What the fuck are they thinking?

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Recent events (a rocket attack by Palestinian militants which killed 1 person and Israel's response which 210 people, so far) have convinced me that the ruling classes in Israel/Palestine and/or their stooges are either mad, stupid, or deliberately stirring shit.

For instance;

1) What the fuck were Hamas/whoever was responsible for the rocket attacks thinking? Not only did they start attacking before the end of the ceasefire, but what the fuck were hoping to achieve by doing so? They attacked a town, and as history tells us all the Israelis are perfectly capable and willing of responding with disproportionate force. As a result they traded the lives of 210+ of their fellows for the life of one Israeli.

That sounds pretty close to fucking insanity to me. Far be it from me to tell the Palestinians how to fight, but if my country was occupied by people I didn't like and I had access to fucking rockets, I would attack military targets and infrastructure that the enemy uses. Blow up the enemy's gas mains and bridges and you help to cripple their war machine as well as providing disincentives to occupy the place, but kill their friends and relatives and they will want vengeance.

2) What the fuck are Israel thinking? They may have lost only one of their number, but their disproportionate response will create nothing but embittered widows, orphans that will likely grow up to be yet more suicide bombers and militants, and other problems for Israel in the form of people seeking vengeance for murdered friends and relatives.

Also, destroying the ability of Hamas to enforce it's will (by killing their security personnel and trashing their compounds) simply makes it easier for splinter groups to carry out their attacks and kill more Israelis.

It's a vicious cycle which seems to feed upon itself. But it seems that neither side has enough rational self-interest to break said cycle. Perhaps some of you can enlighten me as to why this appears to be so?

[The Intransigent Faction]

Recent events (a rocket attack by Palestinian militants which killed 1 person and Israel's response which 210 people, so far) have convinced me that the ruling classes in Israel/Palestine and/or their stooges are either mad, stupid, or deliberately stirring shit.

For instance;

1) What the fuck were Hamas/whoever was responsible for the rocket attacks thinking? Not only did they start attacking before the end of the ceasefire, but what the fuck were hoping to achieve by doing so? They attacked a town, and as history tells us all the Israelis are perfectly capable and willing of responding with disproportionate force. As a result they traded the lives of 210+ of their fellows for the life of one Israeli.

That sounds pretty close to fucking insanity to me. Far be it from me to tell the Palestinians how to fight, but if my country was occupied by people I didn't like and I had access to fucking rockets, I would attack military targets and infrastructure that the enemy uses. Blow up the enemy's gas mains and bridges and you help to cripple their war machine as well as providing disincentives to occupy the place, but kill their friends and relatives and they will want vengeance.

2) What the fuck are Israel thinking? They may have lost only one of their number, but their disproportionate response will create nothing but embittered widows, orphans that will likely grow up to be yet more suicide bombers and militants, and other problems for Israel in the form of people seeking vengeance for murdered friends and relatives.

Also, destroying the ability of Hamas to enforce it's will (by killing their security personnel and trashing their compounds) simply makes it easier for splinter groups to carry out their attacks and kill more Israelis.

It's a vicious cycle which seems to feed upon itself. But it seems that neither side has enough rational self-interest to break said cycle. Perhaps some of you can enlighten me as to why this appears to be so?

Palestinians claim that there were numerous violations by Israel of the ceasefire beforehand.

I was thinking pretty much the same thing, though. Israel and Palestine ought to realize by now, heck, they should have realized in the first place, that killing civilians, intentionally or otherwise, will not bring any measure of stability.

I would chalk a lot of it up to cynicism on either side about how a ceasefire could possibly last after all this time, which led to "preparations" for the end of the ceasefire, seen by either side as a sign of readiness for aggressive measures.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Palestinians claim that there were numerous violations by Israel of the ceasefire beforehand.

If that's true, then the same argument can be presented against the Israelis - it is not in their interest to violate ceasefire agreements, for the simple fact that it invites retaliation.


I was thinking pretty much the same thing, though. Israel and Palestine ought to realize by now, heck, they should have realized in the first place, that killing civilians, intentionally or otherwise, will not bring any measure of stability.

I would chalk a lot of it up to cynicism on either side about how a ceasefire could possibly last after all this time, which led to "preparations" for the end of the ceasefire, seen by either side as a sign of readiness for aggressive measures.

That sounds reasonable. Unfortunately if true that means a lot more people will die before the issue is resolved, if it that ever happens.

[butterfly]

How have they managed to miss this?:(

They may have lost only one of their number, but their disproportionate response will create nothing but embittered widows, orphans that will likely grow up to be yet more suicide bombers and militants, and other problems for Israel in the form of people seeking vengeance for murdered friends and relatives.

[Lynx]

Neither side wants peace. And I don't believe it's just the leadership who don't want peace, 40 years of conflict have psychologically damaged the population.

[jake williams]

Palestine and Gaza in particular are in a state of perpetual trauma. Their actions aren't going to be especially rational. Now there's some things you could say about Hamas's internal politics, but it's almost a subplot.

[bootleg42]

Neither side wants peace. And I don't believe it's just the leadership who don't want peace, 40 years of conflict have psychologically damaged the population.

Actually Hamas has VARIOUS time in the past (also the PLO WAY BACK) made peace proposals which was similar to international opinion (two state solution basically) and Israel (with the U.S. in the background of course) rejected everything.

Israel's peace proposals are jokes and way off international consensus. At least the Palestinian proposals are very reasonable and are near or better than international consensus.

Now do not confuse this for me saying that Hamas is great or that I support their platform (which I don't), etc. But I recognize that they have made legit moves towards peace while Israel (the U.S. basically) has not. I also recognize that the majority of the Palestinian people support Hamas whether I like it or not and that they are an actual legit deterrent.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Shouldn't this be in politics?

---------------------

Anyway, analysis here:

http://leninology.blogspot.com/2008/12/blog-post.html

[Bronsky]

Is that the cease fire that has seen Gaza locked down and its citizens treated no better than animals by their Zionist jailers and the Arab rulers who back them up. firing home made rockets across the border is nothing but a token gesture against the continual occupation and repression carried out by the Israeli forces both within Gaza and the West Bank. During this cease fire did the settlements stop, did the land grab stop, in front of the worlds media one bunch of militants were removed from one building making it "clear" to the world that "democratic" Israel was dealing with its side of the cease fire, while in the real world settlers were expanding their illegal gains, hospital were starved of power and drugs to treat the diseased and starving citizens of Gaza, air strikes on a lesser level than this weekends struck time and time again at the Palestinian people. You know when Israel turns iys mighty army and airdorce on the Palestinians they can always rely on the fake lefts to jump to attention and repeat their propoganda.

You post echoes the trash coming out of every orifices in the capitalist world, “Hamas is to blame Israel is the victim” the well rehearsed and western looking Israeli spoke people scream at the world ...open your eyes and go and read the truth ... I have no connection with Hamas I see them as no better than the other nationalist gangsters that control the Palestinian cause. They wish to sit at the head of the table not in the interest of the Palestinian people but for their own groups prosperity, as is the case of Fattah, hail to the new boss same as the old boss.


What we are seeing is the desperate attempt to “settle the Palestinian question" before the “new boss “ in the USA takes his seat. Israel is riddles with turmoil, its US backers are in deep crisis themselves, the cash that pours into the Western enclave that Zionism expected to continue for ever is drying up and very soon the tap will be turned off for good. Where then for the Israeli people, will they shift to the right or can those groups who seek to unite both Arab and Jew for a true democratic state grow enough to take the power.

It is not a question of this or that leadership being the problem to a cease fire, Israel breaks cease fires as often as Olmert breaks wind. It is about the Western powers the USA in particular losing its grip within that region.

Please Read _ http://www.wsws.org/

[Bronsky]

Neither side wants peace. And I don't believe it's just the leadership who don't want peace, 40 years of conflict have psychologically damaged the population.

Did the French Dutch Chech or any other of the freedom fighters against the Nazis want peace that allowed Hitler to keep their country.Firing rockets at the Nazis before and during WW2 was seen as heroic acts, but then Nazism was the enemy of imperialism where as imperialism is the midwife to the Zionist state of Israel.

Please Read _ http://www.wsws.org/

[The Deepest Red]

The solution is the destruction of Israel and the establishment of a Palestinian workers' state encompassing all of Palestine from the Jordan river to the sea and from Gaza to the border with Lebanon. Israel has no right to exist, no more than Northern Ireland does or the apartheid regime in South Africa did or any other bastard of colonialism. In the mean time, however, the best I believe the Palestinians can do is to resist the Zionist war machine while continuing calls for international assistance.

We all have a responsibility too to show solidarity and come up with ways of putting pressure on the US, EU and Israel. It often seems like a never ending cycle of violence without any hope of reprieve but we must continue to struggle as best we can.

My thoughts are with the Palestinian people at this difficult time.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

You post echoes the trash coming out of every orifices in the capitalist world, “Hamas is to blame Israel is the victim” the well rehearsed and western looking Israeli spoke people scream at the world

To whom is this part of your post addressed to?

If it's me, then you've got the wrong end of the stick. It doesn't matter who started it or who's at fault, because either way the scenario remains the same - the ruling classes on both sides bring it upon themselves, and the average joe and jane suffer the consequences. I'm not interested in stupid dickwaving competitions about which side suffers the most, because such things amount to sweet fuck-all in any case.

[The Deepest Red]

Is that the cease fire that has seen Gaza locked down and its citizens treated no better than animals by their Zionist jailers and the Arab rulers who back them up. firing home made rockets across the border is nothing but a token gesture against the continual occupation and repression carried out by the Israeli forces both within Gaza and the West Bank. During this cease fire did the settlements stop, did the land grab stop, in front of the worlds media one bunch of militants were removed from one building making it "clear" to the world that "democratic" Israel was dealing with its side of the cease fire, while in the real world settlers were expanding their illegal gains, hospital were starved of power and drugs to treat the diseased and starving citizens of Gaza, air strikes on a lesser level than this weekends struck time and time again at the Palestinian people. You know when Israel turns iys mighty army and airdorce on the Palestinians they can always rely on the fake lefts to jump to attention and repeat their propoganda.

You post echoes the trash coming out of every orifices in the capitalist world, “Hamas is to blame Israel is the victim” the well rehearsed and western looking Israeli spoke people scream at the world ...open your eyes and go and read the truth ... I have no connection with Hamas I see them as no better than the other nationalist gangsters that control the Palestinian cause. They wish to sit at the head of the table not in the interest of the Palestinian people but for their own groups prosperity, as is the case of Fattah, hail to the new boss same as the old boss.


What we are seeing is the desperate attempt to “settle the Palestinian question" before the “new boss “ in the USA takes his seat. Israel is riddles with turmoil, its US backers are in deep crisis themselves, the cash that pours into the Western enclave that Zionism expected to continue for ever is drying up and very soon the tap will be turned off for good. Where then for the Israeli people, will they shift to the right or can those groups who seek to unite both Arab and Jew for a true democratic state grow enough to take the power.

It is not a question of this or that leadership being the problem to a cease fire, Israel breaks cease fires as often as Olmert breaks wind. It is about the Western powers the USA in particular losing its grip within that region.

Excellent post comrade.

[Lynx]

Did the French Dutch Chech or any other of the freedom fighters against the Nazis want peace that allowed Hitler to keep their country.Firing rockets at the Nazis before and during WW2 was seen as heroic acts, but then Nazism was the enemy of imperialism where as imperialism is the midwife to the Zionist state of Israel.
It is of course a double standard, and depends on whose side you're on.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

More details here, especially concerning the fact that it was Israel that broke the 'truce':

http://leninology.blogspot.com/2008/12/barbarians-live-in-e14.html

[Dean]

Recent events (a rocket attack by Palestinian militants which killed 1 person and Israel's response which 210 people, so far) have convinced me that the ruling classes in Israel/Palestine and/or their stooges are either mad, stupid, or deliberately stirring shit.

For instance;

1) What the fuck were Hamas/whoever was responsible for the rocket attacks thinking? Not only did they start attacking before the end of the ceasefire, but what the fuck were hoping to achieve by doing so? They attacked a town, and as history tells us all the Israelis are perfectly capable and willing of responding with disproportionate force. As a result they traded the lives of 210+ of their fellows for the life of one Israeli.

That sounds pretty close to fucking insanity to me. Far be it from me to tell the Palestinians how to fight, but if my country was occupied by people I didn't like and I had access to fucking rockets, I would attack military targets and infrastructure that the enemy uses. Blow up the enemy's gas mains and bridges and you help to cripple their war machine as well as providing disincentives to occupy the place, but kill their friends and relatives and they will want vengeance.
Of course you don't think it is rational. But neither are suicide bombings. These people are suffering from malnutrition at this point, so it is worthless to blame them for their irration. Of course the blame lies 100% with Israel, and Abbas is a worthless opportunist for criticising Hamas for the attacks - a statement which has shocked the world on this, the bloodiest day of genocide by the Israeli white supremacists since the beginning of the occupation 49 years ago.

Relevant articles:
http://electronicintifada.net/bytopic/687.shtml
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1050618.html
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/12/28/gaza.israel.strikes/index.html
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2008/12/200812283393636670.html

Israel is planning a new incursion, and probably an occupation of Gaza - they have about 7000 reserve forces called up. Hooray, I say, for the end of the world!

[Sasha]

although im no fan of either nationalism or religion but the palestinians fight a just strugle against an apartheid ocupation and have every right to hit israel in every way they can.
putting any blame on Hamas is out of order IMO.

secular jews against zionism, jawe-damit

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Of course you don't think it is rational. But neither are suicide bombings. These people are suffering from malnutrition at this point, so it is worthless to blame them for their irration.

I wasn't "blaming" them for their irrationality, I was wondering why they were behaving in such a manner.


Of course the blame lies 100% with Israel, and Abbas is a worthless opportunist for criticising Hamas for the attacks - a statement which has shocked the world on this, the bloodiest day of genocide by the Israeli white supremacists since the beginning of the occupation 49 years ago.

And of course, any death and suffering visited upon the Israelis by the Palestinians will be their own damn fault. That's what I'm saying. They're too chickenshit to commit full-blown genocide of every Palestinian and they have certainly shown no inclination whatsoever of either leaving or co-existing peacefully, so they vacillate anywhere between heavy-handed oppression and murderous rampages that serve only to destroy infrastructure and create emnity across the generations.

It's not only the Palestinians that are acting irrationally.


Israel is planning a new incursion, and probably an occupation of Gaza - they have about 7000 reserve forces called up. Hooray, I say, for the end of the world!

Now you're simply being melodramatic. Israel/Palestine is not the world. Fuck, I hate the so-called "Holy Land". It's been a place of human suffering ever since the ancient Israelites raped, murdered and pillaged their way across it.

[Zurdito]

Recent events (a rocket attack by Palestinian militants which killed 1 person and Israel's response which 210 people, so far) have convinced me that the ruling classes in Israel/Palestine and/or their stooges are either mad, stupid, or deliberately stirring shit.

For instance;

1) What the fuck were Hamas/whoever was responsible for the rocket attacks thinking? Not only did they start attacking before the end of the ceasefire, but what the fuck were hoping to achieve by doing so? They attacked a town, and as history tells us all the Israelis are perfectly capable and willing of responding with disproportionate force. As a result they traded the lives of 210+ of their fellows for the life of one Israeli.

That sounds pretty close to fucking insanity to me. Far be it from me to tell the Palestinians how to fight, but if my country was occupied by people I didn't like and I had access to fucking rockets, I would attack military targets and infrastructure that the enemy uses. Blow up the enemy's gas mains and bridges and you help to cripple their war machine as well as providing disincentives to occupy the place, but kill their friends and relatives and they will want vengeance.

2) What the fuck are Israel thinking? They may have lost only one of their number, but their disproportionate response will create nothing but embittered widows, orphans that will likely grow up to be yet more suicide bombers and militants, and other problems for Israel in the form of people seeking vengeance for murdered friends and relatives.

Also, destroying the ability of Hamas to enforce it's will (by killing their security personnel and trashing their compounds) simply makes it easier for splinter groups to carry out their attacks and kill more Israelis.

It's a vicious cycle which seems to feed upon itself. But it seems that neither side has enough rational self-interest to break said cycle. Perhaps some of you can enlighten me as to why this appears to be so?

sorry but reading any mainstream news story could have cleared up many of your doubts here.

Firstly Israel broke the ceasefire as long ago as November, this is not a "palestinian claim" as one poster above said, but a well docuimented fact. Israel had already killed Gazans in airstrikes before the rockets were launched by Hamas in retaliation.

Secondly what the Israeli ruling class was thinking is that there is an election coming up and they cannot afford to look weak, which explains the response here, the most violent for 46 years I believe. You're surprised about their actions? If they didn't shy away from destroying much of Lebanon and killing many more people in a part of the world with a much stronger resistance, why would they shy away here?

I think they have calculated that they can smash the Palestinians and that this is worth the embitterment they may cause, which they calculate is already very high anyway. Instead they are apparently banking on polarising the situation, and relying on the strong support of their allies to get them through. This is not necessarilly stupid on their part, just brutal and inhumane, and illustrates the need for a revolutionary alternative across the Arab world.

[ZeroNowhere]

And of course, any death and suffering visited upon the Israelis by the Palestinians will be their own damn fault.
Oh,would it really?
Re-read that statement, because it is disgusting.

[Jazzratt]

Oh,would it really?
Re-read that statement, because it is disgusting.

They are bombing the living fuck out of Gaza and are threatening to send in thugs and tanks. Of course it will be their fault that Palestinians will retaliate. I mean if some batshit insane tyranny was launching bombs and troops at my home I suspect I'd be firing back a few rockets of my own.

How the christ is it not Israel's fault?

[Labor Shall Rule]

The Qassam barrages started after the Cairo 'truce' was ended by Israel-in early November they already reopened their blockade of the Gazan area without provocation.

If anything, Hamas has been incredibly accommodating of the Israelis. The offer of a two-year cease-fire, which would then lead to peace talks, was rejected by Tel-Aviv. It seems the Islamist charter has long been tossed out the window for a Fatah-oriented 'two-state' solution, but they are still attacked violently.

[Bronsky]

To whom is this part of your post addressed to?

If it's me, then you've got the wrong end of the stick. It doesn't matter who started it or who's at fault, because either way the scenario remains the same - the ruling classes on both sides bring it upon themselves, and the average joe and jane suffer the consequences. I'm not interested in stupid dickwaving competitions about which side suffers the most, because such things amount to sweet fuck-all in any case.

But what you express is the old Liberal stand by during such times of claiming “a plague on both your houses,” allowing you to dismiss the imperialist nature of Israel and what it represents. You highlight the rockets v the carnage without making any political comment about what they represent. Nothing in your posts about the historical fight between Zionism and the Palestinians. I hope I am wrong but for you its is a rather unsavoury dog fight between two equally hideous opponents. The class nature of the conflict and the outcome for the Arab masses and the Jewish progressive forces gets no mention. It is the form rather than the content that has grabbed your imagination. The bourgeois Arab regimes are being exposed as never before, Hamas and Fattah are showing their backward nationalism can do nothing for the Palestinians, I asked where to for the Jews of Israel I ask now where to for the Palestinian and the Arab masses.

Taking all that I have said this isn't a "difficult time for the Palestinians" it is a
pre-revolutionary situation that could see the racist Israel state dismantled and the Arab masses with the Palestinians to the fore moving towards what others who are more enlightened than you, rightly call a workers state for all Jew, Arab and Christian.

[Bronsky]

It is of course a double standard, and depends on whose side you're on.


Yes comrade it was also a demonstration of the hypocracy of "Democracy"

[GhostKing]

It easier for both sides to just kill each other than to talk,which neither are willing to do because they are just doing some tict for tact shit....

[ZeroNowhere]

They are bombing the living fuck out of Gaza and are threatening to send in thugs and tanks. Of course it will be their fault that Palestinians will retaliate. I mean if some batshit insane tyranny was launching bombs and troops at my home I suspect I'd be firing back a few rockets of my own.

How the christ is it not Israel's fault?

And of course, any death and suffering visited upon the Israelis by the Palestinians will be their own damn fault.
My point wasn't whether or not the Palestinians are being screwed over. Presumably every Israeli is bombing the living fuck out of Gaza and are threatening to send in thugs and tanks?

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

But what you express is the old Liberal stand by during such times of claiming “a plague on both your houses,” allowing you to dismiss the imperialist nature of Israel and what it represents.


I'm not dismissing Israel's imperialism, I'm saying their tactics are self-defeating and needlessly bloodthirsty, while Palestine's are ineffective despite having access to rocket launchers.



You highlight the rockets v the carnage without making any political comment about what they represent. Nothing in your posts about the historical fight between Zionism and the Palestinians.


That's because, to be perfectly honest, I'm not fucking interested. Israel is in the wrong here by any sane measure, but that doesn't mean I can't express my opinion that the goals of both are being conducted by what looks like total Mickey Mouse operations.



I hope I am wrong but for you its is a rather unsavoury dog fight between two equally hideous opponents.


They are not "equally" hideous, since I'm lead to believe that Israel has slaughtered more. But their tactics both seem equally stupid.



The class nature of the conflict and the outcome for the Arab masses and the Jewish progressive forces gets no mention. It is the form rather than the content that has grabbed your imagination. The bourgeois Arab regimes are being exposed as never before, Hamas and Fattah are showing their backward nationalism can do nothing for the Palestinians, I asked where to for the Jews of Israel I ask now where to for the Palestinian and the Arab masses.

And until the borgeouisie are toppled, it seems this state of affairs will continue.


Taking all that I have said this isn't a "difficult time for the Palestinians" it is a

pre-revolutionary situation that could see the racist Israel state dismantled and the Arab masses with the Palestinians to the fore moving towards what others who are more enlightened than you, rightly call a workers state for all Jew, Arab and Christian.

If that's true, then this whole business will likely soon be over. But others are predicting the end of the world! Who's a man to believe? :laugh:


My point wasn't whether or not the Palestinians are being screwed over. Presumably every Israeli is bombing the living fuck out of Gaza and are threatening to send in thugs and tanks?

That must have been why I said "...and the average joe and jane suffer the consequences."

[Devrim]

Taking all that I have said this isn't a "difficult time for the Palestinians" it is a
pre-revolutionary situation that could see the racist Israel state dismantled and the Arab masses with the Palestinians to the fore moving towards what others who are more enlightened than you, rightly call a workers state for all Jew, Arab and Christian.


This is in no way a 'pre-revolutionary situation'. It is a slaughter.

Devrim

[GPDP]

Israel's actions are brutal, inhuman, and cynical, but they are not stupid. They know what they want out of this, and they're doing their best to get it. They want to look strong in the face of elections, and they want to topple Hamas once and for all. Hamas may be reactionary, but the Palestinian people have spoken, and no cry of "self-defense" can justify their overthrow by such means.

[ZeroNowhere]

That must have been why I said "...and the average joe and jane suffer the consequences."
I saw that, but then you said that if 'the Israelis' were killed, it would be their own faults. Unless by 'the Israelis', you mean 'certain Israelis'.

[Guerrilla22]

The problem lies with who is in charge in both Gaza and Israel: idealouges. Idealouges don't make pragmatic decisions they push an ideology by any means necessary, usually some kind of military force.

Of course the occupation and oppression ny Israel has created idealouges like Hamas and Hezbollah in the case of Lebanon and their continued use of over top aggression to try to defeat these elements will only produce more extremist.

[berlitz23]

by ALI ABUNIMAH

I want to say, Amy, first of all, that we have to go back to the Warsaw Ghetto or Guernica to find crimes in the modern era of the scale of the viciousness and of the deliberateness of what Israel is committing with the full support of the United States, not just the Bush administration, but apparently as well the incoming Obama administration. We have to recognize the complicity not just of the so-called international community, but also of the Arab regimes, Egypt, President Hosni Mubarak, the Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit of Egypt. Tzipi Livni, when she issued her threats against Gaza, was in Cairo in the biggest Arab capital, and Aboul Gheit stood next to her silently.


Mahmoud Abbas is not a bystander, the so-called president of the Palestinian Authority. For two years since the elections, which Hamas won, he and his coterie have been collaborating with Israel and the United States, first to overthrow the election result and then to besiege Gaza. We have talked before of the Palestinian Contras, funded and armed by the United States, which sought to overthrow Hamas in June 2007 and had the tables turned on them. And now this. The complicity of Mahmoud Abbas is very clear and must be clearly stated. He does not have the authority, moral or otherwise, to call together the Palestinian people for anything. He has gone over to the other side. He has joined the Israeli war against the Palestinian people, and I choose my words very carefully.

And let me say this, as well, Amy, that Israel is trying to produce and promote the fiction that it is engaged in a war with a so-called enemy entity. What Israel is doing is massacring a captive population. You heard—you said in the headlines how Nancy Pelosi, our so-called progressive, liberal, antiwar Speaker of the House, gave her full support to these crimes. Obama has done the same through a spokesman. And that will not change. The United Nations issued a weak statement aimed at covering the backsides, let me say, of those who issued it, not aimed at changing the situation.

What are Palestinians calling for today? Yesterday, the Palestinian National Committee for the Campaign for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions reissued and reaffirmed its call on all international civil society in the United States, in North America, in Europe, everywhere, to redouble the efforts for boycott, divestment and sanctions modeled on the anti-apartheid movement. This is necessary. This is moral. This is the nonviolent resistance we can all participate in. And it is more urgent than ever. Let’s not look back at these crimes like we look at the Warsaw Ghetto and like we look at Guernica and we look at the other atrocities of the twentieth century and say, “We had the chance to act, but we chose silence and complicity.” The time to stop this is now.

And we also have to be clear that those who are accountable—Ehud Barak, his orders over the past few months to withhold insulin, chemotherapy drugs, dialysis supplies, all forms of medicine from the people of Gaza, were just as lethal and just as murderous as the orders to send in the bombers and warplanes to attack mosques, to attack universities. The Islamic University in Gaza is not a military site. It is a university with 18,000 students, 60 percent of them women. Last night, Israeli warplanes attacked a female dormitory in the Islamic University. This is what Israel is attacking. They attacked the fishing port. No food gets into Gaza. People can barely fish enough to sustain them, and Israel has attacked the fishing boats that sustains them. These are historic crimes, and we cannot be silent about them.
And we have to continue this nonsense that there’s fault on both sides. We have a captive occupied population. 80 percent of the people in the Gaza Strip are refugees. 750,000 of them are children. Where else in the world can these crimes be committed while the world looks on, while our elected politicians in Congress, Democrats and Republicans, sit there applauding, when you see the shameful statement of Howard Berman, the Democrat chairman of the House Foreign Relations Committee, giving his full support to Israel? People have to stand up to this. We cannot sit on our hands anymore and say change is coming. Change is not coming unless we create it.

[Mister X]

Q:What the fuck are they thinking?
A:81% of Israelis support this attack on Gaza. Because the ruling coalition is not going well on the polls this will certainly give them a boost.
Also they want to replace the (reactionary) Hamas with someone which is more willing to be a puppet of Israel in Gaza.
That's what they re thinking.

[berlitz23]

The media is blantantly distorting the entire situation. Did they report that the Israeli army attacked civilian nonviolent demonstrators yesterday in Nil’in and killed one person and injured three very seriously. Israel is doing in Gaza is not an act of self-defense, as it is claiming. It’s not an attack on Hamas. It is an attack on the whole Palestinian population. There has been 318 people killed, including thirty children, and at least 1,400 people injured, including 150 children and forty women. THIS IS A BLOODBATH THAT SHOULD BE STOPPED IMMEDIATELY. Israel is claiming that it is attacking Hamas, but in fact it is attacking all the Palestinians. It is attacking the whole infrastructure. They have destroyed a university. They have destroyed five mosques. They have attacked the hospital. What doesn't the news media report Israel was the one that broke the ceasefire since two months. They started operations and attacks here and there, trying to provoke a reaction, until there was a reaction, and then they claim that it was the Palestinians who broke the ceasefire.
Why doesn't the news media report Gaza Strip is the highest densely populated area in the world, with almost 4,150 people in each square kilometer. When you start bombing the place with bombs that are one to two tons heavy, then you’re determined to kill people and kill civilians and innocent people. Israel never ended its occupation of Gaza. It maintains the occupying of the airspace, the sea around Gaza and the land around Gaza. And it was preventing people from getting medical aid and equipment and fuel and electricity. :cursing:

[Bronsky]

It easier for both sides to just kill each other than to talk,which neither are willing to do because they are just doing some tict for tact shit....


Again there is this attempt at equalising both sides without taking into account the conditions history and the class nature of the struggle going on in the Mid East. I don't see Hamas and the Palestinians using their jets to bomb the shit out of Israel, I don't see the mass ranks of Palestinian tanks waiting to go into Israel and bust up every piece of infrastructure left after the planes have done their job.
I don’t read day in day out of the Palestinian army creating havoc in the town and cities of Israel do you?

I would suggest some comrades on here need to brush up on the history of "both sides talking" each time they do larger concessions are handed over to Israel by the Palestinian leaders while Zionism just carries on doing what it has always done, admits to, and is doing so again in Gaza creating facts on the ground, the fav phrase of the Zionist thugs. Those settlements that are still going up in the West Bank they are all facts on the ground that the west turns a blind eye to.

Now I don’t know if some of the comrades feel pressured into thinking that to be anti Israel is to be anti Semitic. That is an accusation honed to near perfection by the well trained and well oiled Israeli propaganda machine. But there are millions of Jews around the world who do not support Israel, Zionism has a very special name for these Jews they call them Self Haters. Norman Finkelstein a Jew whose mother and father were inmates of the death camps has written extensively on this subject. His book The Holocaust Industry should be read by any young comrade uncertain of the nature of Israel. I would also recommend David Harts double volume Zionism: The Enemy of the Jews for a comprehensive breakdown of the history of Israel and the fight against the Palestinian masses.

There is no equality between the imperialist tool that is Zionism and the nationalist fight of the Hamas leadership. When Hamas won what the West had to concede was fair elections the first thing the western powers did was to remove their representatives from the West Bank and Gaza and refused to recognise the chosen government of the Palestinian people. Democracy at work eh! Comrades.

So please as socialists communists and anarchists lets dump this notion that there is some equal ground that is shared by Zionism and Hamas. By uttering these words you echo the words of imperialism.

[Bronsky]

This is in no way a 'pre-revolutionary situation'. It is a slaughter.

Devrim

But comrade isn't that just taking the given situation at a certain time and level and saying that situation is stagnant it will not develop. How is Israel and its Western backers going to get off this hook, you can see the masses demonstrations in all the major cities of the world, the Greek youth already fighting on the streets are hoisting the Palestinian flag while they carry on that fight.

In the Arab world the bourgeois leadership already shaking from the collapse of the price of oil and the global economic crisis are being exposed as never before, The ferocity of Israelis carnage is met by the Arab masses moving further and further forward to an open opposition to their respective governments.

They know that the decision to bomb Gaza was OK'd by the USA and their leaders had prior knowledge of the attacks. The resistance movements will grow and grow during this period of imperial aggression and the Kings Sheiks and Presidents of the Aran League will have to crack down, again cranking up the conditions for an uprising.

[Guerrilla22]

the Kings Sheiks and Presidents of the Aran League will have to crack down, again cranking up the conditions for an uprising.

The chances for any kind of uprising happening in the Arab states is slim to none, especially in Saudi Arabia. Meanwhile over 300 people have died in Gaza and the IDF is preparing for a full scale invasion. Devrim is right, this isn't a "pre-revolutionary" situation this is a fucking slaughter.

[Zurdito]

The chances for any kind of uprising happening in the Arab states is slim to none, especially in Saudi Arabia.

Eh?

The chances of any kind of uprising happening "ever",or right now? I would say the chances of uprisings occurring in many Arab states over the next few years of crisis are quite likely!

I would say that there was a mass uprising against Israel's attacks on Lebanon in 2006, that there have been periodic uprisings in Palestine and will be again, and that the contradictions between the increasing demands of many popular sectors in the Arab world that their governemnts do something to stand up to Israel immediately, and the comprador nature of those bourgeoisie´s, are pretty explosive.

This view of the Arab world as currently beyond hope is pretty worthless. If the situation were so stable then the US and EU wouldn't be giving huge amounts of aid to so many of those regimes (especially Egypt which has a militant and large workers vanguard, which is much more promising than many workers movements in the west, and recently secured the formation of the first independent trade union in that country for over half a century).

It is true that the situation for the Palestinians on their own looks dire, and I would go further than you, withint he next few decades there may well be no "palestinian" nation left to speak of. But this is part of the barbarity of capitalism, it is nothing new to us, if we accepted that this in itself was enough to defeat us then we'd havehad to give up as communists long ago.

Any number of things could happen, but writing off the possiblity of the next few years of crisis greatly polarising the class struggle in the Arab world, which could in the "least" scenario open up spaces for mass democratic and pro-palestine forces taking the political intiative in certain parts of the Arab world, and in the "most" scenario pose the question of revolution, means basically giving up ont hat part of the world and leaving the Palestinians for dead already, which seems like a pretty useless "socialism" to me.

[Guerrilla22]

I would say that there was a mass uprising against Israel's attacks on Lebanon in 2006, that there have been periodic uprisings in Palestine and will be again, and that the contradictions between the increasing demands of many popular sectors in the Arab world that their governemnts do something to stand up to Israel immediately, and the comprador nature of those bourgeoisie´s, are pretty explosive.

True there have been uprisings in the occupied territories and Lebanon, but these are unique cases because 1. Both faced direct Israeli incursions and aggression and 2.both have unstable ruling regimes that have not been able to get the firm grasp of power that the regimes in other countries like Saudi Arabia have.


This view of the Arab world as currently beyond hope is pretty worthless.

I didn't say that the Middle East is beyond hope, I merely pointed out the fact that most of the countries in the Middle East are kingdoms or sheikdoms that have been in place for decades and are not likely to collapse any time soon.


the situation were so stable then the US and EU wouldn't be giving huge amounts of aid to so many of those regimes

This is one of the main reasons why uprisings are not likely. The presence of well armed security apparatuses throughout Middle Eastern regimes.


[especially Egypt which has a militant and large workers vanguard, which is much more promising than many workers movements in the west, and recently secured the formation of the first independent trade union in that country for over a century).
/QUOTE]

yes, however the Middle East still has numerous reactionary elements contending for power and influence as well. These elements present another barrier to any kind of revolutionary movement as well.

[quote]in the "most" scenario pose the question of revolution, means basically giving up ont hat part of the world and leaving the Palestinians for dead already, which seems like a pretty useless "socialism" to me.

No one is suggesting we simply give up the Palestinians for dead, the position of the left should be to call for an immiediete end to the current Israeli attacks and to continue to press for an end to further aggression and occupation. However, let's not kid ourselves; Hamas continues controls Gaza for the time being and bodies continue to pile up in the streets, there really is nothing revolutionary about this situation, it's a blood letting and nothing more.

[Devrim]

In the Arab world the bourgeois leadership already shaking from the collapse of the price of oil and the global economic crisis are being exposed as never before, The ferocity of Israelis carnage is met by the Arab masses moving further and further forward to an open opposition to their respective governments.

I don't notice 'the Arab masses moving further and further forward to an open opposition to their respective governments'. However, it isn't a question of what some amorphous 'masses' are doing, but of what the working class is doing.


Eh?

The chances of any kind of uprising happening "ever",or right now? I would say the chances of uprisings occurring in many Arab states over the next few years of crisis are quite likely!

I was commenting on the situation in Palestine at the moment. I think that the working class struggles to assert itself as a class even in basic ways in Palestine. I don't see any possibility of revolution there at the moment.

As for the next few years in Arab states, I doubt we will see full scale uprisings, but I think that the struggle can develop in a positive manner there.


I would say that there was a mass uprising against Israel's attacks on Lebanon in 2006, that there have been periodic uprisings in Palestine and will be again, and that the contradictions between the increasing demands of many popular sectors in the Arab world that their governemnts do something to stand up to Israel immediately, and the comprador nature of those bourgeoisie´s, are pretty explosive.

I see the situation in Lebanon in a completely different way than you do. I don't think that there was a 'mass uprising' there. I think that the working class was mobilised in defence of the state. I think that the sporadic uprisings in Palestine do not have a working class character, and have nothing to offer the working class.

I don't see the demands of 'popular sectors' as being potentially explosive at all. They are on an absolutely nationalist terrain, and are merely talking about a change in the policy of the state. They are not class demands.


This view of the Arab world as currently beyond hope is pretty worthless. If the situation were so stable then the US and EU wouldn't be giving huge amounts of aid to so many of those regimes (especially Egypt which has a militant and large workers vanguard, which is much more promising than many workers movements in the west, and recently secured the formation of the first independent trade union in that country for over a century).

It is not my view of the Arab world. The movements in Egypt especially at Mahala were of massive importance for the working class internationally. Outside of the Arab world, but still in the region, there are promising sign coming from Iran, and even at a lower level from Turkey.


It is true that the situation for the Palestinians on their own looks dire, and I would go further than you, withint he next few decades there may well be no "palestinian" nation left to speak of. But this is part of the barbarity of capitalism, it is nothing new to us, if we accepted that this in itself was enough to defeat us then we'd havehad to give up as communists long ago.

I think that this is reasonably accurate. The situation is dire. It doesn't go with all the nonsense that the left has been feeding us for years about the Palestinians (in some cases Palestinian working class even) being undefeated. I don't actually see the Palestinian 'nation' ceasing to exist though.

Devrim

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Isreal apparently violated a truce in order to launch these attacks:

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3646972,00.html

Things you won't hear on the BBC:

http://leninology.blogspot.com/2008/12/things-you-wont-hear-on-bbc.html

Kicking them when they are down:

http://leninology.blogspot.com/2008/12/kicking-them-when-theyre-down.html

Big surprise: Obama lines up behind Israel:

http://leninology.blogspot.com/2008/12/change-you-can-make-believe-in.html

Demonstration in London, Saturday:

http://www.socialistunity.com/?p=3237

Demonstrations already taken place:

http://www.socialistunity.com/?p=3236

We are all Palestinians now:

http://www.socialistunity.com/?p=3241

[Reclaimed Dasein]

The solution is the destruction of Israel and the establishment of a Palestinian workers' state encompassing all of Palestine from the Jordan river to the sea and from Gaza to the border with Lebanon. Israel has no right to exist, no more than Northern Ireland does or the apartheid regime in South Africa did or any other bastard of colonialism. In the mean time, however, the best I believe the Palestinians can do is to resist the Zionist war machine while continuing calls for international assistance.

We all have a responsibility too to show solidarity and come up with ways of putting pressure on the US, EU and Israel. It often seems like a never ending cycle of violence without any hope of reprieve but we must continue to struggle as best we can.

My thoughts are with the Palestinian people at this difficult time.
I don't think Israel is in any way unique as a state. The only problem is that it's been a while since we saw what the founding of a state looked like. Shall we ask the American Indians, Armenians, or the 1930s Iraqis what a founding of a state looks like?

Further more, I think we should use "peace" in very clear conceptual terms. We should not understand "peace" as the normal state of things. Instead we should understand "peace" as the formalization of victory. So, in other words, we will only have peace in the middle east when someone "wins." But who can win? The Arabs don't have the means to militarily overwhelm Israel. Nor do they have the clout to politically or economically manuever Israel into a non-violent defeat. They are stuck. However, the Israelis cannot win either. Any military victory brings harsh political reactions that undermines any military success they might have.

So perhaps the question itself is malformed. Currently we seem to be asking, "how can these actors act in such a way to secure peace?" Perhaps we should be asking, "Who can act in such a way to secure peace?" Isn't this the true power of revolutionary communism? The correct actor is neither Israel or Palestine, but rather the revolutionary Proletariat (across all boarders) against the Oppressors (of all nations and creeds).

Let us ask then, how can we articulate revolutionary struggle in the middle east with the correct actor so as to not be ensnared in a false or unsoluable problem? I pose this to those comrades wiser than I.

[Bronsky]

[quote=Rosa Lichtenstein;1320187]Isreal apparently violated a truce in order to launch these attacks:

Thanks for the links Rosa, may I suggest anyone going to the demos should link up with other comrades off here and if we survive a police cell:rolleyes: meet up afterwards for a chat.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Confirmation of London march details:

http://leninology.blogspot.com/2008/12/protest-in-london-this-saturday.html

[Forward Union]

They are bombing the living fuck out of Gaza and are threatening to send in thugs and tanks. Of course it will be their fault that Palestinians will retaliate. I mean if some batshit insane tyranny was launching bombs and troops at my home I suspect I'd be firing back a few rockets of my own.

How the christ is it not Israel's fault?

There's a difference between a state and it's subjects. The Israeli state deserves to be bombed, but the workers of Israel do not.

[Bronsky]

There's a difference between a state and it's subjects. The Israeli state deserves to be bombed, but the workers of Israel do not.

And the difference between Zionism and Judaism, there is another massive contradiction.

[Bronsky]

Confirmation of London march details:

http://leninology.blogspot.com/2008/12/protest-in-london-this-saturday.html


Rosa do you or any of the other comrades have any info on coaches leaving from Liverpool or Manchester to the demo? I emailed the link I was given by email from the Palestinian Solidarity Cte. I got a reply saying the office is closed ’til Jan 5th and whished me a happy holidays. Great eh!!!! I don’t care what group I go down with just so long as I get there, train cant be relied on and driving that far is out for me.

[Yehuda Stern]

Since a lot of people here have been making excuses either for the founding of Israel or its actions, and others try to put blame on both sides equally, I figure this is a good time and place to post a (somewhat rushed, due to circumstances) leaflet we have been handing out in demos:

At the time of the writing of this document, about a hundred Palestinians have been killed and a thousand injured in the Israeli military assault on Gaza, while several Israelis were killed in attacks by the Palestinian resistance and dozens are in a state of shock.

We place the responsibility for the death and injuries suffered by both Palestinians and Israelis on the Israeli government. We have no doubt that behind this barbaric attack are first and foremost the attempt to topple the elected Hamas government of the Palestinian people, and that it is a continuation of the policy of starvation and siege. Also part of the considerations were the coming elections in Israel and the need to test Obama's support for Israel's actions.

While the fundamentalist Christian right and other extreme reactionaries support Israel, all those who fight today against crisis-wrecked capitalism favor the Palestinian struggle, as we can see from looking at Greece.

We are not political supporters of Hamas - a movement with a reactionary leadership, but faced with the barbarism of the Zionist state we defend the Palestinian people regardless of its leadership. We base ourselves on the tradition of Lenin and the Bolsheviks, who favored a military defeat for imperialist states as a lesser evil. The state of Israel is imperialist and the masses who support Hamas are fighting imperialism. Despite Hamas' character, their struggle is progressive.

We do not support shooting Israeli civilians. It would have been much better if Hamas would fight the Israeli army, as attacks on civilians give the barbaric Israeli ruling class the necessary excuse to commit mass massacres. However, we do not for a second forget that the actions of Hamas are an expression, however distorted, of the Palestinian resistance to oppression. This oppression started not in 1967, but with the advent of the Zionist colonialization of Palestine.

Not by chance do the actions of the Zionist state remind many not only of the Apartheid regime in South Africa, but also of Nazi Germany. We do not believe the Zionist state is a fascist state, but we can certainly see many things the Zionist and Nazi regimes have in common.

To be historically accurate, while the Zionist movement claims to represent the world Jewish masses, its history is one of collaboration with the most rabid anti-Semites against the Jewish masses, excused by the theory that the worse off the Jews are, the more they will be attracted to Zionism. For this reason, in Germany, they not only did not oppose the Nazis, but after their rise to power collaborated with them. It also explains why they collborated with and supported the USA's and Britain's closing of their gates to Jewish refugees - an attempt to force more Jews to emigrate to Palestine.

As revolutionary Marxists, we do not support the ICP-Hadash pacifist bourgeois line, which ironically called on the Zionist party Meretz to join its demonstrations while it, loyal to its Zionist character, supports the government and the massacre. We do not forget its part in setting up Israel or in supplying arms to the Zionist gangs, which used it to carry out the Nakba. We do not forget that its solution is the same as that of the American imperialists - a Palestinian bantustan next to the Zionist state, which will keep control over the majority of Palestine.

We support the masses in states collaborating with Zionism and American imperialism who come out against their treacherous governments instead of giving out arms to the Gazaen masses. This applies to the masses in the West Bank as well, who understand the role played by Abu Mazen and his cohorts.

Unlike the supporters of the imperialist order, who call for a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel and who legitimize the existence of Israel, we sympathize with the masses calling for an Arab Palestine, as the only solution that could bring peace to the masses - including the Jews - is a defeat for the Zionist state. The only real solution for the national question is a workers' republic from the Jordan the sea. There is no way to reconcile democratically oppressive Zionism and the expropriated and oppressed Palestinians.

Jews who live in this land need to live safely, but they cannot do so as long as they serve as hostages of the Zionist state and support it and its crimes, just as the whites in South Africa couldn't live peacefully and safely while the black masses were expropriated and oppressed. The state of Israel is a death trap to the Jews living in it.

The best of the Jewish workers will, with the deepening of the capitalist crisis, join over the next years the Arab workers in a struggle against the enemies of the proletariat, first and foremost against the Israeli ruling class, but also against the collaborationist Arab bourgeoisie, as part of the struggle against any imperialist domination in the Middle East. Unlike the reformist historical slogan of Maki, "ma shetov lapoel tov leisrael" (what's good for the worker is good for Israel), we say: "ma shetov lapoel ra leshalitei israel" (what's good for the worker is bad for the rulers of Israel).

Not only this, but the crimes of the Zionist state stoke the flames of anti-Semitism. We are glad that more and more Jews in the world detach themselves from this state and condemn its crimes, and sometimes join demonstrations against its crimes. The more Jews join the fight against Zionism, the easier will it be to smash anti-Semitism.

We offer to mobilize on the following slogans:

Defeat the Criminal Military Advernture of the Zionists!
Defend the Palestinian Masses Against the Beasts Ruling Israel!
The Struggle of Jewish Workers In Israel Against Capitalism Must Target the Crimes of the Zionsit State! The Exploiters and Oppressors Are One and the Same!

Our propaganda slogans are:

For a Palestinian Workers' State from the Jordan to the Sea!
For a Socialist Federation of the Middle East!
For the Creation of a Revolutionary Workers' Party In Every Country!
For the Reestablishment of the Fourth International!

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Worldwide demos planned:

http://fenian-fenianrising.blogspot.com/2008/12/stop-massacre-of-palestinians-tuesday.html

--------------------------------

Bronsky, I'll try and find out for you.:)

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

YS, excellent leaflet, but may I suggest you get rid of jargon like this:


we do not support the ICP-Hadash pacifist bourgeois line


The best of the Jewish workers will, with the deepening of the capitalist crisis, join over the next years the Arab workers in a struggle against the enemies of the proletariat, first and foremost against the Israeli ruling class, but also against the collaborationist Arab bourgeoisie, as part of the struggle against any imperialist domination in the Middle East. Unlike the reformist historical slogan of Maki, "ma shetov lapoel tov leisrael" (what's good for the worker is good for Israel), we say: "ma shetov lapoel ra leshalitei israel" (what's good for the worker is bad for the rulers of Israel).

You'll just get yawns when people see stuff like that.

[Leo]

We have no doubt that behind this barbaric attack are first and foremost the attempt to topple the elected Hamas government of the Palestinian peopleDo you consider the Hamas government to be a "government of the Palestinian people"?

On another point, it could equally be argued that Hamas is intended to be strengthened rather than toppled, or at least that this has got nothing to do with attacking Hamas with the aim of toppling Hamas. Fatah now gives the impression of a liberal-peace faction while Hamas is the more militaristic faction; war is going to do more good on Hamas than bad - and the Israeli state is not stupid either. I am guessing that they are quite capable of knowing that Hamas won't be toppled by a few hundreds of deaths, and it doesn't seem as if it will be after a ground operation.

The key question is this: what does the Israeli state aim, what do they want.


Also part of the considerations were the coming elections in Israel and the need to test Obama's support for Israel's actions.Can you elaborate more on this analysis? I've been hearing about such reasons but would like to hear more detail.


We are not political supporters of Hamas - a movement with a reactionary leadership, but faced with the barbarism of the Zionist state we defend the Palestinian people regardless of its leadership.I don't know about that "people" thing, but Hamas is the "leadership" of the Palestinian proletariat not even as much as Kadima of the Jewish proletariat.


We base ourselves on the tradition of Lenin and the BolsheviksLenin would never have given any support to any movement such as Hamas, and at the time even the most opportunistic, right-wing, degenerated of the Bolsheviks could not have dared to do it openly.

In any case, let's let old Lenin speak for himself: "Who says: “Socialism is opposed to violence against nations, therefore I defend myself when my country is invaded”, betrays socialism and internationalism, because such a man sees only his own “country”, he puts “his own” bourgeoisie above everything else and does not give a thought to the international connections which make the war an imperialist war and his bourgeoisie a link in the chain of imperialist plunder. The socialist, the revolutionary proletarian, the internalionalist, argues differently. He says: “The character of the war (whether it is reactionary or revolutionary) does not depend on who the attacker was, or in whose country the ’enemy’ is stationed; it depends on what class is waging the war, and on what politics this war is a continuation of. If the war is a reactionary, imperialist war, that is, if it is being waged by two world groups of the imperialist, rapacious, predatory, reactionary bourgeoisie, then every bourgeoisie (even of the smallest country) becomes a participant in the plunder, and my duty as a representative of the revolutionary proletariat is to prepare for the world proletarian revolution as the only escape from the horrors of a world slaughter. I must argue, not from the point of view of ’my’ country (for that is the argument of a wretched, stupid, petty—bourgeois nationalist who does not realise that he is only a plaything in the hands of the imperialist bourgeoisie), but from the point of view of my share in th preparation, in the propaganda, and in the acceleration of the world proletarian revolution. That is what internationalism means, and that is the duty of the internationalist, the revolutionary worker, the genuine socialist."


who favored a military defeat for imperialist states as a lesser evil.Well, to put this in the right theoretical perspective, they actually favored defeat of imperialist state in the sense that they favored revolutionary civil war rising in those countries. The Bolshevik tradition does not include a defense of "weaker" states or proto-states against stronger states, and the slogan is totally unrelated to the Bolsheviks position on national liberation, which was first of all something about "independent" national movements developing in places where they, lead by the bourgeoisie aimed at taking local authority and establishing a supposedly "independent" state which would be the accomplishment of that "nations right to self determination".


The state of Israel is imperialist and the masses who support Hamas are fighting imperialism. Despite Hamas' character, their struggle is progressive.It is not the "masses" who are "fighting imperialism" in Palestine. Hamas is fighting Israel - and not very succesfully at the moment - and the masses are being slaughtered. There is no "despite Hamas' character" in the current situation.


We do not support shooting Israeli civilians. It would have been much better if Hamas would fight the Israeli army,It would have been even better if Olmert, Abbas and Haniyeh gave flowers to each other and the blood of innocent workers remained where they belong, but you know... it ain't gonna happen, the bourgeoisie is not capable of doing that.


However, we do not for a second forget that the actions of Hamas are an expression, however distorted, of the Palestinian resistance to oppression.How so?


To be historically accurate, while the Zionist movement claims to represent the world Jewish masses, its history is one of collaboration with the most rabid anti-Semites against the Jewish masses, excused by the theory that the worse off the Jews are, the more they will be attracted to Zionism. For this reason, in Germany, they not only did not oppose the Nazis, but after their rise to power collaborated with them. It also explains why they collborated with and supported the USA's and Britain's closing of their gates to Jewish refugees - an attempt to force more Jews to emigrate to Palestine.I've heard about this too, a more detailed, historical article on this would be interesting.


We support the masses in states collaborating with Zionism and American imperialism who come out against their treacherous governmentsI'd make a more serious research about those "masses" coming out against governments. They in nearly places were far-leftists or conservative to far Islamists which do not give a mass character in most cases. Also, in several countries, like Turkey, where the demos were relatively bigger compared to other places, they were mostly organized by state organs or parties very close to it - needless to say they were very supportive of the position of the Turkish state defining the actions of Israel as massacre and genocide (!).


Jews who live in this land need to live safely
we sympathize with the masses calling for an Arab Palestine,Well, I'll just say that the "Arab Palestine" you have in mind is very different from what Hamas has in mind.


The only real solution for the national question is a workers' republic from the Jordan the sea. Fundamentally, expressed like this that phrase doesn't sound so bad, but I've got two questions. First, how do you thing such workers' republic will be formed? Second, why just from Jordan to the sea?


The best of the Jewish workers will, with the deepening of the capitalist crisis, join over the next years the Arab workers in a struggle against the enemies of the proletariat, first and foremost against the Israeli ruling class, but also against the collaborationist Arab bourgeoisieArab workers, at every step of struggle are facing and will continue facing not only the collaborationist Arab bourgeoisie but also the nationalist, "anti-imperialist" Arab bourgeoisie. I think the crux of your fanatical non-political-but-military support for Hamas and other reactionary bourgeois nationalists lies here. You either simply ignore or don't care about the interests of and the course of class struggle for Palestinian workers in this case, and you have the same approach towards the proletarians of oppressed nationalities in other similar cases. You are not interested in the Palestinian working class, it's interests, it's class struggle; you are interested in Hamas and their struggle against the state of your country. Your perspective fundamentally is "civilized world-centric". It too ends up objectively as chauvinism regardless of your intentions, not internationalism.


we do not support the ICP-Hadash pacifist bourgeois line
Unlike the reformist historical slogan of Maki, "ma shetov lapoel tov leisrael" (what's good for the worker is good for Israel), we say: "ma shetov lapoel ra leshalitei israel" (what's good for the worker is bad for the rulers of Israel).Best parts of your statement.

[Guerrilla22]

Despite Hamas' character, their struggle is progressive.

It isn't their struggle, it's the Palestinian people's struggle. Also Hamas has more than one aim; consolidating power being one of them. Regardless of whether or not they are a reactionary element that is part of the problem.


We do not support shooting Israeli civilians. It would have been much better if Hamas would fight the Israeli army, as attacks on civilians give the barbaric Israeli ruling class the necessary excuse to commit mass massacres.
Exactly. Tactics like suicide bombings and firing rockets indiscrimantely isn't going to help end Israeli aggression against palestine, just serve as an excuse to continue it.

[Glenn Beck]

Of course you don't think it is rational. But neither are suicide bombings.

Suicide bombings may not be tactically ideal or ethically viable depending on your situation or perspective, but they are perfectly rational: they're a way for a relatively weak or poor insurgency to make targeted attacks that are difficult to defend against but have a very high human cost. The whole point of such attacks is to make a continuation of the current policies less and less attractive for the occupying power, just like was done in Algeria and other places of conflict.

This is a pretty horrible situation for the Palestinians and my heart goes out to them: the West Bank under the collaborationist Fatah is split from Gaza and Egypt's dictatorship has Israel's flank covered. Still smarting over Hezbollah's upset the Israeli state has decided to flex its muscles on defenseless Gaza whose resistance is managed by the ideologically bankrupt and militarily exhausted and weakened Hamas. I read in one of the links Rosa posted that Hamas has less manpower than the New York Police Department. These rocket attacks seemed to be the last desperate attempt to imitate the successful tactics of Hezbollah by a resistance that is crushed and demoralized, and now things have come to a head. One can only hope something positive will come out of this massacre and that perhaps the people of Egypt will finally topple the sellout regime there or that some other developments can improve the outlook for the Palestinian cause, because right now things seem very, very grim.

[Comrade B]

Israel keeps claiming they are only bombing "Hamas targets" and that they are not harming civilians

This is totally fucking ridiculous and bull shit. It is like bombing New York City and saying it wasn't a problem because you were only targeting right wingers.

Hamas has a political party. Their followers are not all grouped together in some training camp or barracks, they are everywhere! To bomb Hamas, you have to bomb civilians, because Hamas is made up OF CIVILIANS!

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Bronsky, a friend of mine sent me this message:


why not call the StW office on 020 7278 6694 or 07951 593525?

[Bronsky]

Do you consider the Hamas government to be a "government of the Palestinian people"?

On another point, it could equally be argued that Hamas is intended to be strengthened rather than toppled, or at least that this has got nothing to do with attacking Hamas with the aim of toppling Hamas. Fatah now gives the impression of a liberal-peace faction while Hamas is the more militaristic faction; war is going to do more good on Hamas than bad - and the Israeli state is not stupid either. I am guessing that they are quite capable of knowing that Hamas won't be toppled by a few hundreds of deaths, and it doesn't seem as if it will be after a ground operation.

The key question is this: what does the Israeli state aim, what do they want.

Can you elaborate more on this analysis? I've been hearing about such reasons but would like to hear more detail.

I don't know about that "people" thing, but Hamas is the "leadership" of the Palestinian proletariat not even as much as Kadima of the Jewish proletariat.

Lenin would never have given any support to any movement such as Hamas, and at the time even the most opportunistic, right-wing, degenerated of the Bolsheviks could not have dared to do it openly.

In any case, let's let old Lenin speak for himself: "Who says: “Socialism is opposed to violence against nations, therefore I defend myself when my country is invaded”, betrays socialism and internationalism, because such a man sees only his own “country”, he puts “his own” bourgeoisie above everything else and does not give a thought to the international connections which make the war an imperialist war and his bourgeoisie a link in the chain of imperialist plunder. The socialist, the revolutionary proletarian, the internalionalist, argues differently. He says: “The character of the war (whether it is reactionary or revolutionary) does not depend on who the attacker was, or in whose country the ’enemy’ is stationed; it depends on what class is waging the war, and on what politics this war is a continuation of. If the war is a reactionary, imperialist war, that is, if it is being waged by two world groups of the imperialist, rapacious, predatory, reactionary bourgeoisie, then every bourgeoisie (even of the smallest country) becomes a participant in the plunder, and my duty as a representative of the revolutionary proletariat is to prepare for the world proletarian revolution as the only escape from the horrors of a world slaughter. I must argue, not from the point of view of ’my’ country (for that is the argument of a wretched, stupid, petty—bourgeois nationalist who does not realise that he is only a plaything in the hands of the imperialist bourgeoisie), but from the point of view of my share in th preparation, in the propaganda, and in the acceleration of the world proletarian revolution. That is what internationalism means, and that is the duty of the internationalist, the revolutionary worker, the genuine socialist."

Well, to put this in the right theoretical perspective, they actually favored defeat of imperialist state in the sense that they favored revolutionary civil war rising in those countries. The Bolshevik tradition does not include a defense of "weaker" states or proto-states against stronger states, and the slogan is totally unrelated to the Bolsheviks position on national liberation, which was first of all something about "independent" national movements developing in places where they, lead by the bourgeoisie aimed at taking local authority and establishing a supposedly "independent" state which would be the accomplishment of that "nations right to self determination".

It is not the "masses" who are "fighting imperialism" in Palestine. Hamas is fighting Israel - and not very succesfully at the moment - and the masses are being slaughtered. There is no "despite Hamas' character" in the current situation.

It would have been even better if Olmert, Abbas and Haniyeh gave flowers to each other and the blood of innocent workers remained where they belong, but you know... it ain't gonna happen, the bourgeoisie is not capable of doing that.

How so?

I've heard about this too, a more detailed, historical article on this would be interesting.

I'd make a more serious research about those "masses" coming out against governments. They in nearly places were far-leftists or conservative to far Islamists which do not give a mass character in most cases. Also, in several countries, like Turkey, where the demos were relatively bigger compared to other places, they were mostly organized by state organs or parties very close to it - needless to say they were very supportive of the position of the Turkish state defining the actions of Israel as massacre and genocide (!).

Well, I'll just say that the "Arab Palestine" you have in mind is very different from what Hamas has in mind.

Fundamentally, expressed like this that phrase doesn't sound so bad, but I've got two questions. First, how do you thing such workers' republic will be formed? Second, why just from Jordan to the sea?

Arab workers, at every step of struggle are facing and will continue facing not only the collaborationist Arab bourgeoisie but also the nationalist, "anti-imperialist" Arab bourgeoisie. I think the crux of your fanatical non-political-but-military support for Hamas and other reactionary bourgeois nationalists lies here. You either simply ignore or don't care about the interests of and the course of class struggle for Palestinian workers in this case, and you have the same approach towards the proletarians of oppressed nationalities in other similar cases. You are not interested in the Palestinian working class, it's interests, it's class struggle; you are interested in Hamas and their struggle against the state of your country. Your perspective fundamentally is "civilized world-centric". It too ends up objectively as chauvinism regardless of your intentions, not internationalism.

Best parts of your statement.


Far too much nit picking here, the battering ram of debate I call it. But one point about Lenin and the Bolsheviks attitude to the fight by nationalists to free their homeland from occupation, they sided at all times with the nationalist while making a clear an unwavering criticism of nationalism and stating that the nationalist fight can only be seen as a stepping stone to the socialist revolution. Trotsky’s Permanent Revolution was the Marxist centre of Bolshevik policy towards nationalist struggles prior to the Commintern going over to Stalinism.

What is happening in Gaza today exposes not only the brutality of the Zionists, the hypocrisy of “The Democracy’s” but the bankrupt and backward religious fanaticism of Islam. The advanced Arab and Jewish masses will move forwards towards a Marxist perspective they have nowhere else to go. Already demonstrations by united Arab and Jewish students are taking place in Israel against the carnage, the Zionist state can easily be dragged into a civil war situation that within a short period under the present conditions can move it forward to a revolutionary situation.

As regards naming sources try Tony Greenstein - Unholy Alliance: Lenni Brenner - Zionism in the Age of Dictators and also 51 Documents: Alex Callincios - Plumbing the Depths Marxism and the Holocaust. Besides Alan Hart, Zionism the Real Enemy of the Jews: John Rose The Myths of Zionism. I am sure I have missed out a hundred or so other works that spell out the real nature of Zionism.

[Bronsky]

YS, excellent leaflet, but may I suggest you get rid of jargon like this:





You'll just get yawns when people see stuff like that.

Rosa the language is secondary the content is what matters anyone turning away from the content 'cos they don't like a few words, well they might have to wait ‘till they buy a Marxist phrase book before joining the struggle. Marxism has a language that describes clearly imperialism and the capitalist system, why try to change it cos a few middle class stand up comedians make fun of that language. I don’t agree with some of what it states and it misses out a lot but all in all it is a very good pamphlet.

Thanks for the numbers they are an answering service , left a message, but it looks like the early train for me. Anyone else going down from the N West?

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Bronsky, no problems.

However, the language we use is important; us Marxists are notoriously bad at getting our message across (compare what we have to say, and the audience we connect with, to that of say Michael Moore). And I was not referring to a few middle class twerps, either.

The huge march we saw in London in February 2003 was built partly because we used simple, straight-foward leaflets and slogans, and by the fact that the Daily Mirror threw its weight behind it, employing similar language.

You can have the same content but with much less jargonised terminology.

So, I stand by my comments.

[Devrim]

Bronsky, no problems.

However, the language we use is important; us Marxists are notoriously bad at getting our message across (compare what we have to say, and the audience we connect with, to that of say Michael Moore). And I was not referring to a few middle class twerps, either.

The huge march we saw in London in February 2003 was built partly because we used simple, straight-foward leaflets and slogans, and by the fact that the Daily Mirror threw its weight behind it, employing similar language.

You can have the same content but with much less jargonised terminology.

So, I stand by my comments.

I am not one for phrasing things in obscure political language. I think though that you have to consider that everywhere is not the same as where you personally live.

These are the two thing that Rosa objects to:


The best of the Jewish workers will, with the deepening of the capitalist crisis, join over the next years the Arab workers in a struggle against the enemies of the proletariat, first and foremost against the Israeli ruling class, but also against the collaborationist Arab bourgeoisie, as part of the struggle against any imperialist domination in the Middle East. Unlike the reformist historical slogan of Maki, "ma shetov lapoel tov leisrael" (what's good for the worker is good for Israel), we say: "ma shetov lapoel ra leshalitei israel" (what's good for the worker is bad for the rulers of Israel).

I presume that this is a popular slogan in Israel. I think that there is nothing wrong with attacking it.

For example in our country, there are many traditional national slogans. One of them proclaims 'How happy I am to be a Türk'. It is something that everybody knows (indeed I have heard it muttered at me by waiters in bars when speaking Arabic or English). I don't see anything wrong in turning this around, for example; 'How miserable I am to be a Türk-we have the lowest wages in Europe' (That is not an example of what I suggest as propoganda. I am merely putting forward the point).


we do not support the ICP-Hadash pacifist bourgeois line

It depends whether people undesrstand what you are talking about. I would imagine that people at an anti-war demonstration in Israel at the moment will.

I don't agree with everything that these people are saying in the leaflets, but I don't think that we can criticise a translated leaflet for its language out of context.


Best parts of your statement.

You should think about whether it is the right way to address people too. It maybe, but you have a liking for this sort of rhetoric when it is not useful.

Devrim

[Bronsky]

Bronsky, no problems.

However, the language we use is important; us Marxists are notoriously bad at getting our message across (compare what we have to say, and the audience we connect with, to that of say Michael Moore). And I was not referring to a few middle class twerps, either.

The huge march we saw in London in February 2003 was built partly because we used simple, straight-foward leaflets and slogans, and by the fact that the Daily Mirror threw its weight behind it, employing similar language.

You can have the same content but with much less jargonised terminology.

So, I stand by my comments.

But it was the objective conditions (jargon?) the war, the injustice, the slaughter, the lies that brought the people out into the streets, not words Rosa.

Are you saying that if the wording had been different then the effect would have been less. Of course nobody can say how many came on the streets after reading this or that source, but if revolutionaries taper their language so as to fit what the Daily Mirror also says, well sorry but that will get us nowhere.

How many of us had ever come to grips with Marxist language before we became active, was it the rhetoric that brought us to the movement or the conditions that prevailed at the time. I came through the 1966 seamen’s strike my comrades came through Vietnam, the battle in the unions or other struggles they identified with. We learnt the language of Marx because it was important to understand Marx. Many workers have become excellent Marxist theorists by fighting to understand its meaning, they didn't junk it saying I can't read that.

The pamphlet in question although it might have had some Marxist jargon was not over the heads of those it was meant to target. The words or phrases are easily decipherable by the majority of workers.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Bronsky:


But it was the objective conditions (jargon?) the war, the injustice, the slaughter, the lies that brought the people out into the streets, not words Rosa.

I agree, but if we use language that sets up a barrier with those who are on the street, then we can look forward to another 150 years of going nowhere slowly.


Are you saying that if the wording had been different then the effect would have been less. Of course nobody can say how many came on the streets after reading this or that source, but if revolutionaries taper their language so as to fit what the Daily Mirror also says, well sorry but that will get us nowhere.

I think that had the Daily Mirror worded its reports in the way that far too many comrades have done, and had the STWC done likewise, the likelihood is that the turn-out would have been far less than it was.

And I am not suggesting that we should tail-end the politics of the Daily Mirror, but its journalists at least know how to talk to working class people. Can't say the same for most Marxists. [Paul Foot being a notable exception, here.]


How many of us had ever come to grips with Marxist language before we became active, was it the rhetoric that brought us to the movement or the conditions that prevailed at the time. I came through the 1966 seamen’s strike my comrades came through Vietnam, the battle in the unions or other struggles they identified with. We learnt the language of Marx because it was important to understand Marx. Many workers have become excellent Marxist theorists by fighting to understand its meaning, they didn't junk it saying I can't read that.

I too am working class, and my background in the struggle goes back nearly as far as yours does. But, if you want to see us always in the minority, feel free to hang onto the methods and jargon of the past. It has obviously won over the masses so far...

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Leo:


I am not one for phrasing things in obscure political language. I think though that you have to consider that everywhere is not the same as where you personally live.

I couldn't agree more.

[Bronsky]

Bronsky:



I agree, but if we use language that sets up a barrier with those who are on the street, then we can look forward to another 150 years of going nowhere slowly.



I think that had the Daily Mirror worded its reports in the way that far too many comrades have done, and had the STWC done likewise, the likelihood is that the turn-out would have been far less than it was.

And I am not suggesting that we should tail-end the politics of the Daily Mirror, but its journalists at least know how to talk to working class people. Can't say the same for most Marxists. [Paul Foot being a notable exception, here.]



I too am working class, and my background in the struggle goes back nearly as far as yours does. But, if you want to see us always in the minority, feel free to hang onto the methods and jargon of the past. It has obviously won over the masses so far...

I
I don't think we are miles apart on this Rosa its just that I say the objective conditions will be the reason the working class come towards Marxism where we agree is that they will move to the revolutionary party that is both clear and honest with them. That will take putting forward Marxist policies that workers can identify with, but that should not include removing the basic Marxist language while explaining Marxist policy, and that is what we will have to do day in day out it can confuse more than enlighten. Workers will grasp the Marxist phrases and words, Trotsky makes great play on the fact that workers picked up on the Bolsheviks policy almost on the fly they came to the party running so to say.

The workers of today many know of the words and phrases already but they won't have a real understanding of how they relate to their situation, so yes we use language that will be easy to grasp, but we should also educate them in Marxism while we enlighten

It would be wrong to think the masses will just come out on the streets without any regard as to what they are fighting for, Bread Peace and Land was a slogan in 1917, but the workers especially their vanguard wanted to know how what and why this and that was going to change, they grasped the basics of Marxism, today’s worker, better educated that the Russian will surely ask the questions and will grasp the answers.

Yes slogans and speeches will have to be sharp concise and easy to grasp but the theory behind the propaganda, the plan of action, has to be prepared in the scientific method of Marxism.

I get this feeling talking to some Marxists that they continually search for reasons for why Marxism doesn't have the following they would wish. My take is the betrayals of Stalinism and social democracy has more to with that than some "obscure" language confusing the masses, again I put forward the objective against the subjective.

I booked a rail ticket for Saturday by the way gave up on the organisers disclosing the arrangements for travelling from the North West to the London Demo. Thanks for your help though.

[Yehuda Stern]

YS, excellent leaflet, but may I suggest you get rid of jargon like this:

Yeah, not really into the whole "not criticizing reformist groups to seem more attractive to some of their members" thing. So no dice. Thanks though.


Do you consider the Hamas government to be a "government of the Palestinian people"?

We don't think its a progressive government, and we don't defend it politically, but we do defend the right of the Palestinians to elect a government independently of the interventions of the Zionist state, regardless of what government. We would not, however, defend it against a working class opposition had one existed, to state the obvious.


Can you elaborate more on this analysis? I've been hearing about such reasons but would like to hear more detail.Well, in Israel such actions tend to whip up chauvinist sentiments that help the big parties in many cases. Not much more to say on that.


Hamas is the "leadership" of the Palestinian proletariat not even as much as Kadima of the Jewish proletariatHardly accurate - the mass of Palestinians actively support Hamas and view it as their leadership. Although I don't think Hamas is a proletarian or progressive leadership, it remains the leadership of the masses, just like unfortunately in many countries the leaders of the workers are reformists or worse.

Most of the rest of your remarks pertain to a more general debate we have on imperialism. I see no point in rehashing debates we've had many times before. I'll just that in no place do we claim that the Arab bourgeoisie is anti-imperialist or capable of (or even willing to) overthrow imperialism or Zionism.


It isn't their struggle, it's the Palestinian people's struggle.

Which is exactly why "their" refers not to Hamas but to the masses mentioned in the sentence before (the wonders of English syntax!).


Hamas has more than one aim; consolidating power being one of them. Regardless of whether or not they are a reactionary element that is part of the problem.How is that a problem "regardless" of whether or not Hamas is reactionary? If Hamas wasn't reactionary, if it were a revolutionary socialist party, would it be a problem that it wants to consolidate power?

[Devrim]

Quotes in previous post from Leo, not myself.
Devrim

[Yehuda Stern]

Edited. Sorry, the identical avatars and few hours of sleep take their toll.

[Guerrilla22]

How is that a problem "regardless" of whether or not Hamas is reactionary? If Hamas wasn't reactionary, if it were a revolutionary socialist party, would it be a problem that it wants to consolidate power?
__________________

that was terribly worded on my part. What I meant to say is that Hamas is a reactionary element, they are not solely seeking to end the occupation/Israeli aggression, they are seeking to consolidate power as well. As you stated previously their tactics have given Israel justification to "defend" themselves in the eyes of many in the world, which is self defeating. Therefore, Hamas is part of the problem.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

YS:


Yeah, not really into the whole "not criticizing reformist groups to seem more attractive to some of their members" thing. So no dice. Thanks though.

1) Where did I even so much as suggest this?

2) You obviously cannot read, which nicely compliments your incapacity to write leaflets free of jargon.

3) I see you are determined to keep your tiny group small, since your devotion to jargon is stronger than your desire to change society.

With comrades like you, is it any wonder Trotskyism is such an abject failure?

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Bronsky:


My take is the betrayals of Stalinism and social democracy has more to with that than some "obscure" language confusing the masses, again I put forward the objective against the subjective.

I tend to agree, but then the Stalinists used the same sort of jargon!:(

Look where that got them.

Finally, the language we use to communicate with workers is just as objective a fact as the leaflets we use to do that.

[BIG BROTHER]

The brutal attack of Israel against Palestine, reminds me of a speech that Che gave, regarding the brutality of imperialism

(here's a part of it)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDiqhpKryzs

[Bronsky]

Bronsky:



I tend to agree, but then the Stalinists used the same sort of jargon!:(

Look where that got them.

Finally, the language we use to communicate with workers is just as objective a fact as the leaflets we use to do that.

Rosa I don’t want to fall out with you but you should go back and read Marx. Lenin and Trotsky to better understand the objective and the subjective in dialectics. You first of all agree with me that the betrayals of Stalinism and Social Democracy effect had on the development of the global class struggle, but then trivialise the Stalinist role by lumping Stalinism in with Marxism saying they have similar jargon.

My god with a stroke you dismiss the fight taken up by the Left Opposition against not the jargon but the actual policies of Stalin and his group.

Pamphlets and language are not objective they are subjective forms, they reflect rather than represent the objective conditions.

I become more and more convinced that you are amongst those who are pessimistic and see only the dark side of any struggle, glass halve empty – halve full? They can only see the Palestinians being butchered by Zionism yet behind this barbaric carnage there is the conditions for the Arab masses to move forward and the Jewish vanguard in Israel to break from the nationalist perspective of the Jewish state of Israel. The more barbarous the Zionist becomes the more depressed the middle class radicals become yet for Marxist it is the objective facts that spur them on, the understanding that the class struggle is heightened and moved forward, not just in Gaza, Israel the Arab nations but world wide.

I see you amongst the new breed that think Marxism should have a make over and dump this and that change the other and bring in some snappy language to attract the workers. This is born out of the defeats and so called capitalist progress. Rosa I think it’s a middle class gripe that is centred towards the middle class. Workers across the globe and down the ages grasp the revolutionary nature of their situation, the language is elementary, it is the action that derives from that language that the majority understand, they know only too well that their lives are threatened by a capitalist system that will become more and more oppressive.

We are moving towards the conscious understanding of what Capitalism represents not from jargon or any language but through the objective conditions of the economic crisis, Marx’s Capital is flying off the bookshelves, who is buying it? Why are they buying it? Socialism represents the only alternative to capitalism, workers some dragged and screaming to the idea will as the crisis develops understand that Marxism is the only road to a future.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Bronsky:


Rosa I don’t want to fall out with you but you should go back and read Marx. Lenin and Trotsky to better understand the objective and the subjective in dialectics.

Check out my profile, and the vast majority of my posts: I am a militant anti-dialectician. So, this material you refer to does not impress me at all. Nor does the prospect of you 'falling out with me' daunt me in the least.


My god with a stroke you dismiss the fight taken up by the Left Opposition against not the jargon but the actual policies of Stalin and his group.

Where did I do this? All I said was that the Stalinists use the same hackneyed jargon, and look what happened to them. And then us Trotskyists wonder why workers ignore us in their hundreds of millions.


Pamphlets and language are not objective they are subjective forms, they reflect rather than represent the objective conditions.

And that's just another example of the meaningless jargon we produce, year in year out, as if it meant something.


I become more and more convinced that you are amongst those who are pessimistic and see only the dark side of any struggle, glass halve empty – halve full? They can only see the Palestinians being butchered by Zionism yet behind this barbaric carnage there is the conditions for the Arab masses to move forward and the Jewish vanguard in Israel to break from the nationalist perspective of the Jewish state of Israel. The more barbarous the Zionist becomes the more depressed the middle class radicals become yet for Marxist it is the objective facts that spur them on, the understanding that the class struggle is heightened and moved forward, not just in Gaza, Israel the Arab nations but world wide.

Indeed. the Stalinists used to say the same about us Trots: "defeatists and wreckers", wasn't it?

And what has my rejection of the hackneyed, empty jargon we have been churning out for the last 150 years got to do with the Zionist attack on the Palestinians, or my opposition to it, which is just as stong as yours is?

It seems to me that you are more concerned to maintain the mask of 'orthodoxy' than to communicate with the working class.

Forward to the next 150 years of failure, comrades...


I see you amongst the new breed that think Marxism should have a make over and dump this and that change the other and bring in some snappy language to attract the workers. This is born out of the defeats and so called capitalist progress. Rosa I think it’s a middle class gripe that is centred towards the middle class. Workers across the globe and down the ages grasp the revolutionary nature of their situation, the language is elementary, it is the action that derives from that language that the majority understand, they know only too well that their lives are threatened by a capitalist system that will become more and more oppressive.

Once more, I am a working class Marxist, and I reject the empty jargon imposed on our movement by petty bourgeois theorists, who haven't a clue how to communicate with workers.

And, I agree that workers need to hear the revolutionary message contained in Marxism, but the evidence of history is that we are not getting through to them. As I noted above, you may prefer that this sorry record is maintained to altering one comma of the sacred catechisms handed down to us by the petty bourgeois prophets who founded Marxism, but I do not. Unlike you, I want to see a successful movement.

After 150 years of trying it your way, and getting nowhere, one would think that you had got the message. Obviously not.

We claim to learn from practice, but then ignore what it tells us!


We are moving towards the conscious understanding of what Capitalism represents not from jargon or any language but through the objective conditions of the economic crisis, Marx’s Capital is flying off the bookshelves, who is buying it? Why are they buying it? Socialism represents the only alternative to capitalism, workers some dragged and screaming to the idea will as the crisis develops understand that Marxism is the only road to a future.

Yes, I recall being told this sort of stuff back in the late 60s, then in the 70s, 80s and 90s. It goes in one ear and out of the other now.

And I sincerely hope that workers are buying Das Kapital, but I rather doubt it. Have you any evidence to the contrary?

And I do not know why you are telling me this:


Socialism represents the only alternative to capitalism, workers some dragged and screaming to the idea will as the crisis develops understand that Marxism is the only road to a future

You'll be informing me that grass is green next!

[Bronsky]

YS:




With comrades like you, is it any wonder Trotskyism is such an abject failure?


Trotskyism a failure Rosa? How so? Without it the workers movement around the globe would have come further under the boot of Stalinism and the Social Democrats. How do you count failure Rosa as not having mass parties around the globe, of not being an influence in the workers movements? Millions of workers students and others are committed Marxists through their contact with the Trotskyist movement, it still represents the only real and honest Marxist movement out there. So what if AT THIS PRESENT TIME the members of its parties are not counted in millions, the British Labour Party is a party of the masses if you listen to the fake lefts that adorn its corridors. It gets millions of votes in every election but which would you rather be aligned with Rosa?

History shows us that to preach revolution the conditions have to be present, outside of these eras the advanced workers come forward and during this time the party is strengthened, some fall by the way side due mainly to an improper Marxist education, but throughout its history Trotskyism has created more and more leaders of quality and integrity than any movement, including the Bolsheviks who were a party of Russian revolutionaries .

Again this outburst shows your real lack of Marxist knowledge or even history, read the Russian Revolution by Trotsky and begin to understand how a minority party banned and prescribed by even some of the other socialist parties came forward to lead the only real socialist revolution in history. They didn’t start off as a mass popular party did they, they grew out of wait for it … the objective social conditions that only they could give answers to the masses …Marxist answers …. In fact tell me which party didn’t grow out of the objective conditions going back to the Levellers …. You show a tendency to admire the accomplished fact, yet the class struggle has yet to run its course so how can you or anyone pronounce Trotskyism as being dead. I doubt if you have ever made a study of Trotsky’s works those of us who have go back and we are amazed at how profound his theories are taking into account the modern world.

Sadly Rosa all that you have disclosed here is the reflection of deep pessimism of the middle class that hasn’t been able to gauge the movement of class forces but takes in subjectively each knock and set back as proof to them of this or that failure, they rejoice that they can prove themselves right while the objective world developes around them.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Bronsky:


Trotskyism a failure Rosa? How so?

After 60 or more years there are nearly as many Trotskyists sects, all infected with the same sort of semi-religious fervour you seem to exude, as there are days in a handful of years.

The Fourth International is a joke, and deeply divided, and has led nothing significant in 60 years. At least the Maoists led a few revolutions and the Stalinists spread (as you might say), 'deformed workers states' across Eastern Euopre and elsewhere.

What have we done? Bicker, expel, and split. That's all.


Without it the workers movement around the globe would have come further under the boot of Stalinism and the Social Democrats.

Like where? And the social democrats and openly capitalist parties dominate the planet. Strikes me that us Trotskyists are as successful as prayers are at stopping earthquakes.


How do you count failure Rosa as not having mass parties around the globe, of not being an influence in the workers movements? Millions of workers students and others are committed Marxists through their contact with the Trotskyist movement, it still represents the only real and honest Marxist movement out there. So what if AT THIS PRESENT TIME the members of its parties are not counted in millions, the British Labour Party is a party of the masses if you listen to the fake lefts that adorn its corridors. It gets millions of votes in every election but which would you rather be aligned with Rosa?

I may or may not be the most unsuccessful individual ever to walk the planet, but then that does not affect the fact that Trotskyism is the least successful of all the leading Marxist tendencies.


Millions of workers students and others are committed Marxists through their contact with the Trotskyist movement, it still represents the only real and honest Marxist movement out there.

I'd like to see the evidence.

In fact, this sounds like the sort of wishful thinking I've witnessed now from fellow Trotskyists for over 30 years, who seem to be living in a bubble or in a fantasy world. The circulation of no Trotskyist paper rises much above ten or twenty thousand, so these 'millions' do not even buy the paper!


History shows us that to preach revolution the conditions have to be present, outside of these eras the advanced workers come forward and during this time the party is strengthened, some fall by the way side due mainly to an improper Marxist education, but throughout its history Trotskyism has created more and more leaders of quality and integrity than any movement, including the Bolsheviks who were a party of Russian revolutionaries .

History has in fact shown that the vast majority of workers ignore us -- and no wonder. All we have to offer are stale ideas dressed up in obscure jargon. And, of course, scores of bickering sects, all with the 'correct' line.

Naturally, you can continue to day-dream otherwise if you choose, but I prefer change (an odd thing for an anti-dialectician like me to have to tell a dialectican like you!).


Again this outburst shows your real lack of Marxist knowledge or even history, read the Russian Revolution by Trotsky and begin to understand how a minority party banned and prescribed by even some of the other socialist parties came forward to lead the only real socialist revolution in history. They didn’t start off as a mass popular party did they, they grew out of wait for it … the objective social conditions that only they could give answers to the masses …Marxist answers …. In fact tell me which party didn’t grow out of the objective conditions going back to the Levellers …. You show a tendency to admire the accomplished fact, yet the class struggle has yet to run its course so how can you or anyone pronounce Trotskyism as being dead. I doubt if you have ever made a study of Trotsky’s works those of us who have go back and we are amazed at how profound his theories are taking into account the modern world.

I have lost count of the number of times comrades have told me this, not realising that I have been reading and studying these great works now for thirty years or more.

The problem is that you mistake Marxism for a set of hard and fast dogmas that we all have to accept or we are told we 'do not understand', all the while forgetting that Marxism is a science, and sciences grow, modernise and change. If physicists adopted your attitude they'd all be stuck in the 1860s, and biologists would still be rejecting Darwin.


Sadly Rosa all that you have disclosed here is the reflection of deep pessimism of the middle class that hasn’t been able to gauge the movement of class forces but takes in subjectively each knock and set back as proof to them of this or that failure, they rejoice that they can prove themselves right while the objective world developes around them.

As I said: forward with Bronsky to the next 150 years of glorious failure!

Single-celled organisms learn faster...

[Bronsky]

Bronsky:



After 60 or more years there are nearly as many Trotskyists sects, all infected with the same sort of semi-religious fervour you seem to exude, as there are days in a handful of years.

The Fourth International is a joke, and deeply divided, and has led nothing significant in 60 years. At least the Maoists led a few revolutions and the Stalinists spread (as you might say), 'deformed workers states' across Eastern Euopre and elsewhere.

What have we done? Bicker, expel, and split. That's all.



Like where? And the social democrats and openly capitalist parties dominate the planet. Strikes me that us Trotskyists are as successful as prayers are at stopping earthquakes.



I may or may not be the most unsuccessful individual ever to walk the planet, but then that does not affect the fact that Trotskyism is the least successful of all the leading Marxist tendencies.



I'd like to see the evidence.

In fact, this sounds like the sort of wishful thinking I've witnessed now from fellow Trotskyists for over 30 years, who seem to be living in a bubble or in a fantasy world. The circulation of no Trotskyist paper rises much above ten or twenty thousand, so these 'millions' do not even buy the paper!



History has in fact shown that the vast majority of workers ignore us -- and no wonder. All we have to offer are stale ideas dressed up in obscure jargon. And, of course, scores of bickering sects, all with the 'correct' line.

Naturally, you can continue to day-dream otherwise if you choose, but I prefer change (an odd thing for an anti-dialectician like me to have to tell a dialectican like you!).



I have lost count of the number of times comrades have told me this, not realising that I have been reading and studying these great works now for thirty years or more.

The problem is that you mistake Marxism for a set of hard and fast dogmas that we all have to accept or we are told we 'do not understand', all the while forgetting that Marxism is a science, and sciences grow, modernise and change. If physicists adopted your attitude they'd all be stuck in the 1860s, and biologists would still be rejecting Darwin.



As I said: forward with Bronsky to the next 150 years of glorious failure!

Single-celled organisms learn faster...

All this subjective rant above olny confirms my earlier reply .....

"Sadly Rosa all that you have disclosed here is the reflection of deep pessimism of the middle class that hasn’t been able to gauge the movement of class forces but takes in subjectively each knock and set back as proof to them of this or that failure, they rejoice that they can prove themselves right while the objective world developes around them. "


Your final assault saying there is another 150 years of capitalism waiting for the working class comes at a time when the workers are about to take centre stage in what nobody can avoid, including you, the heightened conflict between the classes not seen by this or the past generation of real "committed revolutionaries.”

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Bronsky:


All this subjective rant above olny confirms my earlier reply .....

As this head-in-the-sand attitude of yours confirms mine.


"Sadly Rosa all that you have disclosed here is the reflection of deep pessimism of the middle class that hasn’t been able to gauge the movement of class forces but takes in subjectively each knock and set back as proof to them of this or that failure, they rejoice that they can prove themselves right while the objective world developes around them. "

It's you who prefers the failed jargon of middle class elements in Marxism, sunshine.


Your final assault saying there is another 150 years of capitalism waiting for the working class comes at a time when the workers are about to take centre stage in what nobody can avoid, including you, the heightened conflict between the classes not seen by this or the past generation of real "committed revolutionaries.”

Once more, you show you can't read. In fact, I referred to 150 years of our failure (or perhaps that of us Trotskyists). I nowhere said there was another 150 years of capitalism waiting for the working class.

We could be looking toward barbarism, the 'common ruin of the contending classes', or even to a workers' revolution not led by jargon-bound Marxists like you -- since workers seem to have grown rather tired of the sort of failed rhetoric you prefer -- rhetoric like this:


at a time when the workers are about to take centre stage in what nobody can avoid

As I said, single-celled organisms seem to learn faster.

[Reclaimed Dasein]

Bronsky:And I sincerely hope that workers are buying Das Kapital, but I rather doubt it. Have you any evidence to the contrary? I'm sorry to bring this up, but it's a bit of a pet project of mine. In Japan, people actually are buying Das Kapital albeit in a different form.

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/markets/japan/article5175853.ece

Also, I'm trying to get people to scan and translate it so we can distribute it to everyone in English. That way, if they can read a comic book, they can read Das Kapital. Actually, it follows the story of a cheese factory owner. Check our progress here.

http://mangahelpers.com/s/revolutionarytranslations

Also, is yours and Bronsky's light cigarette acromony about the proper terms to denounce bombing the shit of people really necessary? It may be, but I'd just like to know how exactly.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

RD:


In Japan, people actually are buying Das Kapital albeit in a different form.

Well, that's the point -- this comic strip is clearly trying to make Marx relevant, de-jargonizing it.


Also, is yours and Bronsky's light cigarette acromony about the proper terms to denounce bombing the shit of people really necessary? It may be, but I'd just like to know how exactly.

It is for two reasons:

1) YS's leaflet (posted above), and

2) If we do not learn to communicate with ordinary workers, etc. then these massacres will go on into the next century.

[Reclaimed Dasein]

RD:



Well, that's the point -- this comic strip is clearly trying to make Marx relevant, de-jargonizing it.



It is for two reasons:

1) YS's leaflet (posted above), and

2) If we do not learn to communicate with ordinary workers, etc. then these massacres will go on into the next century. Fine. I think the over emphasis of jargon is unhelpful. However, I'm just not particularly sure that

As I said, single-celled organisms seem to learn faster.
shows the proper solidarity with the Palestinian and Israeli people. I mean this as a genuine question (since there seems to be a strong diversity of answers on revleft) which is worse someone who is well intentioned but wrong or someone who is ill intentioned but knows very well what they're doing?

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

RD:


shows the proper solidarity with the Palestinian and Israeli people. I mean this as a genuine question (since there seems to be a strong diversity of answers on revleft) which is worse someone who is well intentioned but wrong or someone who is ill intentioned but knows very well what they're doing?

Unfortunatley, traditional Marxists like Bronsky and YS here, are committed to a theory that tells them that practice is a test of truth. But, when it is pointed out to them that the jargon-ridden practice they and their predescessors have been engaged in all these years has not succeeded (in fact it has done the opposite), they all respond in the same way:

1) They attack me for pointing this out (or they deny the obvious, like Bronsky, and claim Marxism is the very epitome of success, or it is about to be) -- as if things will improve if we ignore it, and

2) They continue in the same vein -- and they have been doing this since I became a revolutionary 26 years ago (when they responded to me in the above way then, too!)

So, it is relevant that I make this point, since my feelings of solidarity with the oppressed of this world, and not just those in Gaza, actually stretches to wanting to see it end. But, if we contine with the same failed and jaded slogans, leaflets, books and pamphlets, it won't.

Recall, it is their doctrine that tells them that theory is tested in practice, but these dinosaurs learn from practice far slower than a bunch of single-celled organisms.

And that is why I said what I said.

[Reclaimed Dasein]

RD:
Unfortunatley, traditional Marxists like Bronsky and YS here, are committed to a theory that tells them that practice is a test of truth. But, when it is pointed out to them that the jargon-ridden practice they and their predescessors have been engaged in all these years has not succeeded (in fact it has done the opposite), they all respond in the same way:

1) They attack me for pointing this out (or they deny the obvious, like Bronsky, and claim Marxism is the very epitome of success, or it is about to be) -- as if things will improve if we ignore it, and

2) They continue in the same vein -- and they have been doing this since I became a revolutionary 26 years ago (when they responded to me in the above way then, too!)...

But, if we contine with the same failed and jaded slogans, leaflets, books and pamphlets, it won't.

Recall, it is their doctrine that tells them that theory is tested in practice, but these dinosaurs learn from practice far slower than a bunch of single-celled organisms.

And that is why I said what I said.Just a few points I guess. First, I think there is a diversity of positions to have about point 1. I mean, the Russians who suffered quite heavily under Stalin voted him the #3 Russian ever.

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTRE4BR17620081229?feedType=RSS&feedName=topNews
Furthermore, most of these countries have gone from rural or feudal states to more or less industrialized state. However, I'd imagine your point is they don't look like anything you'd want to live in, which is a point well taken.

Also, I think the distinction between theory and practice isn't so clear as many would want to have it. That being said, I think you have a point that things aren't working as well for the Left as they could be. Yet, even if I agree that your position is right, I'm not sure you approach is. Doesn't the use of the world "learn" entail a higher cognitive power or at least the existence of certain neurological organs such as a brain? Shouldn't you, at least out of a regard for precision, avoid saying that fellow comrades learn slower than one celled organisms?

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

RD:


First, I think there is a diversity of positions to have about point 1. I mean, the Russians who suffered quite heavily under Stalin voted him the #3 Russian ever.

I'm sorry, but I fail to see the relevance.


Doesn't the use of the world "learn" entail a higher cognitive power or at least the existence of certain neurological organs such as a brain? Shouldn't you, at least out of a regard for precision, avoid saying that fellow comrades learn slower than one celled organisms?

In a way you are right, but there are single-celled organisms that will react to certain stimuli in a way that indicates they have registered a negative/positive impression of it, and will avoid/seek out/anticipate that stimulus in future.

http://precedings.nature.com/documents/2431/version/1/files/npre20082431-1.pdf

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn15068

Some of our comrades have yet to advance so far.

[Reclaimed Dasein]

RD:



I'm sorry, but I fail to see the relevance.



In a way you are right, but there are single-celled organisms that will react to certain stimuli in a way that indicates they have registered a negative/positive impression of it, and will avoid/seek out/anticipate that stimulus in future.

http://precedings.nature.com/documents/2431/version/1/files/npre20082431-1.pdf

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn15068

Some of our comrades have yet to advance so far.
The relevance is this. It seems that the people who have suffered at the hands of an individual are most likely to be critical of that individual. The Russian people have suffered at the hands of Stalin. Yet, they view him as one of the greatest historical figures ever. It seems then that Stalin, and by extension, the Soviet Union were viewed a positive goods for the Russians. That being said, it seems to raise the debatable nature of the position 1 which was about whether or not communism was a success. One could argue that the soviet union was a success. That's the relevance.

As for the second point, I can't believe you think comparing a comrade to single cell organism is helpful as such. If you've decided to be divisive and insulting, so be it.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

RD:


The relevance is this. It seems that the people who have suffered at the hands of an individual are most likely to be critical of that individual. The Russian people have suffered at the hands of Stalin. Yet, they view him as one of the greatest historical figures ever. It seems then that Stalin, and by extension, the Soviet Union were viewed a positive goods for the Russians. That being said, it seems to raise the debatable nature of the position 1 which was about whether or not communism was a success. One could argue that the soviet union was a success. That's the relevance.

And many in Italy think Mussolini was a a great leader, just as many elsewhere think the same of Hitler.

That does not make Fascism or Nazism a success.

And, of course, I was addressing fellow Trotskyists who under no circumstances think Stalin was a 'Great Leader'.

Had I been addressihg a Stalinist, I would have worded my comments differently.


I can't believe you think comparing a comrade to single cell organism is helpful as such. If you've decided to be divisive and insulting, so be it.

It is if single-celled organisms adapt to the world faster than some comrades seem to be able to do.

[Reclaimed Dasein]

RD:



And many in Italy think Mussolini was a a great leader, just as many elsewhere think the same of Hitler.

That does not make Fascism or Nazism a success.

And, of course, I was addressing fellow Trotskyists who under no circumstances think Stalin was a 'Great Leader'.

Had I been addressihg a Stalinist, I would have worded my comments differently.
The relevant difference being of course that most Germans viewed themselves as not suffering under Hitler. Once they did begin to suffer under Hitler, mostly under the form of Allied victory, they began view Hitler negatively. For Stalin, the people were always suffering under him, which is one of the most salient critiques, but there is still an argument to be had that the Soviet Union along with other communist projects weren't complete failures.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

RD:


The relevant difference being of course that most Germans viewed themselves as not suffering under Hitler. Once they did begin to suffer under Hitler, mostly under the form of Allied victory, they began view Hitler negatively. For Stalin, the people were always suffering under him, which is one of the most salient critiques, but there is still an argument to be had that the Soviet Union along with other communist projects weren't complete failures.

Indeed, if you'd have asked the Germans in, say, late March 1945 if they were suffering under Hitler, I think we both know what response you'd have got.

And, you are right that many Russians suffered under Stalin, but how many blamed him for this?


but there is still an argument to be had that the Soviet Union along with other communist projects weren't complete failures

History has given a clear verdict here: they have all gone down the tubes, or will do soon.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

There were at least 50,000 on the march, which was excellent given the fact that it was only announced three days earlier.

Comrades can see my pictures of the London demonstration here:

http://flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/

[They are in reverse order.]

Here's one of a tiny section of the march looking west toward the Houses of Parliament along the Embankment:

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3054/3166066062_16f72002db_b.jpg

[progressive_lefty]

As much as I hate Hamas and seeing Israeli civilians die due to their tactics, know one can afford to forget the brutal occupation and settlement-expansion in Palestine. In extreme circumstances people don't think rationally, in my mind people of Gaza see Israel as being the nation that cut off its energy supply and medicine... They couldn't care what happens to Israel or Israelis. Know one can afford to forget the real situation in Palestine.