Jewish Peace Groups in Europe Voice Support for Continuation of Sabra and Shatila War Crimes Trial in Belgium

Press release, Jewish Socialist group, 4 May 2003

As Belgian MPs were considering repeal of legislation allowing for foreign war criminals to be prosecuted, Jewish peace groups were backing attempts by lawyers acting for victims of the 1982 Sabra and Chatila camps massacres to bring Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon before the Belgian courts.

On February 12, Belgian's appeal court threw out an earlier Appeals Court ruling and agreed that a case could be brought under Belgian law. The Israeli government responded angrily, accusing the Belgians of an anti-Semitic "blood libel," and of standing by during the Nazi Holocaust against the Jews. Israel's ambassador was withdrawn from Brussels, and in the United States an Israeli consul urged Jews to boycott Belgian goods.

But the Israeli government reaction has been rejected by Israeli Jewish peace campaigners and by Jews in Belgium itself. Writing in Le Soir, Brusels magistrate Leon Leibman accused Israeli foreign minister Netanyahu of slandering his country, Belgium, and trying to provoke the anti-Semitism which it pretended to protest. The Union des Progressistes Juifs de Belge, a left-wing association which includes Holocaust survivors and Resistance veterans, has also condemned the Israeli attempt to shield Sharon.

In Britain, the Jewish Socialists' Group at its annual conference on March 30 welcomed the decision that Sharon could be tried, and expressed sympathy for the massacre survivors' and relatives' efforts to secure justice. Their resolution accused the Israeli government of insulting the memory of Jewish victims of persecution by trying to hide its own crimes behind their name.

Below is the text of the Jewish Socialists' Group's Resolution on this matter:

War Crimes and Belgian Law

This JSG conference remembers the horror with which we heard of the barbaric massacres of defenceless civilians at Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in Lebanon in 1982, carried out by Christian Fascists unleashed by the Israeli Army. We recall that according to international law, and the findings of Israel's Kahan commission, Israeli commanders were culpable. This led to the removal of the Defence Minister responsible for the Lebanon war -- Ariel Sharon, now prime minister of Israel.

We welcome a Belgian Supreme Court decision that families of those killed at Sabra and Shatila can pursue justice against those responsible. We express our sympathy and support to these Palestinian and Lebanese families. As Jews, whose people suffered racist pogroms and mass murder, we know the added pain and insult of seeing perpetrators escaping justice, and attempts to erase crimes from memory.

As Jews we condemn the efforts made by Israeli leaders to shield their responsibility for the Sabra and Shatila massacres by denouncing the victims as "terrorists", and smearing the Belgian people as anti-Semites, invoking the Holocaust to suggest Sharon is the innocent victim of anti-Semitism and "blood libel." They insult our martyrs and fighters by association with this bloodthirsty butcher, and undermine the real fight against anti-Semitism. We urge all Jewish people to have nothing to do with this desperate, cynical ploy.

We declare our support for every effort to uncover the truth about war crimes, and to ensure there is no hiding place in future for those who organize mass killing.

For more information, contact: JSGBulletin@aol.com, JSG@bardrose,dircon.co.uk or Charles Pottins 07958 565 022.

[In The Press]