As the Israel-Hamas/Palestine war continues, the need for dialogue around othering and the intolerance it springs from becomes more and more urgent.
Anti-semitism and anti-Muslim rhetoric continue to be used as justification for violence and therefore separate the global community, encourage hate crimes internationally as well as block a peaceful outcome. Now is as good a time as any to demand that calls for peace across all current conflicts that are thriving off of ethnic intolerance be put on the world stage.
While the Israel-Hamas/Palestine war might be the biggest conflict currently in terms of airtime and media attention it is not the longest lasting or most devastating (in its current active form). An alarming amount of conflict and wars that are currently being waged are exasperated - if not caused- by ethnic and religious intolerance. They are a reminder that conflict cannot thrive without intolerance, and governments often use ethnicity as a justification for violence. We must remember that peace and progress must always be protected by policing intolerance in times of conflict.
Here are 3 countries currently at war where a proxy of conflict is religion and ethnicity and where genocidal acts are being committed.
ISRAEL-PALESTINE/HAMAS WAR
What is essentially a territorial conflict that has been fought since 1948 has been exasperated by religion and ethnicity. Tensions and violence have flared on and off since then around religious holidays and locations as well as with the development of Hamas - an Islamic organisation established by members of the Muslim Brotherhood - who see themselves as protectors of Palestine. It has flared up this year again with the bombing of major cities in Israel on the 7th October. Israel has since received international condemnation of Apartheid-like strategies and genocidal war actions made in retaliation.
SUDAN WAR
Now in its 7th month of active conflict, the war in Sudan between Sudan's military and a paramilitary group has resulted in 9000 deaths and 5.6 million people having to seek refuge. The conflict has been aggravated by the targeting of ethnic groups and reports of ethnic cleansing in Darfur. The UN has stated while ethnic tensions are not new, they are now being used as "justification for reprisal". U.N. Undersecretary-General Martin Griffiths says "Half a year of war has plunged Sudan into one of the worst humanitarian nightmares in recent history."
MYANMAR CIVIL WAR
The world's longest ongoing civil war has featured intense ethnic conflict with several ethnic armed forces fighting against the country's forces. The current spate of conflict has been active since 2021 following a military coup d'etat by the Junta (Tatmadaw) of civilian rule. Ethnic armed forces (ethnic militia) have been retaliating since then, with civilians bearing the brunt of intense violence. One of the biggest travesties of the Myanmar conflict has been the ongoing displacement and planned genocide of Myanmar's Rohingya Muslim community that began in 2016. It has resulted in over 25 000 deaths and over a million people seeking refuge to this day. According to the Human Rights Watch, an estimated 600,000 Rohingya remain in Rakhine State and "are subject to persecution and violence, confined to camps and villages without freedom of movement, and cut off from access to adequate food, health care, education, and livelihoods.".