Yossi Schwartz ISL (RCIT section in Israel/Occupied Palestine), 07.10.2024
On October 4, the ICL, in their journal: “Spartacist,” published an article under the title: “Zionist Carnage Spreads Why Can’t Anyone Stop Netanyahu”. A title that implies that only their program can defeat Netanyahu.
The article begins with a position against the infernal Zionist machine that massacred tens of thousands of Palestinians despite the large pro-Palestinian demos that have failed to stop the Zionist killing machine. So far, it is a good beginning, but then they write that the right Zionists managed to marshal the Israelis into a genocidal frenzy after October 7th, 2023. There is no attempt to try and explain why the Israelis were marshaled into the genocide frenzy. Why is there no Israeli mass movement that opposes the genocide? The U.S. has been involved in many mass killings, and yet we have seen mass movements like in the war against Vietnam or this war of Israel backed by the White House. There must be some unique character to the Israeli people. If you think about this question, it is part of the nature of settler colonialists that the Israelis are. No one has to marshal them to a genocidal frenzy. They are similar to the Europeans who settled in Algeria and supported the genocide of the native Algerians when they fought the colonialists. Another example, the white Puritans in the 19th century in the USA who did the same kind of genocide to the native Americans. But instead of understanding the nature of the Zionist settler colonialist, the ICL, in typical arrogance, says that the mass pro-Palestinian movement lacks the proper program that only the ICL has.
So, what is this unique, great program for the Middle East that only the ICL, which has existed for more than 50 years, has failed to convince the Israelis to adopt? The article says:
“Despite the wishful thinking of the ideologues of the Axis of Resistance, Israel is not a paper tiger. It will not collapse if its narrative gets exposed or if it suffers economic blows—even severe ones. The two pillars of Israel’s strength are the support it receives from the U.S. and the existence of a consolidated Jewish nation on the territory of Palestine.”
A Jewish nation? This is the language of the Zionists, who claim that there is a world Jewish nation. By the decision of the Zionist Supreme Court, the Zionist settler colonialist can not be recognized as a separate Israeli nation, and there is not such a thing as a world nation as nations go with national territory. Are the whites in South Africa a nation? Were the Europeans in Algeria a nation? Did Trotsky recognize the white Europeans in South Africa as a nation?
“In a letter to the revolutionaries in South Africa, Trotsky recognized the need not for a state of the white “nation” or for a binational state but for a black republic” [i]
So why does the ICL recognize a Jewish nation? So, they can spread the counter-revolutionary position that the settlers’ colonialists should get their state, and the Jewish working class in Israel can stand today in solidarity with the liberation of the Palestinians.
The article says on page 2 in the part of the demands:
“National liberation of Palestine and recognition of full national rights, including self-determination for all nations!”
This, members of the ICL, is not a socialist demand but a Zionist demand. To cover up for their pro-Zionism, the article says:
“There do exist in Israel small forces that stand against Palestinian oppression. However, while they face intense repression, they fail to confront the obstacle that liberal Zionism represents. In the case of groups such as the Internationalist Socialist League (affiliated with the RCIT), the argument is that because Israel is a settler-colonial state, basically nothing can be done now to break the Israeli working class from Zionism. For them, the task is to stand in liberal solidarity with the Palestinians without seeking to affect Israeli society” [ii]
The ICL is very aware that the RCIT, including the section in Israel/Occupied Palestine, is calling for military support for Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran in a war with Israel without giving them political support. Is this a liberal position? If you believe so, you must confuse revolutionary Marxism with Liberalism.
There is a good reason for such confusion, which is the ICL’s pro-Zionist program. That program is very similar to the program of the ISA that calls for two socialist states to reach the Zionist working class. The Israeli working class, that is, aristocratic workers, can break from Zionism in one of the two conditions or both —total defeat in the war or the victory of the Arab revolution.
It may be sad, but the ICL has learned nothing; it just uses a different language. In the past, they called for bi-nationalism, and now they call for two states. Both are pro-Zionists.
For Palestine, red and free from the river to the sea!
Endnotes:
[i] Leon Trotsky Letter to South African Revolutionaries (April 1933)
[ii] Page 3 of the article in the middle of the page