Abbas: I'll let Israel take full control of the West Bank

[HEAD ICE]

Oh the beautiful wonders of "critical support" :

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101204/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_israel_palestinians


RAMALLAH, West Bank – Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101204/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_israel_palestinians#) has warned he may dissolve his self-rule government and ask Israel to resume full control of the West Bank if troubled peace talks fail.
Dismantling the Palestinian Authority would be a last resort, Abbas told Palestine TV in an interview broadcast (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101204/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_israel_palestinians#) late Friday. However, his comments marked the most explicit warning yet that he's considering a step that could crush lingering hopes for a Mideast peace deal.
If Abbas were to take such a step, Israel, as a military occupier, would have to assume full responsibility again for 2.2 million Palestinians in the West Bank. Israel was relieved of that financial burden with the establishment of the Palestinian Authority (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101204/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_israel_palestinians#) in 1994, as part of interim peace deals.
Still, Abbas might face considerable domestic opposition to dismantling the Palestinian Authority, since it employs some 150,000 Palestinians, a large chunk of the work force.
The Palestinian self-rule government, which receives hundreds of millions of dollars a year in foreign aid, has limited authority over 40 percent of the war-won West Bank, while Israel has final say over the entire area and exclusive control over 60 percent of the land.


Are people still going to argue that supporting one bourgeois nationalist against the other in the age of imperialism offers anything to the working class? The bourgeoisie will sell you out in an instant. If there is one thing that is damn sure is that the bourgeoisie are very much class conscious.



"Liberation" in the form of supporting Abbas or HAMAS will result in things like this, or worse. Even if Palestinians get a state, not a thing will change. Israel will control the borders and the violence will most likely get worse. It is no doubt to me that the bourgeoisie in a potential Palestinian state will allow widespread foreign investment in their country and the profits through exploitation will exceed anything that happened in the occupation, just like how de-colonization in Africa was the greatest gift the European bourgeoisie ever achieved (along with new faces, America and the Chinese).


Gaza is already autonomous: will anything change because they are called a "state"? You will be joking if you said yes. Was it not a few years ago that Israel butchered hundreds of civilians in Lebanon, an "independent" country? This most certainly will continue, if not more so in the case of a Palestinian state.



Israel is one of the most heinous states in terms of sheer barbarism, and is supported by both of the main imperialist powers: the USA and China. They are not weakening, if anything the Israeli state is growing stronger.



The only way to stop the butchers in Israel, Palestine, Northern Ireland, the Congo etc. is unrepentant class struggle against the bourgeoisie of all nations. When a Palestinian is protesting patrols by an IDF soldier, he isn't doing so out of a desire to have a joke of a country: the protest is an act of class resistance. It is class struggle that will set the proletariat free.



The working class doesn't need national liberation, but liberation from nations.

[~Spectre]

Indeed, the working class has no nation.

That said, in terms of improving the short term lives of Palestinians, this sort of thing is probably a better strategy anyway, i.e. to turn it into a direct human rights struggle instead of a quest for statehood.

[FreeFocus]

There is a difference between state and nation. Please do not confuse the two. Does the idea of the "Palestinian" exist only because of Israel? I don't think so. There were efforts to establish Palestinian nationhood, identity, and statehood even when Palestine was part of various Arab states and later, under British control. Still, the idea of a Palestinian state encompassing all of historic Palestine is an anachronistic idea now. The only way to right the historic crime of ethnic cleansing is for a Palestinian movement for human rights to break the back of Israeli apartheid and statehood and push for a one-state solution.

Nonetheless, Abbas is obviously a spineless coward who rightly deserves the enmity of not only all Arabs, but people concerned with confronting imperialism seriously and courageously. Fuck Abbas.

[~Spectre]

There is a difference between state and nation. Please do not confuse the two.

Who confused the two?

[HEAD ICE]

There is a difference between state and nation.

I do understand the difference. Where in my post do I conflate the terms? I've spoken of national liberation movements and a potential Palestinian state, which I argue will not alleviate the suffering of the Palestinian working class a single inch (it would probably be very beneficial to the local bourgeoisie though).


Does the idea of the "Palestinian" exist only because of Israel? I don't think so.Me neither. Palestinians have a long cultural history that predates the Israeli state by a number of years.


Still, the idea of a Palestinian state encompassing all of historic Palestine is an anachronistic idea now. The only way to right the historic crime of ethnic cleansing is for a Palestinian movement for human rights to break the back of Israeli apartheid and statehood and push for a one-state solution.If the idea of a "Palestinian" state encompassing the former Palestine is anachronistic, why should we be pushing for one? To answer the question of the Palestinian situation, we have to look at the material conditions that exist there right now. What it is is Israel in firm control over the occupied territories that is not growing weaker, but stronger by the day. Encroachments continue by the day, and the brutality of the occupation hasn't weakened. I say that a single Palestinian state is highly unlikely, wouldn't solve anything, not an idea that advances the struggle a single step on the class terrain, and would itself cause a whole new slew of problems.

A teachers strike in Gaza becomes a political game between two opposing nationalist factions. Is this the progressive, socialist position we wish to take and encourage?

[Rafiq]

The Palestinians first need to rid themselves of foreign support, whether that be from the United States, Iran, Saudi Arabia, or anywhere for that matter.

And, I think they need to form an alliance with the Israeli workers.

Remember, if their is a Palestinian ruling class (Abbas) we need to have no sympathy with it.

[NKVD]

And, I think they need to form an alliance with the Israeli workers.

Keep dreaming.

[Revolutionair]

Keep dreaming.
Actually there used to be an alliance between Israeli workers and Palestinian workers. Chomsky had a video about it.

[Revolutionair]

We rarely hear, it has been said, of the combinations of masters, though frequently of those of workmen. But whoever imagines, upon this account, that masters rarely combine, is as ignorant of the world as of the subject. Masters are always and everywhere in a sort of tacit, but constant and uniform combination, not to raise the wages of labour above their actual rate. To violate this combination is everywhere a most unpopular action, and a sort of reproach to a master among his neighbours and equals. We seldom, indeed, hear of this combination, because it is the usual, and one may say, the natural state of things, which nobody ever hears of. Masters, too, sometimes enter into particular combinations to sink the wages of labour even below this rate. These are always conducted with the utmost silence and secrecy, till the moment of execution, and when the workmen yield, as they sometimes do, without resistance, though severely felt by them, they are never heard of by other people. Such combinations, however, are frequently resisted by a contrary defensive combination of the workmen; who sometimes too, without any provocation of this kind, combine of their own accord to raise the price of their labour.
-Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations

[Blackscare]

Considering, beyond the employment of however many workers, that the Palestinian authority is largely a powerless joke, it's probably strategically better for him to do this, actually. He's shifting the burden back to the people creating the economic and political hardship, and also making a lot more Palestinians at least ostensibly citizens, which will only worsen the pressure on Israel. At least, this makes for an excellent threat, because Moses knows that Israel does not want to deal with this.

Keep in mind, this is a precarious time for Israel. They face more international admonishment than ever. Rocking the boat like this could actually work in the Palestinian's favor, however distasteful it is.

[The Red Next Door]

Abbas is an Israeli in disguise.

[NKVD]

Considering, beyond the employment of however many workers, that the Palestinian authority is largely a powerless joke, it's probably strategically better for him to do this, actually. He's shifting the burden back to the people creating the economic and political hardship, and also making a lot more Palestinians at least ostensibly citizens, which will only worsen the pressure on Israel. At least, this makes for an excellent threat, because Moses knows that Israel does not want to deal with this.

Keep in mind, this is a precarious time for Israel. They face more international admonishment than ever. Rocking the boat like this could actually work in the Palestinian's favor, however distasteful it is.

As much as I dislike Abbas, I think this move is really good. Because you will no longer have a puppet state doing Israel's dirty work. Israel will have to carry out the occupation directly. It will increase the pressure on Israel.

[The Vegan Marxist]

As much as I dislike Abbas, I think this move is really good. Because you will no longer have a puppet state doing Israel's dirty work. Israel will have to carry out the occupation directly. It will increase the pressure on Israel.

But at what extent will this pressure on Israel be aired, or even mentioned on mainstream media? So many things have taken place in Israel against the Palestinians that if everyone knew took place we would've seen a global mass movement by now. But we aren't. Why? Because the mainstream media are making sure none of this makes its way to the mass people.

[Rafiq]

Keep dreaming.

They should, whether it is likely or not.


Thanks for yet another unproductive comment.