Zionism and antisemitism
Dear comrades,
John Turkie's article in donism and anti-semitism?
inadvertantly highlights the ease with which anti-zionism can slip into concessions to anti-semitism, rather than proving his intended objective of showing a clear difference berween the two. The article is spattered with dangerously wrong propositions which are grist to the mill to anti-
1The primant commercial and artisan character el Judgim,
Aritagr of a long historical past!
This is a notion which sadly has a pedigree which includes
Marx himself (On Me Jessich
Quiton) and which, il followed through Ingically, as Marx does in thar toxt, leads to the cunclusion that socialists ought to be fundamenrally opposed to Judaism "because of its petty bourgeuis essence" stupidity of this proposition becomes clear later on in Jolin Turkie's article, when, in arguing against a racial definition of Judaisue (and T agree with him on that he demonstrares the enormous diversity of world Jewry which cannot conceivably have an cconomic homogencity any more than a racial homogeneity.
Looking specifically at the context in which John Turkie is making his elain -curopean Jewry in the period leading up to the rise of fascisen, we sce a wide diversity in the cconomic position in which Jows were to be found. The commercial character of Judaism' is an anti-senutic myth: John. Turkie should know better.
Zionzim copitulates to dan-
According to zibrum. than waste time m a futile fight agatur and semitiom, Jews should amply emigrate to a Jewish
There is an ambiguity bere as to whether john Turkie is saying that the logical conclusion of zionist principles is to abandon the fight against anti-semitism or whether he is saying that zionists actually do always abandon this struggle. I he means the latter, he is simply wrong and this is a particularly pernicious error.
To be sure, sections of the zionist leadership may have played a despicable role in relation to the light against anti-semitism How many movements does John Turkie support which have leaderships or tendencies within it whose hands are dirty and bloodymany, I'm sur. But on the ground zionists have been actively involved in such struggles, often laying down
John Turkie is corrort to say that there is, ultimatels, a defeariss logic in the zionist: position. What he refuses to understand is thar logic has been imposed by a vast history of persecution, terror and genocide, noc by the reactionary ideas of a lew monist philosophers and Traders: History seems to be Teaching Jews that, wherever we go and whatever we.do. we have no guarantee of survival.
After all, other peoples have been wiped out entirely in history, Clearly we should stand up and fight for nor rights throughout the world, Stop burying yourselves in the Labour Party!
Reading articles by John Lister is like watching a small child playing with building bricks — all the bricks are there, he tuches most of ther but fails to construct anything. The piece he co-wrore with Phil Hearse in the opening insuc of Socialist Cuttook is to
Endless academic articles that claims to provide the kind of analytical and political approach that is vital the coming bactes against the .. hureaucracy" are no substitute for understanding the dynamics of the "various wings and lavers' of that
Much of the article was taken up with bald facts without any attempt at understanding how the left or the working class have arrived at the situation that they are now in. Yer withour knowing the hismrical background it is
ERS but the establishment of a secure sanctuary dues soem to be a wise precaution. Ir is the desire for such sanctuary which forms the basis of zionism's near hegemony of Jewish polirics: Revolutionary ancialism has vet to offer a cunvincing alterative to satisty
The spergh feature of zionion which distinguisher it from all other modern settler colonisation modements i that it wanted Prople cure not thensiore to be replanted but totally replornd:
These features are by no means unique to cionist colonialism, The colonisating of North America, Australia and New Zealand was similar, only in these cases, the colonialists engaged in a policy ol curright genocide cather tan displacement and dispossession.
There is, however, a unique felture of zionist colunisation which John Tutkie omite to. peoples du not have au imperialist bomeland. The abscoce of any homeland is. difficult to assess anything for the future. The historical backuround of the Labour Party and the fate of socialists within it is there for all to see.
Thus only by looking at the origins and history of the Labour Party that we can understand its dynamics
The fact is that despite its undemiable organic link with the working class (via the trade unions) the Labour Party, from its inception has neser been even a mouthpicce for militant working class aspirations and any socialist that has stood by working class. prociples has been cither marginalised or drummed out of the party
It is clear to all but the most be smogged minds than this will always be the case. How can it be any different when the whole machine is geared to the parliamentary road ro reformism? To wry and make the Labour Party a socialist one is akin to de railing a train and expecting it to travel by Toad - even if vou change the driver it simply isn'T going to after all, preciscly why they are there! The imperialist powers for whom they are effectively a colonial proxy are countries with which most
Israelis have no historical
This crucial difference between Israclis and other colonial peoples dues not alleviate the plight of the
Palestinian people one iota. Lt does, however, have profound implications for their national liberation struggle, both in termis of defining objectives and in how it can be successfully prosecuted
1 am not a zionist. My opposition to zuinism rests primarily on the terrible suffering inflicted upon the Palestinian people by zionist colonisation and then by the Isracli state itself. John Turkie s doing no favours for the Palestinian people by associating their struggles with ideas taken, however unconsciously, from the world of anti-semitic myth. Needlesss to say, he is doing no favours for Jows either. Dave Landau,
The Lister/Hearse article admits that it is possible that socialists will seck solutions outside the (Labour) Party' and claims that this is a
They do not. however, explain why this is a
It is easy to claim to be a revolutionary socialist, and with a good education you can write miles of polemics, but to BE a revolutionary you must think in terms of organising a fightback that is based firmly in the working class.
The alternatives are quite clear then: stop being a revolutionary or come outside. the Labour Party. No amount of pedantic pontification can alter that basic fact.
Some good class fighters will continue to bury themselves in the warmth of the Labour Party and many sectarian academics will carry on their irrelevant sniping, splitting and fusing. Meanwhile I shall continue to help build a fighting socialist organisation - the Socialisr Workers' D. Hammond,