After Paris Attacks, a Call for Justice—Not Vengeance

[polly7]

By Phyllis Bennis
Source: The Nation
November 15, 2015

France is in mourning and in shock. We still don’t know how many people were killed and injured. In fact, there’s a lot we still don’t know—including who was responsible. The ISIS claim of responsibility tells us virtually nothing about who really planned or carried out the attacks; opportunist claims are an old story. But the lack of information hasn’t prevented lots of assumptions about who is “obviously” responsible and what should be done to them. Already the call is rising across France—“this time it’s all-out war.”

But we do know what happens when cries of war and vengeance drown out all other voices; we’ve heard them before.

A few days after the 9/11 attacks, we at IPS and some of our allies organized a public statement whose lead signatories included Harry Belafonte, Danny Glover, Gloria Steinem, Rosa Parks and many more. The statement reflected the deeply-rooted fear we all shared, that however horrific the attacks of September 11, it was George W. Bush’s statement in response to those attacks that threatened the world. That was the moment he announced that the response to this enormous crime against humanity would be a war—that he would lead the world to war “against terror.”

Wars of vengeance won’t work for France anymore than they worked for the US.

Full article: https://zcomm.org/znetarticle/after-paris-attacks-a-call-for-justice-not-vengeance/