For Gaza’s Fate, Heed the Sri Lankan Civil War

The unfolding horror in Israel and Palestine has left our community and the world grieving and searching for answers. We have seen people slaughtered in the streets and watched families in unimaginable anguish after losing their loved ones.

In response to Hamas’ terror attack, the Israeli military has decimated neighborhoods, bombed hospitals, and cut off electricity, water, and food from the Palestinian people. At least 11 United Nations staff, 30 students at U.N. schools, and four international Red Cross paramedics have been killed in Gaza, according to those organizations. And hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have been made homeless by Israeli airstrikes.

Now, as Israel prepares for its ground invasion, it has asked an estimated 1.1 million Palestinians to relocate to the south of Gaza — an order the U.N. has called “impossible.” When asked what worries him most about a potential ground invasion, United States President Joe Biden’s answer was the same as mine: “Death.”

The lessons of the Sri Lankan Civil War lead me to fear for what may be yet to come for Gaza.

For decades, the Sri Lankan government engaged in violent conflict with the Tamil Tigers, a separatist organization that committed acts of terrorism to further its cause. The group attacked civilians, recruited children, and tortured prisoners. As a result, their actions were rightly condemned by the international community, just as Hamas’ have been this week.

In the final years of their conflict with the Tamil Tigers, the Sri Lankan government made steady advances into Tiger-controlled territory, while designating no fire zones for civilians caught in the conflict. By the last year of the civil war, the government gained control of all but a tiny strip of land inhabited by around 300,000 Tamil civilians, which it again designated as a no-fire zone.

Then, with the world watching, the Sri Lankan government indiscriminately slaughtered civilians in the same no-fire zones it said were safe. It blocked provision of humanitarian aid. And it bombed food distribution lines and hospitals, including ones administered by the Red Cross.

The U.N. reported that, during the final stages of the war, 40,000 to 70,000 Tamil civilians were killed by the Sri Lankan government — figures that the Sri Lankan government continues to deny. To put it in perspective, this would be proportionally equivalent to the killing of around 600,000 to 1.1 million civilians in the U.S. today.

Did the Tamil Tigers, like Hamas, commit unjustifiable acts of terror against civilians? Yes. Did both precipitate humanitarian crises, through reprehensible acts such as using civilians as “human shields”? Again, yes. The West has rightly labeled both the Tamil Tigers and Hamas as terrorist organizations.

But the West did not just condemn the Tamil Tigers. During the war, the United States and United Kingdom remained largely in support of the Sri Lankan government. The U.S. only halted some aid late in 2007 as human rights abuses soared to a level of sufficient concern. Even as the Sri Lankan government’s worst atrocities became clear in the last three years of the conflict, the United Kingdom continued selling arms to the country. The consequence: tens of thousands of innocent lives taken with near impunity.

The governments of the U.S. and all other liberal democracies must do everything in their power to prevent a similar outcome in Gaza. The horrific crimes committed by the Sri Lankan government against the Tamil population are a reminder of an important truth: It is in times of grief, trauma, and fear — such as the aftermath of a horrendous terrorist attack — that it is most difficult to protect human rights. It is also when our commitment to those principles is most necessary.

Just as we unequivocally denounce Hamas notwithstanding the airstrikes, daily checkpoints, and blockades that people in Gaza have endured for decades, we must also hold the government of Israel accountable for any actions it takes, notwithstanding the rockets, mass kidnapping, and fear of extinction that drive its military assaults. For thousands of Palestinians, such accountability may mean the choice between life or death.

In the end, the true test of a liberal democracy is our ability to hold other countries accountable for their actions, not just when they are our enemies, but even — especially — when they are our allies.

Tascha Shahriari-Parsa is a fourth-year joint-degree student at Harvard Law School and the Harvard Kennedy School.

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—Cara J. Chang, President

—Eleanor V. Wikstrom and Christina M. Xiao, Editorial Chairs