The death of our collective conscience, By Osmund Agbo

Not way back, Nigerians awoke to the harrowing information of a brutal bloodbath in Uromi, Edo State, the place sixteen able-bodied males, reportedly hunters of northern Nigerian origin, had been violently killed. Preliminary reviews counsel that their ethnic identification as Hausa-Fulani could have performed a decisive function of their tragic destiny. It seems the attackers, pushed extra by emotion than purpose, allowed the victims’ cultural and linguistic affinity with the felony components terrorizing the area to distort their ethical judgment. Of their misguided pursuit of justice, they tragically discarded the foundational precept that each particular person is presumed harmless till confirmed responsible.

The atrocity was met with widespread condemnation and a real outpouring of grief that transcended Nigeria’s ethnic and spiritual divides. Amongst those that spoke out was my good friend, Professor Farooq Kperogi, who penned a poignant piece on the incident. His publish sparked a flurry of responses on social media, and it was inside a kind of remark threads that I got here throughout a very troubling response that impressed this reflection.

A Fb consumer working below the title “Arewa Information,” with a following exceeding twenty thousand, decried the killings, rightly so, however then pivoted, bizarrely, to blaming “Igbo settlers in Uromi” for the violence, no matter that will imply. Let’s be clear: this atrocity didn’t happen in Enugu, Onitsha, or Aba. But one way or the other, the Igbo, handy and perennial scapegoats in Nigeria’s fraught nationwide discourse, had been as soon as once more invoked as the foundation of the issue, supposedly deserving of retribution. As grotesque, harmful, and bewildering as this deflection is, it however displays what has develop into Nigeria’s recurring “Igbo downside.”

In his characteristically no-nonsense method, Prof. Kperogi promptly deleted the remark and issued a stern warning in opposition to Igbophobia and all types of ethnic bigotry. Nonetheless, the priority stays: in a local weather as unstable as ours, even oblique incitement can have catastrophic penalties. It doesn’t take a lot for a mob, already steeped in historic grievances and infected by ethnic rhetoric, to erupt in violence. One shudders to think about a situation the place extremists, emboldened by that publish, launch reprisal assaults: burning outlets, looting property, and even taking harmless Igbo lives in cities like Kano or Kaduna, all within the title of a fabricated grievance.

Within the pre-dawn hours of Tuesday, March 18, as Israeli mediators had been engaged in delicate ceasefire negotiations with Hamas, the skies over Gaza as soon as once more erupted in violence. In a transfer that blatantly undermined the spirit of diplomacy, Israel launched a ferocious wave of strikes from warplanes and naval vessels, shattering a fragile truce that had held since January 19. One Israeli official admitted that the deception was intentional and the offensive was designed to catch Hamas management off guard. However how can Palestinians be anticipated to belief that Israel is able to negotiating in good religion sooner or later?

The preliminary section of the ceasefire had lasted 42 days, throughout which Hamas signaled its willingness to proceed with the following step as outlined within the settlement. This second section would have required Israel’s full withdrawal from Gaza and a binding dedication to a everlasting cessation of hostilities. In return, Hamas would launch all remaining residing hostages.

However Israel balked. As a substitute, it proposed a revision, hostage releases in alternate for Palestinian prisoners, with none obligation to finish the conflict or retreat militarily. This deadlock, nonetheless, tells solely a part of the story.

The true fulcrum of Israel’s shift lies within the machinations of its far-right coalition. Hardline components have lengthy decried the ceasefire as a betrayal, viewing any negotiation with Hamas not as pragmatism, however as capitulation. Their goal is unambiguous: the entire erasure of Palestinian presence in Gaza and the reestablishment of Israeli settlements dismantled in 2005.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s political survival hinges precariously on this bloc. Minister Itamar Ben Gvir resigned in outrage over the ceasefire, whereas Bezalel Smotrich threatened to withdraw his get together’s help until hostilities resumed. The collapse of Netanyahu’s governing coalition loomed,making renewed warfare not merely a army determination, however a political crucial.

There was additionally the declare that Israel solely agreed to a short lived cessation of hostilities attributable to dwindling army {hardware} and provides, because it awaited resupply. Because of U.S. President Trump, who didn’t simply come to their rescue however successfully handed them a clean verify.

What ensued was catastrophic. Over 400 lives had been extinguished in a single day, the deadliest in Gaza in over a 12 months. For the reason that conflict’s inception on November 7, 2023, triggered by Hamas-led assaults that killed 1,200 Israelis and captured greater than 200 hostages, Israel’s army marketing campaign has taken practically 49,000 Palestinian lives together with rescue employees, the overwhelming majority of them girls and youngsters.

However past the harrowing statistics lies a deeper tragedy: these civilians had been already captives of Hamas’s oppressive rule. Now, they endure doubly—crushed by their rulers and bombarded by their occupiers. That is the darkish and damning legacy of collective punishment: the morally bankrupt doctrine that punishes the numerous for the sins of the few.

This follow will not be merely unethical, it’s explicitly prohibited below worldwide humanitarian legislation. The Fourth Geneva Conference is unequivocal: “No protected individual could also be punished for an offense she or he has not personally dedicated.” But, in pursuit of vengeance or the phantasm of safety, this precept is routinely deserted, reworking harmless lives into expendable forex in a geopolitical sport.

Israel claims its purpose is the dismantling of Hamas. However the devastation it has wrought extends far past militant infrastructure. Residential neighborhoods have been flattened. Hospitals, faculties, and refugee camps, sanctuaries below the legal guidelines of conflict, have been razed. Primary requirements, clear water, electrical energy, medical provides have been intentionally severed. These will not be strategic targets. These are the very important organs of human survival.

Historical past reminds us that collective punishment has by no means introduced peace, solely devastation. Between Might and October 1966, 1000’s of Igbos and different Easterners had been massacred in Northern Nigeria. These killings weren’t random eruptions of violence however coordinated pogroms, carried out with army complicity. An estimated 10,000 to 30,000 perished, and over 1,000,000 fled. The catalyst? A army coup falsely ascribed to a whole ethnic group. When the federal authorities didn’t act, Colonel Odumegwu Ojukwu declared the independence of Biafra, a determined assertion of dignity in opposition to systemic persecution.

Again and again, whether or not below emperors, autocrats, or democrats states have reached for collective punishment as a blunt instrument of energy. It’s a instrument of concern, of management. However additionally it is inherently unjust, for it punishes the innocent, extinguishes hope, and corrodes the ethical material of society.

Strategically, it’s disastrously short-sighted. Oppression doesn’t pacify, it inflames. Kids who develop up amid rubble and funerals don’t forget. They inherit grief, and with it, rage. What future could be constructed upon such soil? What peace could be negotiated with these whose humanity has been discarded?

Some defenders of this tactic argue that Hamas embeds itself amongst civilians, leaving Israel no alternative however to strike indiscriminately. However this rationale abdicates any ethical accountability. If the shortcoming to differentiate between combatants and non-combatants turns into a license for wholesale slaughter, then the very basis of humanitarian legislation collapses.

And the injury will not be confined to our bodies. It seeps into the psyche. In Gaza, a era is coming of age amid trauma, deprivation, and profound disillusionment. They’re denied not simply bodily security, however the primary recognition of their innocence and humanity. What does this inform the world in regards to the worth of Palestinian lives?

To oppose collective punishment is to not deny a nation’s proper to self-defense, it’s to demand that protection be certain by ethics, guided by legislation, and constrained by a reverence for human life. It’s a name to conscience to do not forget that behind each casualty depend lies a baby, a mom, a future eternally misplaced.

Peace can’t be born from a graveyard. It should rise from justice, from fact, and from a shared dedication to human dignity. As Gaza smolders below the load of bombs and damaged guarantees, the world should reply a searing query: Will we proceed to tolerate a world the place the harmless perish for the crimes of the responsible or will we lastly summon the ethical braveness to say: no extra?

Osmund Agbo is a US-based medical physician and creator. His works embrace Black Grit, White Knuckles: The Philosophy of Black Renaissance and a fiction work titled The Velvet Courtroom: Courtesan Chronicles. His newest works, Pray, Let the Shaman Die and Ma’am, I Do Not Come to You for Love, have simply been launched.