Introduction to urbicide

MSc Integrated Urbanism & Sustainable Design (IUSD)

Urbicide A brief introduction

Dr. Yehya Serag January 2013

What ?

Urbicide is the deliberate wrecking or killing of a city. (Graham, 2003) Urbicide is a combination of the Latin words ‘urbs’ (city) and ‘cide’ (killing), so it literally means ‘the killing of a city. (Verhaert, 2006)

Urbicide is the process and coordination of different elements and stages of control, planning and implementation of particular designs by destruction or construction. It is the process of destroying urbanity as a physical form and way of life. Urbicide is thus about the destruction of the physical and spatial urban tissue as well as the elimination of particular forms of social, economic and cultural life, of mental and spiritual experience, and of a sense of home, security and belonging. In general it is the destruction of the ‘other’ place and space of identity and urbanity as a way of life. (Abujidi, 2009) Urbicide involves two simultaneous acts: the intentional large-scale destruction of a built-up urban environment and the indiscriminate targeting of the inhabitants of a city with the goal of inflicting terror and injury. ( Fedman and Karaces, 2012)

Destruction of Carthage 148-146 BC

Was known before as…

Many competing discourses emerged to describe and conceptualize urban destruction. For example in the Second World War the physical and material destruction of cities was termed ‘place annihilation’ by Kenneth Hewitt (1983), and was extended to ‘ethnic cleansing’ in Kosovo by Hugh Clout (2000). The urban destruction that occurred in Palestine in 1948 and Bosnia in the 1990s was identified by scholars like Ilan Pappe (2006) as ‘ethnic cleansing’ and discussed as a type of spatial violence.

Why 1- To carry out the strict interpretation of the term as the complete annihilation of the city.

This is often the interpretation of writers who study related subjects as genocide and who mention Dresden and Hiroshima (all targeted from the air) as the most famous examples.

(Verhaert, 2006)

Why 2 -Urbicide concerns the destruction of buildings. It focuses more on the destruction of constructions rather than the environment, regardless of their military or economical functions and with another purpose than mere killing. Religious or national buildings, with high symbolic value, are often the target of this sort of urbicide. Most notable examples are the Mostar bridge, and the Sarajavo Library.

This form of urbicide is sometimes also referred to as ‘cultural cleansing’, which aims to eliminate any built evidence of the presence of a group of people in a certain territory.

It is therefore closely related to genocide. Cultural cleansing is described as a way to change the history by destroying the material presence of a people. In doing so an attempt is made at erasing the collective memory that is sustained by historic buildings.

Why 3 – Urbicide could be seen as an attempt to destroy the main characteristic of the city, or its heterogeneity, “Heterogeneity, than, can be said to be the defining characteristic of urbanity. Urbicide, as the ‘slaughter’ of urbanity, can thus be said to comprise the systematic destruction of heterogeneity. Buildings, as that which is destroyed in urbicide, would thus be the conditions of possibility of the heterogeneity (also through politics) at stake in urbicide.” (Verhaert, 2006)

Downtown Beirut – the official political center

The urbicide literature can be grouped into three main streams:

(1) Urbicide as ‘anti-urban, anti-city’ violence (Berman 1987, 1996; Shaw 2004; Simmons 2001; Graham 2004; Heathcote 2005). This stream discusses urbicide as targeting cities for what they represent - as spaces of cosmopolitan life. and tolerance, ranging from their buildings, assets, institutions, industries, and infrastructure and extending to their symbolic meanings - both in acts of organized war and through bureaucratic and urban planning policies.

(2) Urbicide as politics of exclusion, ‘anti-heterogeneity’ (Coward 2002, 2004, 2005).

Martin Coward describes urbicide as a politics of exclusion, of ‘anti-heterogeneity’.

Urbicide, for this stream, entails destroying heterogeneous plurality, as manifested in the spatial configuration of the urban environment.

(3) Urbicide as war of (or against) terror. Urbicide is also defined as war of, or against, terror (including state terror in colonial projects) and anti-terrorism, as described in the work of Stephen Graham (2003, 2004) and Derek Gregory (2003, 2004). This thesis relies mainly on the inseparability of war, terror, place annihilation, and modern urbanism (here within a very proactive colonization process). In such cases, cities are perceived, in the geopolitical imaginary of the political elite, as places of unrest that need to be regularized and reorganized, either by war or through urban-planning policies in colonized cities.

Examples: Japan WW II

Initially USAAF targeted Military targets only

Examples: Japan WW II -Removing the Guilt - Has considerable workforce - Military targets -Moral blow - Hindering the working hours related to war effort indirectly - Making the bombing legitimate

Examples: Japan WW II (Fedman and Karacas , 2012)

Examples: Beirut 2006 (Verhart, 2006)

Examples: Beirut 2006 (Verhart, 2006)

Examples: Beirut 2006 (Verhart, 2006)

Urbicide here is characterized by the excessive and logic destruction of buildings and public places as an attack on the living environment of a certain group, or to destroy a political forum.

In the southern suburbs of Beirut the IAF first targeted the political space of Hezbollah when they destroyed their headquarters and the entire neighborhood surrounding them. This means the special focus on the destruction of the goods of one religious community. As the conflict evolved this destruction assumed such proportions that the “buildings became the enemy�: After a few weeks some areas in the southern suburbs that were targeted regularly had become so dangerous that all the inhabitants were evacuated. This was mainly organized by Hezbollah itself and people were not authorized to enter these zones, to prevent accidents and looting. The IAF kept on bombing the residential areas, disregarding the fact that they were (almost) completely empty.

Examples: Bulldozing in Jenin 2002

(Graham , 2002)

Examples: Bulldozing in Jenin 2002

Examples: Bulldozing in Jenin 2002 1- Bulldozing has been used as a weapon of collective and individual punishment and intimidation, and as a means of shaping the geopolitical configuration of territory. Such bulldozing overwhelmingly occurs in strategic areas. It backs up the wider use of settlements and access roads to undermine any contiguity in Palestinian territory These sites are meticulously selected.

2- Targeting to achieve demonetization by demolishing not only houses but also infrastructures .

3- Operation ‘Defensive Shield’ marked a major shift from the systematic demolition of houses and occasionally streets, infrastructures, and villages, towards wholesale urbicide as a cornerstone of Israeli policy. Complementing ongoing ‘pepper-potted’ demolitions, Israeli forces switched in the middle of the invasion to embark on the systematic and carefully planned destruction of entire districts within settlements for political and military reasons.

Urbicide can be achieved by destruction, construction and control (Abujidi , 2009)