Genocide!? Yet another word to use and clearly understand when engineering a solution.

A close friend and former colleague (a world expert on genocide) Dr. Greg Stanton (Founding President of Genocide Watch) offered me an answer today that corrected to my opinion regarding the intentions of Israel and Hamas and the violent horrors not being extended between them.  Violence that could possibly spread globally. And maybe into another bi-polar world war. 

Dr. Stanton believes Hamas is a genocidal organization because its charter states its intention to destroy the nation of Israel and all Jews. He said "Its massacre of Jewish Israelis, men, women, children, the elderly, even babies demonstrated its genocidal intent." 

Israel is "committing war crimes and crimes against humanity" and "Its bombing and blockade of Gaza are war crimes because they do not distinguish between civilians and combatants."   

But it's not clear that "Israel intends to destroy Palestinians as a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group, even in part. Israel's intent is to destroy Hamas".  Hamas is a political group that has attacked Israel. But Israel is not committing genocide by going after the perpetrators of mass murder.  People and the media use the term 'genocide' loosely to 'inform' others, but this term can actually lead to exacerbating of an existential problem instead of solving it. 

Humans and the media regularly misuse other well-defined, ill-defined, and undefinable terms that rarely lead to solving problems.  Engineers, medical doctors, and scientists can run into the same problem but that is why they usually rely on terminology in their respected fields to ensure success.   Other professions that have not provided reliable solutions include most elected officials, religious leaders, or economists. 

My former use of the term "ethnic cleansing" as an official crime was wrong.  It is not an approved term in any international treaty.  It was a euphemism invented by Milosevic that was used to deny genocide. The violent expulsion of people should be called "forced displacement" or "forced deportation", "both of which are crimes under the Rome Statute of the ICC" according to Dr. Stanton. 

I'm sadly predicting the inevitable use of genetically engineered ethnically targeted bioweapons with the clear intention to commit genocide.  That is now possible by any radicalized individual or group with limited funding but a deep commitment to use it in the future.  This capacity was predicted in an article in the esteemed "Lancet Journal" in 1998?   And the exponential growth of technology since then is beyond our mental capacity to grasp and our governments capacity to stop.  This is now left to humanities willingness to unite and grasp the fact that there is only one race.  The human race.  And we are all in the same family.  And the Golden rule still applies.  What can we do encourage all others to abide by it?