Can Gaza be pulled 'back from the brink'?

[RSS News]

British aid agencies warn that Gaza is facing its worst humanitarian crisis in 40 years. Do you agree with their call to engage with Hamas?

(Feed provided by BBC News | Have your Say (http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/2/hi/talking_point/default.stm))

[Static]

Uggh. I tried to write about 5 different responses to this question, but they all could be concluded as offensive. so I will answer simply. No.

Why would Britain want to engage with Hamas at all?

[Faux Real]

Britain doesn't want to (nor do they have no interest doing so), but they should pressure Israel to because they represent Gaza and it's population, and there can be no ceasefires or an end to the senseless violence without these discussions between Israel and Hamas. Hamas has repeatedly offered truces, ceasefires and other agreements but Israel would rather have a puppet leader like Mahmoud Abbas in power. 65% of Israelis want their government to talk to Hamas and yet it doesn't. This refusal can do no harm to Israel, that's why there's no rush to talks with Hamas. The damage is only felt by Gaza's citizens and Palestinians.

[red flag over teeside]

I find it difficult to understand why anyone on the revolutionary left would argue for support for Hamas on the basis of Hamas receiving more votes than the PLO in Gaza. Hamas is a deeply reactionary organisation who has in the past victimised members of trade unions and socialist parties. As an organisation they offer nothing to the Palestinian workers apart from further repression. Simply to go down the path of votes is parliamentry cretinism of the worst type.

Marxist revolutionaries in the occupied terrertries need to be arguing and organising, illegally, for independent action against the repression and violence of the Israeli state. Of course this is difficult and requires incredibe levels of courage but without this then palestinians will remain trapped in the nightmare that is theirs.

Internationally we needto be arguing in our workplaces against any imperialist intervention in the occupied terrortiries. This means to point out the so called road map to peace is nothing more than legitimisng the current strategy of turning palestine into a bantusan. If possible we need to be arguing for a workers blockade of Israel.

We also need to see that the success of Hamas is due to the failure of Arab Nationalism, Stalinism and various forms of petite bourgeosie struggle.

[Ferryman 5]

I find it difficult to understand why anyone on the revolutionary left would argue for support for Hamas on the basis of Hamas receiving more votes than the PLO in Gaza. Hamas is a deeply reactionary organisation who has in the past victimised members of trade unions and socialist parties. As an organisation they offer nothing to the Palestinian workers apart from further repression. Simply to go down the path of votes is parliamentry cretinism of the worst type.

Marxist revolutionaries in the occupied terrertries need to be arguing and organising, illegally, for independent action against the repression and violence of the Israeli state. Of course this is difficult and requires incredibe levels of courage but without this then palestinians will remain trapped in the nightmare that is theirs.

Internationally we needto be arguing in our workplaces against any imperialist intervention in the occupied terrortiries. This means to point out the so called road map to peace is nothing more than legitimisng the current strategy of turning palestine into a bantusan. If possible we need to be arguing for a workers blockade of Israel.

We also need to see that the success of Hamas is due to the failure of Arab Nationalism, Stalinism and various forms of petite bourgeosie struggle. And Trotskyism?

Are you a paid member of the imperialist propaganda network or are you just an amateur volunteer? I only ask because I am looking for an easy part time job. Writing bollock for the capitalists would suit me fine, mostly because I know that no worker with half a brain would take any notice of such desperate Murdoch style anti-Palestinian, anti-revolutionary and anti-communist propaganda.

[red flag over teeside]

Explain to me how will Hamas lead palestinian workers into a struggle against capitalists. The tragedy in the past for workers who allow petite bourgeoise factions to lead struggles is that when these factions take power then their first act is to arrest, torture working class militants. History is littered with examples Iran 1979, China 1930's, Germany 1930's. Each example shows the price that is paid for following tactics such as advocated by Ferryman5.

Fortunately there are Palestinian workers who have no faith in Hamas or other bourgeoise factions or reformist factions and are looking for support from western workers. Also didn't ferryman take the souls of the dead over river styx. Well I don't want to see the bodies of Palestinian workers sacrificied to the struggles of Hamas.

[BobKKKindle$]

If the Occupied Territories are to regain any degree of economic stability, it is important that the EU release the funds of the PA. In the long term, Israel must withdraw, and eliminate the current system of checkpoints, which makes commerce between urban centers very difficult, because, by the time Palestinians reach the nearest marketplace, their fruit is no longer fit for sale.



I find it difficult to understand why anyone on the revolutionary left would argue for support for Hamas on the basis of Hamas receiving more votes than the PLO in Gaza. Hamas is a deeply reactionary organisation who has in the past victimised members of trade unions and socialist parties. As an organisation they offer nothing to the Palestinian workers apart from further repression. Simply to go down the path of votes is parliamentry cretinism of the worst type.We do not support Hamas because they received more votes than another organization. Trotskyists recognize that Hamas, in addition to a range of other groups, propogate some reactionary ideas - for example, regarding the role of women in an Islamic society, as well as how we should treat homosexuals - but we still give them support, because we recognize that fighting against Imperialism weakens capitalism, and, if workers in the imperialist countries are to challenge the power of the bourgeoisie, they must accept that workers in other countries have the same interests as them. By challenging Imperialism, and eventually driving the Imperialist powers out of the Middle East, we strike a blow against the Imperialist ruling class, and also enable workers in the region to push forward their own class demands, as the struggle against imperialism is based on a desire to control one's own land and resources, and so will eventually overlap with internal struggles, especially in the bourgeoisie capitulates and accepts an indirect system of economic control in place of direct military occupation. However, despite this unconditional support, we also criticize all groups fighting imperialism, because they generally do not support socialism, and engage with these groups so we can argue against their ideas and try and win over some of their members to our own organizations. This is the Trotskyist position on national-liberation struggles.

Hamas actually commands support in working-class areas, because they provide a range of social serves to the people of Gaza, and, in contrast to Fatah, are relevant transparent in their management of public funds. Although this does not make them socialist, it also invalidates your claim that Hamas has "nothing" to offer the Palestinian working-class, because, given the effects of the Israeli roadblock system and repeated incursions into the occupied territories, these services improve the quality of life for workers.


Simply to go down the path of votes is parliamentry cretinism of the worst typeWe should not change our positions in order to gain more votes, but elections can still be useful, they give an indication of the level of working-class support for our ideas, and they can also provide us with a platform, to reach a broader audience, and to launch transitional demands, which can expose capitalism's inability to meet human needs.

[Ferryman 5]

This talk of pulling back from the brink is akin to talking about a compromise 'solution' to "The Palestine problem".

European and American imperialist settlers descended on Palestine and robed the land.
Palestinians can not tolerate that and survive as a "free people" at the same time. Get it?

The "two stat solution" is no solution but only surrender and dependent servility.
Get it?

Either poor Palestine is finely crushed or imperialist Israel is defeated.
Get it?

Now join in on whichever side your class instincts tell you to.
Get it?

[Static]

This talk of pulling back from the brink is akin to talking about a compromise 'solution' to "The Palestine problem".

European and American imperialist settlers descended on Palestine and robed the land.
Palestinians can not tolerate that and survive as a "free people" at the same time. Get it?

The "two stat solution" is no solution but only surrender and dependent servility.
Get it?

Either poor Palestine is finely crushed or imperialist Israel is defeated.
Get it?

Now join in on whichever side your class instincts tell you to.
Get it?

Regardless of how much I hate Imperialism, I would much rather see Palestine fall.

[Faux Real]

Regardless of how much I hate Imperialism, I would much rather see Palestine fall.
Why? :rolleyes:

[Ferryman 5]

Regardless of how much I hate Imperialism, I would much rather see Palestine fall.

Well that at least is honest. All you can now do is get on with supporting the imperialist destruction of Palestine and at best attempt to reform some of the bits of imperialism you personaly hate. Just a lost soul.

[Module]

I'm not sure that the UK trying to negotiate with Hamas is really the right thing to do, although I don't feel knowledgeable enough on this to really offer any more of an opinion in that regard :( but,
While the Gaza blockade remains, and people feel they're being denied their rights then the fighting will continue, regardless.

[Ferryman 5]

The religious ideology of the current Hamas leadership is not something that Marxists would subscribe to. At best that religious ideology hamstrings the vital philosophical fight for objective scientific understanding of the balance of class forces and at worst has backward and reactionary and culturally backward elements.

Currently it may even create unnecessary difficulties for urgent unification of the Palestinian people by blocking away some of the less conscious of the secular elements in the population.

But all that is completely secondary when it comes to the conflict against imperialism and pales into insignificance against the fact that it is revolutionary in spirit and approach.

It is that uncompromising revolutionary 'spirit' which is feeding the revolutionary aspirations of tens of millions more poor workers around the world. And that is what frightens the imperialists and their left apologists like the one above who would "rather see Palestine fall" than 'Israel' be defeated.

Marxism has no hesitation in wanting such militancy to inflict the greatest defeat possible on the Zionist monstrosity and its imperialist backers, the fundamental mechanism which will eventually drive the degenerate and oppressive imperialist system from the face of the earth.

Th e argument for better philosophical understanding and scientific leadership can and must go on but the Marxist understanding alongside those willing to fight is always "march separately but strike together".

For all its cultural rough edges, religious anti-women anti-guy prejudices, and some crud and even horrific fighting methods, this is the reality of the world struggle of hundreds of millions of oppressed people which will only grow and mature as the imperialist economic crisis deepens in to far more destruction than anything seen yet.

[Ferryman 5]

It should be regarded as remarkable that a Marxist can post a remark on a Revolutionary site at 7pm on Saturday evening saying: "Regardless of how much I hate Imperialism, I would much rather see Palestine fall" and by 2pm the following day it is only queried or challenged by two people. Astonishing!

Last week 'Israel's' deputy defence minister, Matan Vilnai said that a "holocaust" would be unleashed on Gaza if the rockets didn't stop. Like a playground bully claiming self defense from some junior victim's puny efforts to resist more beating.
Or as Europe's Nazis said they were acting in self defence when whipping rebelious Jews who attacked them in order (like the Palestinians) not to be dragged off to prison camps for speaking out against occupation.

This "Shoah" fascist threat to the poor Palestinians is in microcosm exactly of what the imperialist system is lining up for the whole world - an escalation of the "shock and awe" blitz much bigger than what was visited on Iraq and Afghanistan. Yet gobsmakingly a Marxist on this site can say: "Regardless of how much I hate Imperialism, I would much rather see Palestine fall." and go almost unchallenged.

Of course s/he can have their opinion and express it, but, that so few revolutionaries have even protested about it has to be worrying. The hammer blows in the Middle East which were supposed to serve notice on the world of dominant US imperialism's ruthless readiness to impose its will on us all, in order to escape the consequences of its system's onrushing crisis collapse, have been a bloody failure.

Neither the spontaneous revolutionary upheavals which are breaking out everywhere - Somalia, Kenya, Nigeria, into Nepal, Pakistan, India, the Philippines, Indonesia and on into South and Central America, - not the growing threat of trade war and potential hot war challenges ultimately from big capitalist rivals, have been quelled or intimidated.

For the imperialist order the only solution must be to have another go - and this time with enough devastating destructive impact that it will shatter completely the growing world rebellion. Plans are long advanced for just such an onslaught on a suitably demonised target like Iran for example with a 3-day 1200 target bombing plan already being reported by the capitalist press last autumn and later accounts suggesting that 10,000 targets would be bombed in 8 an hour period slaughtering a 100,000 and leaving the country crushed.

All that is in question is the choice of target and the timing. That is why it is vital that we debate the balance of class forces.

[red flag over teeside]

I think that in recent postings on this site some of the most interesting contributions have come from Bobkindles and Ferryman so I would like to respond to a few of the points that they make. The first point that strikes me is their perspective which primarily sees the resistance in the occupied Palestinian territories as being inspired by some variant of nationalism in this case seeing the struggle being carried out by and on behalf of the Palestinian people. For me this is the fundamental flaw in their argument over why there should be critical support for Hamas in their struggle against Israeli aggression. As a Marxist I believe that we always need to be absolutely clear that the notion of a people exists solely as a capitalist ideological construct which workers need to be won away from. In its place we need to organize struggles which emphasis workers internationalism and seek to build links between workers across the world in the same way that the best practice of the first four congresses of the third international did.

Ferryman 5 also argues that by critically supporting Hamas we aid the anti imperialist struggle. I would disagree on this point if anything by supporting however critically Hamas what we are doing is helping to derail the anti imperialist struggle. This is because the political leadership of the armed struggle is being led by nationalists, in this case religious nationalists. Instead of supporting Hamas leadership in the struggle against the occupation we should be giving support to Palestinian workers in their struggles and by so doing helping to create an independent working class organization which can replace the leadership by Hamas. Such an organization needs to mobilize workers on class interests and not on some figment of national unity.

This struggle to be effective needs to be more than firing what are essentially ineffective rockets into Israeli territory or conducting suicide operations. Instead what should occur is to link up with workers in Israel such as Arab workers but also to try to build links with Israeli workers. I know that for most of the left this suggestion is a heresy but without workers breaking with their respective capitalist class then all that will happen will be that workers will be the pawns for some other dominant nation such as Iran.

Finally on the overthrow of a Palestinian state again if we are not careful about being clear over what is meant then it is easy to fall into reactionary positions. I want to see a world where all capitalist states have been overthrown by working class revolution be this a capitalist Palestinian state, an Israeli capitalist state, a British capitalist state etc. Only when there is established a world communist society where nationalism has been consigned to the murky past of human development will there be a future for all people to develop all of our talents to the full. In the meantime a truly consistent Marxist position I feel is to oppose all organizations such as Hamas which is part of the problem and not part of the solution.

[Ferryman 5]

red flag over teeside,

Thanks for your considerate reply.

I started a detailed rebuttal of your points, but realised that life is to short.

1) You are not a Marxist

2) The revolution is already happening

3) You will very soon discover that 1) and 2) correct