have arms to bully civilians, deny them freedom, and deprive them of their dignity, even though their claim was they had bore arms in the first place to defend and avenge said people?

Do any laws allow the killing of civilians or even combatants in captivity?

Armed Syrian groups - which are difficult morally and practically to call revolutionary - bombard cities under loyalist control. They bomb civilians knowingly, and they boast in some of their statements of having bombed residential areas.

Dozens of victims have paid the price of what at best can be called political recklessness. Or rather, more clearly, they paid the price of hatred built on ignorance and the lack of political leadership, or on the cowardice of political leadership vis-a-vis the warlords sprouting like mushrooms in a swamp of intellectual staleness, political inertia, and military failures.

When international human rights organisations address and condemn these violations, the armed groups in question, which hijacked a part of the patriotic civil and military uprising, adopt the discourse of the same tyrannical regimes in hitting back at the watchdogs.

They accuse them of "collaboration", allude to the alleged domination of "international Zionism and crusaders" on them, and engage in whataboutery by claiming they ignore the violations of the other side.

Revolutionary legitimacy is based, primarily, on both ethical and patriotic legitimacy, where there can be no room for hatred of the other, murder of the other, and torturing of the other.

If the ruling echelons shun patriotic and moral values, they are rejecting part of their brutal character that they worked hard to build.

But for the forces that claim to be defending the homeland and its people to disregard these values, then this is a great disaster. And what is even more painful is the stance expressed by some political leaders who seem to appease, excuse, or ignore these violations.

No patriotic uprising will prevail if its leaders, or those who purport to be its leaders, are afraid to say what is right and confront what is wrong.

This is an edited translation from our Arabic edition.