tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1140650604509655196.post6656686180996021025..comments2023-08-02T15:18:54.487+01:00Comments on Second Life Left Unity: SLLU and SLIS member Abel Koskinen on Palestinian protests and her thoughts on her SL activism...Second Life Left Unityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14982429657523549873noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1140650604509655196.post-21361299936604877792009-01-22T17:07:00.000+00:002009-01-22T17:07:00.000+00:00by Ernest Newman: My Position re: Israel / Palest...by Ernest Newman: My Position re: Israel / Palestine<BR/><BR/>This is not really an issue of Israel, or Palestine, so much. This is really an issue of British and US foreign policy.<BR/><BR/>Lest I seem chauvinistic about that, or dismissive of the very real angst, fear, grief and anger on both "sides" of the I/P situation, let me acknowledge that "issues" do develop legs of their own, and do spiral out of control, especially on the micro level of direct interpersonal interaction. <BR/><BR/>As contrived and bogus as racism and religious chauvinism are, for example, they are "real" and have very real consequences in people's lives. I am certainly not denying that. <BR/><BR/>I'm just saying that such abberations originate, emanate, basically, from elitist manipulation of a population, primarily by religious "high holies" who are most interested in justifying and facilitating their own power over society, and as an economic ploy to shore up and enrich the privileged classes who are their benefactors.<BR/><BR/>Such despicable tactics are exclusive to no race, religion or nation. Virtually all have used racism and religious chauvinism as a fundamental basis of policy, at one point or another in their history. <BR/><BR/>While the US does not, and cannot, control everything that happens all over the world, it does have a special and very powerful role and position in the world, which allows it to influence, manipulate, and contrive circumstances and conditions to a very substantial degree, socially, economically, diplomatically, and militarily.<BR/><BR/>The early modern Israel, and the Jewish people who founded it, were of predominantly secular, and even atheist, communist and socialist tendencies, which the US and the UK were not willing to countenance, in their rabid, irrational anti-communist fervor. The US simply did not like those "commie" kubbutz "communes", and what they implied for the future of Israel and the region.<BR/><BR/>These early communes may have embraced, or perhaps more correctly, adapted, some aspects of the historic zionist movement that had developed in Europe, but my impression is that they tended to do so from a more idealistic and socialist perspective that tended to reject the more religious and chauvinistic aspects of that movement.<BR/><BR/>Many of them had also experienced prejudice and discrimination, and even pogroms in "Communist" Russia, and were thus inclined to reject some of the more opportunist, elitist aspects of that regime. <BR/><BR/>Kibbutz<BR/><BR/>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kibbutz<BR/><BR/>This US and Brit anti-communist obsession is obviously not based not on any hype about the supposed "evils of communism", such as totalitarianism, or brutality, etc, per se, since the US and Brit governments have clearly exhibited no qualms about funding, arming and supporting brutal totalitarian regimes on the right, all over the world.<BR/><BR/>Indeed, the early Israel was none of that, and actually had good potential for being a very successful, peaceful, and exemplary display of how beneficial a socialist society can be, for their own people, and their neighbors. But that did not fit in with the "needs" and desires of US capitalism.<BR/><BR/>It's really all about the concept of any country asserting popular democratic control over their own natural resources and their own democratic management of the production and distribution of goods and services, instead of turning over that power, and most of the "profits", to international capitalist imperialism.<BR/><BR/>As soon as the leaders of any country start demanding popular democratic control, to provide for things like roads and schools and hospitals and other infrastructure for their own people, the US brands them "communists", and proceeds to hire the most vicious, right wing, reactionary conservative fundamentalist gangster warlord elements they can find, to harass, beat up, torture and kill those "damn commies", and to seize the power in that country.<BR/><BR/>This was the basis of broad support by US industrialists and other public figures for Hitler, before, during and after WW2. Hitler and Nazi Germany were a contrived construct developed for the exclusive purpose of attacking Russia, to destroy or cripple the revolution there. <BR/><BR/>US Support for Hitler<BR/><BR/>http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Fascism/Support_Hitler_US.html <BR/>While many of those US and Brit supporters of Hitler were also anit-semitic, the fact is that much of Hitler's rancor toward the jewish people, while opportunistically taking advantage of substantial existing degrees of racism in German society, was rhetorically aimed at conflating the fairly progressive tendencies of the the jewish community with communism. <BR/><BR/>Jewish people were not the first major victims of the mass arrests, concentration camps and slaughter. First and foremost were the communists, socialists, anarchists, social democrats, liberals, and anyone else, including unionists, church people, etc. who advocated for labor rights, civil rights, human rights, and popular democracy, among whom the Nazis made no distinctions, branding them all as "damn commies" who had to be exterminated. <BR/><BR/>The Balfour Decision of 1917, which established modern Israel was nothing more or less than a propaganda ploy against Russia. While dupliciously negotiated with some of the surrounding arab nations, it was never honored in that regard, and also specifically excluded the Palestinian arabs from any consideration, thus deliberately sowing the seeds of future conflict and chaos on the flanks of Russia and the oil fields.<BR/><BR/>Balfour Declaration of 1917<BR/><BR/>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balfour_Declaration_of_1917<BR/><BR/>Subsequently, the western powers covertly agitated, funded and armed reactionary fundamentalist arab elements some of whom had indeed been subject to nazi influence in the region, against the fledgling Israel, to deliberately sabotage the new "commie" state.<BR/><BR/>The US and Britain, by means of both overt diplomatic (war by "other means"), financial support, weapons, and covert operations, ensured that the more socialist elements of Israeli society were eventually co-opted, framed, murdered or otherwise marginalized, and that the most right wing conservative reactionary elements seized control of the government, industry, the economy, and the society.<BR/><BR/>Most recently, in 1995, the beloved Center/Left Prime Minister of Israel, was assassinated by an extreme right wing ultra-nationalist settler, for trying "too hard" to make peace. <BR/><BR/>Once complete (or relative) control has been established by international capital, a certain amount of development and infrastructure may be allowed to benefit a nation, in direct relation to how favored and strategically useful that nation and that development may be to the interests of US imperialism, but never on a truly equitable, democratic basis. Class divisions are encouraged and only the most privileged lackeys of US imperialism reap the full benefits. <BR/><BR/>And, of course, the same thing has occurred in the surrounding countries, in every case, including among the Palestinians. The US decides who "we" want to be in control, and "we" give them the money and guns to kill off anyone "we" don't "like".<BR/><BR/>And then, those various "clients" are pitted against each other, toward machiavelian US goals to maintain hegemony, often through chaos, in the region, by hook or by crook.<BR/><BR/>They don't have to control it on a micro, day to day level, in every detail. All they have to do is manipulate on the macro level, and let it take it's own course.<BR/><BR/>Russia, of course, has also played this game, at various stages, and managed to establish it's own influences in the region, as well.<BR/><BR/>Both "sides" of this conflict are being played, manipulated like pawns, in a struggle for imperialist hegemony by forces far removed from the region.<BR/><BR/>Of course, this is somewhat simplistic, but I defy anyone to refute the basic truth of this analysis, re: US practice anywhere in the world.<BR/><BR/>There are many specific factors involved in this particular case, not the least of which is the region's proximity to Russia, and, of course, the oil in the region. The US doesn't need that oil so much, actually, since it's only the source of about 12% of US oil procurement, but European and Japanese allies rely on it much more, like to the tune of 80% or more.<BR/><BR/>This is all about perpetuating the cold war, which is all about whether nations have a right to popular democratic control of their own resources, or whether they should submit to US imperialism. <BR/><BR/>It's all about continuing to encircle and strangle Russia to the greatest extent possible, to cripple and retard their potential for developing a successful alternative popular democratic socio-economic model in competition with US capitalist imperialism.<BR/><BR/>When encircled, invaded, embargoed and boycotted, a socialist nation is forced into a defensive military posture, which can never be conducive to optimal popular democratic, social or economic development. They either collapse, or must adapt a draconian martial law regime, to survive.<BR/><BR/>The conditions resulting from this deliberate isolation and sabotage are then pointed to by capitalism as "proof" that socialism is neither feasible nor desirable.<BR/><BR/>I don't know all of the details about the middle east, but I know the US pattern of practice. <BR/><BR/>The US has not allowed any of the international "issues", which the US has created, for the most part, to be resolved democratically.<BR/><BR/>Realistic Solutions:<BR/><BR/>We need to see a virtual reversal of US foreign policy, including no more automatic veto in favor of Israel at the UN, and a cut off, or at the very least, stringent controls on the huge amount of money and weapons that the US provides to Israel.<BR/><BR/>To the extent that the US drags it's feet on these points, an international movement to boycott Israel must be mobilized, to bring that government to it's knees, or to force a change of government, such as was done with South Africa.<BR/><BR/>Israel has national parliamentary elections coming up on February 10, which could make a big difference in how quickly and easily the conflict is resolved. <BR/><BR/>Obviously, if the present extreme right wing conservative fundamentalist coalitions retain power, a just peace will be much more difficult to negotiate. <BR/><BR/>If the Left coalitions prevail, and seize the power in the Knesset, chances are much better for an equitable resolution of the conflict.<BR/><BR/>But regardless of which of these options manifest, to what degree, the struggle will continue for generations. It's not going to be easy for either "side" to put aside the grief and the hatred now fueling the all too often mutually racist violence that has been deliberately provoked by US and Brit meddling in the affairs of the region.<BR/><BR/>These obvious solutions are strictly short-term, tacticaL, practical elements necessary to stop the slaughter and oppression of the Palestinian people, as immediately as possible.<BR/><BR/>As to the specific details of resolution of the conflict, in terms of borders and water, etc, I cannot presume to proscribe. Obviously, all parties are going to hash that out, with major international help and technical assistance, to figure out solutions that all peoples in the region can live with.<BR/><BR/>International assistance will certainly be needed on a massive scale, both to maintain peace, and to rebuild, relocate, and begin to develop a new social, economic, political, and especially a green technological infrastructure in the region for the 21st Century, which of course must also include all of the surrounding nations in the project.<BR/><BR/>Strategically, of course, until the world unites against the right, and supports the left, chaos and injustice will continue to plague all peoples, everywhere.<BR/><BR/>But doctrinaire, dogmatic 100 year old catechisms of left rhetoric are not the ultimate, nor the short-term, solution.<BR/><BR/>Armed struggle is not, ultimately, the solution, nor is "religious" manipulation by "high holies" of any stripe.<BR/><BR/>The only solution is popular democratic control of the production and distribution of goods and services, not only within each nation, but also between nations, to whatever extent we even need, or want to maintain "nations" at all. <BR/><BR/>Ultimately, world wide mutual aid, solidarity and co-operation between all peoples are the only way we can ever achieve universal justice and peace, to save the planet. <BR/><BR/>This requires pragmatic, non-rhetorical, modern appeals for genuine democracy, as the only real solution to any of the many, intimately connected issues of the day, locally, regionally, and world-wide.<BR/><BR/>Death to All Chauvinism and Elitism!<BR/><BR/>Death to Capitalism, and it's moribund form, Fascism!<BR/><BR/>All Power to the People!agitprophttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10969591436674569551noreply@blogger.com