Israel W. Charny: Would Israel sell a used drone to a Hitler?

Executive director and co-founder of the Institute on the Holocaust and Genocide in Jerusalem and editor of the Encyclopaedia of Genocide, Israel W. Charny published an article in The Times of Israel concerning Israel selling arms to Azerbaijan.

“I am ashamed. The Armenians were the victims of a major genocide 100 years ago that has even been called the “Armenian Shoah” by some Israeli scholars, including from Bar Ilan University. A great deal of their national and cultural ethos continues to focus passionately on the memory of that genocide (does that sound familiar to us Jews?). For many years now, we Israelis – whether led by Labor or Likud – have insulted and hurt the Armenian people by failing to recognize their genocide officially and formally. Would we ourselves tolerate another government – say the US or England – refusing to recognize the Holocaust because of their realpolitik interest with the perpetrator government?” he writes.

Charny also writes that Israel is reported to have sold billions of dollars worth of arms, including to ‘governments that are killing or threatening to attack victim peoples’.

“In general, how willing are we Israelis to strengthen our economy by lucrative arms sales? Of course, “everyone” in the world is doing it, but do we have to also? Have we given up the vision of Israel as a moral leader of peoples on this planet? Is this idea tiresome, naïve, and childlike in a madly destructive and self-destroying world?

An alternative principle could be that we build arms first and foremost for the defense of Israel, and that we supply arms only to underdog peoples who are facing mass destruction and to allies like the US that are essentially committed to shared democratic values and to peace. Of course we will still make some mistakes, but at least our conscience will be more clear that we have not delivered arms to the ‘Nazis.’
To my Armenian colleagues and friends, I can only say that as a Jew and as an Israeli, I am mortified – and angry,” writes the scientist.