Palestinian Hamas fires rockets at Israel from Gaza City on May 18, 2021.
As the Israeli-Palestinian conflict intensifies, Chinese Communist Party officials play an anti-Israeli role and strongly support the Palestinians. According to Omer Kanat, executive director of the Uyghur Human Rights Project, a U.S.-based human rights organization, the Communist Party’s actions at this time are an attempt to divert attention from the atrocities suffered by Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang.
Kanat told the Washington Examiner that this provides an opportunity for the Chinese government to “play ‘whataboutism,'” a political propaganda technique used by the Soviet Union against the Western world during the Cold War. (a political propaganda technique used by the Soviet Union against the Western world during the Cold War) to divert attention from their ongoing genocide against the Uighurs.”
“With respect to the Uighurs, we reject any attempt to pit the Uighurs against the Palestinians.” Karnat stressed.
The Palestinian-Israeli conflict erupted at a time when Beijing was facing unusual public pressure at the United Nations over the persecution of the Uighur community. But after the Palestinian-Israeli conflict erupted, the Communist Party turned to condemn Israel’s actions against Palestinian militants in Gaza and asked the United States to put pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“So far, it doesn’t seem to be resonating, and it seems a little unclear who exactly the target audience will be.” A Western official who has been following the Communist Party’s approach to the controversies told the Washington Examiner, “It’s not a consistent topic that they’ve raised before, but something that seems very new and very loud.”
Chinese Communist Party officials have not hidden their view that the Palestinian issue gives them a useful gap in the debate related to the Uighurs.
Communist Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian declared on Tuesday (18) that he questioned why the United States is so indifferent to the human rights of the Palestinian people, but keeps talking about defending the human rights of Muslims. And then gave his supposed answer that the U.S. only cares about nepotism and interests, not the merits of the matter itself.
Kanat dismisses Zhao Lijian’s comparison of the two situations. “The intention of the Chinese Communist government is to wipe out the Uighur people,” Kanat said, adding that the message from the Communist Party is designed to drive a wedge between the United States and any Muslim-majority country that tends to condemn the mistreatment of Uighurs.
“Many Muslim countries remain silent on the Uighur issue, and (Chinese Communist Party officials) want to use this opportunity to divert attention and say, ‘Oh, the U.S. government is not sincere when it says the Communist Party should respect the human rights of the Uighurs and respect the religious rights of the Uighurs.’ ” Karnat further explained.
Like Pakistan, one of the CCP’s closest clients, Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan has admitted that his country’s economic dependence on China has led him to pledge silence on the oppression of the Uighurs. This is just as the Organization for Islamic Cooperation (OIC) has chosen to ignore the plight of the Uighurs because of Beijing’s economic clout.
In response to Zhao Lijian’s remarks, Kanat emphasized, “Absolutely, every government must respect human rights. If the U.S. government is not perfect in human rights, that doesn’t …… justify the horrific oppression of the Uighurs by the Chinese Communist Party.”
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