A Nonexistent Palestinian Genocide

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas
addressing the United Nations General Assembly.
Picture from BBC News.

A few months ago Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas addressed the United Nations General Assembly and made the claim that Israel had committed a genocide during its latest military operation in the Gaza Strip.

Abbas stated “In this year, proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly as the International Year of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, Israel has chosen to make it a year of a new war of genocide perpetrated against the Palestinian people.” Later he thanked the international community for its support saying “all of these manifestations of true solidarity constituted an important message to those who were facing genocide in Gaza.”

This is not the first time, nor will it be the last, that the Jewish state of Israel has been accused of committing genocide against the Palestinian population. From Asia to Europe people have taken to both print and digital publications offering opinion pieces alleging an Israeli genocide of the Palestinian people. But such uninformed accusations are not limited to random netizens and the random ignorant individual. President of the Center for Constitutional Rights and past Professor of Law at Yale and Columbia, Michael Ratner, is one of the most prominent people to subscribe to this theory. Even some Israeli Jews have accepted and propagated such an allegation.  

Accusations of a Palestinian genocide are of particular importance now considering Abbas’s attempts to gain admission to the International Criminal Court (ICC). As a super-national body the ICC has the jurisdiction to investigate and prosecute international crimes, including genocide, which occur in member states. If Palestine does gain admission to the ICC it will no doubt seek prosecution against Israel for genocide.

But all this begs the question, what is genocide?

Genocide is a crime and like all other crimes, both international and domestic, there is statutory language which legally defines it. Under the Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide the international community formulated the definition of the crime as follows:

State representatives at the Genocide Convention. From
United Nations Audiovisual Library.

“Genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group: a) killing members of the group; b) causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; c) deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; d) imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; e) forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.”

The language of the Genocide Convention was adopted verbatim into the Rome Statute, the organizing treaty which established the International Criminal Court, reaffirming the definition’s acceptance and validity.

In order to meet the legal requirements of the statute two elements need to be established: 1) the victimized group is a protected group under the statute’s definition; and 2) the perpetrating party must commit one of the listed acts with the intent to destroy the victimized group in whole or in part.

Whether or not the Palestinians are a protected group under the Genocide Convention is not at issue. Over the last half century the Palestinian people have molded a unique national identity without an independent national state, one which has been recognized by every government including Israel (although Israeli policy disputes the scope of that identity). Therefore the Palestinian people are a protected group as defined by international law.

Therefore, the issue raised is not one of identity but rather identifying whether the crimes conform to meet the definition of genocide. When the provisions of the Genocide Convention were being drafted, the intent of the drafters was to define the crime of all crimes. In other words, genocide was to be considered the most severe crime ever established. Therefore the convention’s writers set a high threshold 

Moving to the second element, the criminal provision provides that the perpetrating party must have the necessary mens rea, or intent, and must commit the necessary actus reus, or act to fit within the provided definition. To meet the statutory requirements of genocide it is not enough that an actor commit the aforementioned acts without intending to destroy a group in whole or in part. Alternatively, it is not enough that the actor have just the intent to commit the crime but not engage in any of the unlawful actions.

Intent

We now move to an analysis of the Palestinian situation in light of the established legal definition of genocide.

Proponents of the genocide theory point to statements made by individual Israelis and members of the Israeli legislature, the Knesset, as proof.  An example of which was a plan articulated in a post on Facebook by the Deputy Speaker of the Knesset, Moshe Feiglin. Through his post Feiglin called for Israel to conquer the entire Gaza Strip and eliminate the Palestinian population in the area.

The fact that Mr. Feiglin published such a plan in a Facebook post implies in of itself that his scheme did not have the support of the Israeli government. Had Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and the rest of the Israeli cabinet supported such a plan there would have been no need for Feiglin to resort to Facebook to espouse his radical solution. Additionally, the fact that the Israeli government pursued a course of action contrary to Feiglin’s plan, e.g. by pulling IDF forces out of Gaza instead of reoccupying it, further shows the lack of support Feiglin’s idea had with Israeli policy makers.

Statements such as Feiglin’s don’t equate to government policy, but instead serve as an individual’s own opinion. Minus such assertions no evidence exists which points to the specific intent of the Israeli government to commit genocide. There has been no evidence to date which shows that the Israeli government has the specific intent to engage in any of the statutorily illegal acts with the objective of destroying the Palestinian people in whole or in part.

Admittedly it is difficult to ascertain an actor's true intent. Rarely will actors outwardly flaunt the fact that they intend on committing an international crime. When presented with this conundrum during the prosecution of Jean-Paul Akayesu, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) found that intent could be surmised through an analysis of the final results of the conflict considering factors such as a party's overall capability to commit the crime and the final casualty count. Which brings us to the numbers.

The Numbers

Even if we were to accept the claims that the Israeli government intended to destroy in whole or in part the Palestinian people, the claim still fails the second part of the test regarding the actual act of destruction.

Neither the literature of the Genocide Convention or the Rome Statute clearly defines what constitutes destruction in whole or in part. While it is reasonable to infer that destruction in whole would be the extermination of the entire population of a protected group, the term destruction in part is much more ambiguous. With little guidance we are left to discern a quantifiable qualification from what we have historically found to be genocide.

During the Holocaust, the Nazis were responsible for an estimated 5.9 million Jewish deaths. According to estimates by Lucy Dawidowicz and the Jewish virtual library, the worldwide Jewish population in 1939 was about 16.7 million and the total number of Jews living in Europe was 8.8 million. The deaths of over 5.9 million Jews represented 35% of the entire worldwide Jewish population and 67% of the Jewish population of Europe.

Past the immediate effects of the Holocaust on the Jewish population, the destructive nature of Nazi public policy is still being felt today. Whereas the total worldwide Jewish population was about 16.7 million in 1939, the worldwide Jewish population as of 2012 is estimated at 13.7 million, 82.2% of the population prior to the occurrence of the Holocaust. Furthermore the Jewish population of Europe as of 2012 is 1.4 million, a 16% remnant of European Jewry prior to World War 2.

While the breadth of the immediate destruction of the worldwide and European Jewish populations is evidence of the Nazi’s intent to destroy a protected group, the inability of the Jewish population to fully recover in the 70 years since the Holocaust speak to its long term effectiveness.  

Killing fields during the Khmer Rouge. Images from
the documentary "Killing Fields."

Further genocides accorded during the Khmer Rouge, the Cambodian government was responsible for the deaths of over 2 million people, approximately 25% of the entire country’s population according to estimates by Craig Etchenson. And in 1994 of the 1.1 million Tutsis residing in Rwanda the Rwandan Government estimates that approximately 795,000 Tutsis, representing 72.6% of the entire Rwandan Tutsi population, were killed during the country’s genocide.

As previously stated, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas claimed that Israel had conducted a genocide in the Gaza Strip through the recently concluded Operation Protective Edge (OPE). To ascertain the validity of that statement it is necessary to look at the population breakdown of the Palestinian people. As of 2012 the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics lists 11.6 million Palestinians worldwide, 4.8 million living in the Gaza Strip, West Bank and East Jerusalem, and 1.7 million living in the Gaza strip alone. 

According to Islamic Jihad, a militant group located in the Gaza Strip which is affiliated with Hamas, 2,143 (the number includes both militants and civilians) Palestinians were killed during the almost two month operation. The 2,143 killed represent 0.018% of the entire worldwide population of Palestinians, 0.045% of Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip, West Bank and East Jerusalem, and 0.13% of Palestinians in Gaza.

Even if we were to limit the protected group to Palestinians living in Gaza, rather than the entire world population of Palestinians or just the Palestinians living in the “Occupied Territories” including the West Bank, Gaza Strip, and East Jerusalem, the 0.13% casualty ratio pales in comparison to the 72.6% of Tutsis killed in the Rwandan Genocide, 35% of Jews killed during the Holocaust, and 25% of Cambodians killed during the Khmer Rouge. Additionally the Palestinian casualties include both civilians and combatants, while the numbers from Rwanda, the Holocaust, and Khmer Rouge represent only civilian deaths.

An explosion from an Israeli air strike on the Gaza Strip
during Operation Protective Edge. Photo from Reuters.

To lump the Palestinian deaths during Operation Protective Edge into the categorization of Genocide would in essence undermine the atrocity as a crime by devaluing the level and scope of the necessary elements. Lowering the legal standard would also open the door to including military operations within the meaning of the genocide convention.

The Palestinian death rate during Operation Protective Edge closely resembles the Iraqi death rate during the 2003 American led coalition invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq. The Iraqi Central Organization for Statistics estimates that 37,344 Iraqis were killed during the invasion and occupation. In a country with a population estimated at 31.6 million people the number of deaths represent 0.12% of the population, only a hundredth of a percentage point lower than the 0.13% ratio during Operation Protective Edge.

Under a more expansive definition of genocide, the American led Operation Iraqi Freedom would fit within the elements of the crime of genocide. Such an expansive view undermines the purpose for codification of genocide as a crime as well as the intent of the convention’s drafters. The travaux preparatoires, the documents compiling the drafting history of the convention, show that the drafters of the Genocide Convention did not intend to extend the crime of genocide to include casualties of a protected group’s population resulting from military operations. It further establishes that the convention’s writers were focused on defining and establishing a crime of crimes, unquestionably implying that a high standard be set to meet the convention’s definition of destruction.

Considering the language of the Genocide Convention, the travaux preparatoires, and the casualty numbers from the recent Operation Protective Edge compared to those during internationally recognized genocides, in a light most beneficial to Mr. Abbas’s argument, the results show that the Palestinian deaths during Operation Protective Edge do not meet the statutory standards for the crime of genocide.  In fact it doesn’t even come close.

Abbas’s logic further fails when we consider his allegations of Israeli war crimes. In the past Abbas has accused the Israeli military of specifically targeting Palestinian civilians. Accepting his argument, such allegations imply and require an Israeli military which is highly efficient and effective. It follows that such an efficient and effective military, with complete military superiority over the combat zone, would have the capability to effectuate an assault which would yield a death toll high enough to meet the threshold requirements of the genocide convention. Yet the death toll from Israeli operation fails to meet that threshold.

Returning to the element of intent, under Abbas’s own assertions considering the military prowess of Israel, if Israel wanted to it could effectuate a genocide of the Palestinian population with little effort. The lack thereof serves as proof that Israel does not have the mens rea to commit genocide. In this case the evidence of the actor’s actions does not support the finding of intent. 

Ilan Pappe appearing on BBC News.

Abbas’s comments alleging a genocide perpetrated by Israel were not the first. In fact many have suggested that since its establishment Israel has engaged in a systemic policy to eradicate the Palestinian population. Ilan Pappe, an Israeli scholar, has alleged that Israel has been engaging in an “incremental genocide” against the Palestinian people. Such an allegation suggests that the Israeli government, since its inception in 1948, has slowly and systematically engaged in a policy to destroy the  Again we must look at the numbers.

According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics in 1948 there were 1.37 million Palestinians worldwide. As of 2012 that population has increased to 11.6 million, an overall increase close to eight times the population before the establishment of the state of Israel. This includes 1.4 million Palestinians within the 1949 Armistice Line (Israel proper), 2.7 million living in the West Bank (an estimated additional 400,000 in East Jerusalem), and 1.7 million living in the Gaza Strip. Looking just at Israel proper the Palestinian population within the Jewish state has exceeded the number of Palestinians worldwide prior to 1948. This evidence supports the very antithesis to Pappe’s argument. 

Instead of exhibiting any sign of destruction the Palestinian population has grown at an exponential rate in all relevant geographical categories. 

If we were to accept Pappe's argument there must be some evidence of the destruction of the protected group. That evidence would be a contracting population. However, as previously shown, the Palestinian population is not contracting but rather expanding. Even if we were to narrow the scope of our search to smaller increments of time Pappe's argument would require a dip in the Palestinian population similar to those seen in the Jewish, Tutsi and Cambodian populations. However, according the the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, the Palestinian population has increased in every decade since 1948. 

A further flaw in Pappe's logic concerns a lack of correlation between the Palestinian growth rate and the growth rate of both the worldwide and Israeli Jewish population over the same period of time. Logically if a group was perpetrating the destruction of another protected group, it would follow that the perpetrating group's population would grow at a faster rate than the victimized group's population during the time of commission. 

Over the last 70 years the Jewish population has been unable to fully recover from the effects of the Holocaust, and has only reached 82.2% of the population, even though the atrocities of the Holocaust had ceased after 1945. Further the worldwide Jewish population in 1950 was 11,297,000 compared to 13,746,100 an increase of 21.7%.  Over the same period of time, the Palestinian population has grown from 1.37 million to 11.6 million an increase of 746.7% . Were a protracted campaign of genocide occurring the victimized group's population growth should not outpace the population growth of the perpetrating group as it has in this case. 

The continued existence of a Palestinian population in Gaza and elsewhere dismisses the possibility that Israel has attempted to destroy the whole of the protected group. Similarly, the growth and lack of contraction of the Palestinian population even in areas of Israeli sovereignty are irrefutable evidence that an Israeli policy seeking to destroy the Palestinian population in part does not exist. 

Considering Israel's sovereignty over areas with a Palestinian population of 6.2 million people, and its military effectiveness, the Israeli government has had the opportunity and the capability to commit a campaign of genocide. But when we include the actual numbers in the equation, the fact remains that there is no evidence that a genocide has taken place even in light of Israel's ability to do so. The existence of the Palestinian population in Gaza and elsewhere shows that there has not been a genocide 

In light of the evidence, acceptance of Mr. Abbas and Mr. Peppe's argument would mean that the highly efficient and effective Israeli military has carried out the least effective and least efficient genocide in human history. The numbers just don't add up. 

Why It Matters

A few months ago Al Jazeera posted an article on its English language website alleging that Jaffa, a predominantely Palestinian neighborhood in Tel Aviv, was undergoing an ethnic cleansing. The gist of the argument was that the current gentrification of the neighborhood was leading to higher housing prices which the economically poorer Palestinian population could not afford, leading them to leave the neighborhood. 

I responded by articulating the international legal standards for the crime of ethnic cleansing, and showed how the allegation that such a crime occurred in Jaffa in light of those standards was not only unsubstantiated but were frivolous and served no purpose other than to evoke irrational and emotional anti-Israeli sentiment. 

Genocide, like ethnic cleansing and apartheid, are terms which the world immediately equates with evil, even though the majority of people don't truly understand their definitions. These terms garner an emotional response and convey a wave of hatred towards the accused, usually lacking in any real objectivity. 

It's easy to just dismiss such comments like Abbas's as over dramatic and mere pandering. But it needs to be emphasized that genocide and ethnic cleansing are actual crimes, the performance of which can lead to prosecution and punishment. The danger over the use of these terms doesn't necessarily come from the partisan unsubstantiated accusation, but rather the wide and growing blind acceptance of them. 

It further explains Israel's reluctance to join or work with international organizations such as the International Criminal Court and United Nation task forces. With esteemed professionals like Michael Ratner disregarding the statutory language of the criminal provisions for a penumbra of justice, it stands to reason that were Israel to submit itself to international scrutiny it would not receive a fair and impartial critique of its actions. 

Unreasonable assertions of criminal activity only further isolate Israel from the rest of the international community by creating a double standard from which it will be judged. Instead of engaging the Israeli government regarding Palestinian issues the miss-use of these terms only serves to further entrench Israeli public opinion to the point where it has become intractable. 

This isn't to say that Israel is absolved of any and all wrong doing, as a proper investigation might reveal,  but regardless of the alleged crime the Jewish state deserves to be judged within the eyes of established international law not reactionary biased double standards. 

But all things considered the greatest injustice perpetrated by Mr. Abbas's unsubstantiated claim is the fact that this false allegation of genocide is being aimed at a people who have actually been victims of genocide, and a country created in the wake of that crime. 

Hong Kong Is Not Tiananmen

Thousands of protesters gather in Central, Hong Kong. Picture from
BBC News originally AFP.

Over the last few weeks thousands of Hong Kong residents have taken part in a mass civil disobedience campaign aimed at protesting the indirect totalitarian rule of the communist regime in Beijing. As the pro-democracy movement continues to grow many in the media and public have begun to draw comparisons between the protests in Hong Kong today and the Tiananmen Square protest in Beijing 25 years ago. Memories of PLA (People’s Liberation Army) tanks and infantry moving into the central Beijing square have prompted fears that the Communist party will respond to the current unrest with a similar swift and decisive military crackdown of Central, Hong Kong.

Students gather in Tiananmen Square 1989. Picture from
CNN.

While it might be a tempting comparative exercise to equate the two movements, stark differences exist which lessen the likelihood of a Tiananmen repeat in Central. Four factors highlight the disparity between the two movements: environment; scope; location; and media. In considering these elements with the substantive realities of the two protests in mind one overarching narrative emerges distinguishing 1989 and today, the Chinese Communist party does not view the Occupy Central movement as a threat to its hold on power and control of the Chinese government. By contrast the 1989 protests in Tiananmen Square was a direct threat to the ruling party, one which spooked high ranking party members enough to send the military in to violently quell the dissidents.  Unlike in 1989 the Communist party will most likely not respond with military force to quell the unrest in Hong Kong today.

International Environment

One of the differences which exist between then and now is the international environment in which the two protests took place. When Chinese students started to gather in Tiananmen Square in April of 1989 they did so in the midst of the anti-Communist revolution which was beginning to sweep across Eastern Europe. Earlier in the year the Hungarian regime had announced the adoption of the democracy package calling on the implementation of democratic reforms while the communist government in Poland had just agreed with the Solidarity movement to set up free parliamentary elections.

In addition, protests in other eastern bloc countries such as Romania and Czechoslovakia left doubt as to the sustainability of communist regimes throughout the world. The protests came in light of the adoption of the economic reforms of glasnost and perestroika among Eastern Bloc nations, similar to the economic reforms adopted under Deng Xiaoping in China during the late 70s. It was not unreasonable to believe that the protests were a direct result of the economic liberalizations undertaken by socialist states, and could lead to the overthrow of those governments by popular movements spurred by the continuing unrest. Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leaders were cognizant of the developments in Europe and the fragility of their own government as the protests in China continued through the month of May. Recognition of that fragility among high ranking members in the CCP regime precipitated the decision to send the PLA in to quash the protests in early June.

Whereas the Tiananmen protests occurred during the anti-communist revolutionary wave that was sweeping across the globe in the late 80s, the current Hong Kong protests are taking place in a less volatile environment. Compared to the late 80s the CCP has stabilized its hold over China through the centralization of political power and the adoption of various economic reforms. Given the relative stability of the government, and the lack of an international movement which could possibly imperil the party today, the CCP will most likely not employ the use of the military to suppress the pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong.

Scope

Protesters in Guangzhou on June 5 1989. Picture from Guangzhou
Yearbook 1990 and Duihua Research.

A second major factor differentiating the two movements is the breadth and scope of the protests.  In 1989 the protests which began in Beijing spread to other cities on the mainland. Shanghai and the interior cities of Xi’an, Guangzhou, Wuhan, Nanjing and Chengdu all experienced almost simultaneous social unrest by student protests organized to mimic the one in Beijing.

The spread of the protests to areas outside the nation’s capital showed that the mass discontent among the student population wasn’t just isolated to Beijing, but was evident throughout the country. What had begun as a small student protest had sparked larger protests in some of China’s largest cities, including the capital, and had the potential of spreading further within the country.

Today the Occupy Central movement is confined to the Special Administrative Region of Hong Kong. On the mainland few are even aware of the protests. Through its firewall, nicknamed the great firewall of China, the Chinese government has restricted the mainland population’s access to online content regarding the current protests in Hong Kong. Few have the resources to circumvent the restrictions, and those who do either lack the wherewithal to search for the specific content or are members of the upper and middle classes of Chinese society who have benefited from the political and economic stability maintained by the communist government and would be hesitant, if not opposed, to introduce an unstable element into the current environment such as a political protest.

The difference in scope between the 1989 and 2014 movements isn’t limited to just geography. 1989 was highlighted by a broad ideological mentality with the goal of democratic governance. The Tiananmen protests had the specific aim of ending the communist system of governance throughout China.

Juxtaposed, Occupy Central has made it clear that its goal is not revolution but rather reform, and that the democratic reforms it seeks is regionally specific to Hong Kong.  Their goals are explicitly tailored to voting and elections within their own local government and the relationship between the Special Administrative Region and the central government in Beijing. Whereas the students in 1989 were looking to overthrow the prevailing national system, Occupy Central is only looking to tweak the system specific to its own locality.

Were Beijing to acquiesce to all of the demands of the Occupy Central movement the Communist party would still emerge in the aftermath in control of the People’s Republic of China, albeit with less direct control of Hong Kong. However, it would still maintain its monopoly over the organs and entities of the Chinese government, and would still maintain sovereign control over the Special Administrative Region of Hong Kong.

In the end the geographical and objective scope of the Occupy Central movement does not pose a threat to the CCP’s control over mainland China.

Location

Tiananmen Square is not a stranger to student protests and demonstrations which serve as the catalyst to larger political movements. Sitting at the entrance of the Forbidden City in Beijing, the seat of imperial Chinese power during the Ming and Qing Dynasties, Tiananmen Square serves as both a strategic and symbolic location for the public to communicate its discontent with the prevailing government.

A map of central Beijing, with Tiananmen Square highlighted in yellow.
Zhongnanhai, located around Zhonghai lake directly adjacent to the
Forbidden City (in pink), is the location of the Central Headquarters of the
Chinese Communist Party. 

Although the Forbidden City no longer houses any branch or organ of Chinese governance, the entities of the People’s Republic of China were removed to locations adjacent to and in close proximity to Tiananmen. Under the current communist regime Tiananmen still serves as the historic center of China’s government.

Student demonstrations in Tiananmen Square in 1919 were the catalyst to the May Fourth Movement, a political and intellectual movement which was sparked by Chinese outrage towards the Versailles Treaty. Many communist scholars credit the May Fourth Movement as the start of the revolution which brought communism to China and ultimately to power. Every communist leader in China is aware of the correlation between Tiananmen Square and political protests, and that student protests which take place in the square have the potential to morph into a nationwide movement.

When student protests began forming in Tiananmen Square in 1989, the symbolic, strategic and historical value of the location was on the mind of every member of the Chinese leadership. Recognition of that value was one of the many elements  

Hong Kong might be a leading world financial center, but it is not the capital of China. None of the central Chinese government entities are located in the Central neighborhood of Hong Kong. Nor does Central carry the same symbolism or historical value as Tiananmen.

Media

Throughout the protests in 1989, the Chinese government restricted foreign media access to the protesters and the area of protest.

Tiananmen Square after the military moved in to suppress the protests.
Image from International Christian Concern.

The protesters themselves were limited to relatively primitive communication technology. They lacked access to direct communication with the outside world and the ability to upload imagery from the protests to a worldwide cyber network.

Even with the relative limitations in communication and technology images of various stages in the protests did emerge from the event and were released to the western media. As a result many Western nations responded with economic sanctions, and super-national organizations followed suit with the World Bank suspending loans to the People’s Republic.

More importantly Western named brands temporarily pulled out of China, similar to their abandonment of South Africa in light of the growing international resentment of Apartheid during the 80s. While the effects of the economic repercussions were felt only for a short time, China’s economy began to boom in the early 90s the sanctions were lifted and brands returned in force to the mainland, they still had a noticeable effect on the economy.

Today we live in a world where cell phones can record images and upload them in real time to an international network of people located throughout the world. Once the data is loaded on to the internet it stays there, and outside of mainland China the Chinese government has little power to constrain the content.

Were a similar reaction to Tiananmen in 1989 to occur in Hong Kong today the images and videos would be streamed unfiltered throughout the world. Such an event would raise the possibility of another western brand boycott. A boycott would raise serious problems for the CCP for two reasons. First, a brand boycott would serve to hurt an already weakened Chinese economy on the precipice of a construction bubble. Since the economic reforms of the early 90s the CCP has longed recognized that its existence is unquestionably tied to the economic performance of the country. Continued economic growth equates to a complicit population, while an economic contraction creates a restless and unhappy populace prone to political and social movements.

Second, a Western brand boycott would deprive the Chinese population of products it craves. Companies such as Apple and BMW have become ubiquitous with wealth and a signpost for achievement within Chinese society. To deprive the upper and middle classes of these brands would create tremors within certain segments of the Chinese population, the very people who the CCP is trying to appease and is relying on to maintain stability. Withdrawal of these products from the Chinese market won’t necessarily start a revolution but would expose a vulnerability within the Chinese economy, an element which could lead to instability and political resentment of the current regime.

While the current environment in Hong Kong doesn't directly threaten the communist regime in Beijing, the state of the media and modern day technology can alter the existing equation if the CCP decides to suppress the movement with the military.

Central’s Future

Compared to Tiananmen Square in 1989 the current protests in Central, Hong Kong pose little risk to the CCP’s control over the Chinese Government. In their present form the protests are contained in the periphery of the Chinese state, in an area of the country where the exercise of the Communist Party’s sovereignty has always been truncated. On the other hand, a military crackdown of the Occupy Central movement along the scale of what was seen in Tiananmen Square in 1989 poses a high risk of undercutting the present stability on the mainland.

In 1989 the CCP was faced with a decision where if they did not act then the party would have been overthrown. Today the formula is reversed where the action can serve to undermine the party’s control.

In the West we have a tendency to regard non democratic governments as having a propensity to behave in a belligerent manner exercising control and steadfast devotion through totalitarian policies. But while these dictatorial states promote the maintenance of their regimes as the highest state priority, they are still rational actors. To lose sight of this creates a false sense of paranoia, one in which we expect these states to always behave in the worst possible manner, with brute force disregarding human rights. 

All this isn’t to say that a repressive military operation to curb the protests in Hong Kong won’t occur. As the situation currently stands a military crackdown in Central is unlikely to occur. However, the calculus of the Chinese leadership will change if the protests spread or begin to garner support on the mainland. Additionally, a protracted occupation of Central which could begin to threaten Beijing’s sovereignty over the Special Administrative Region, might also tip the scale.

Without a doubt Beijing has drawn a red line. However that line has been drawn with more flexibility than the one in 1989.