Today's terrorism has its roots in US foreign policy. 2007 Article

 I was looking for some statistics in an old file and found this article I wrote in 2007. I am quite happy with what I wrote and the concerns included in it. It’s so important to understand the past if we want to solve the crises of the present and the impending catastrophe in the future if the working class does not take up the task history has set for us. That task is to end the present capitalist system in which production is set in motion for profit and the accumulation of capital for a tiny minority, and the building of a global federation of democratic socialist states that can work in cooperation with each other producing for social needs in harmony with the natural world, rather than at war with it. RM

 

Today's terrorism has its roots in US foreign policy

 

Richard Mellor

AFSCME Locl 444, retired

Oakland CA

02-2007

 

I rarely watch the news on the major cable or TV channels.  But as I flipped through the 80 or so channels I have trying to find something worthwhile watching, a commentator on CNN grabbed my attention.  I can’t recall the show but it appeared to be CNN’s attempt to challenge Fox’s mantle as the right wing propaganda machine’s front-runner.

 

I thought it was Fox news for a minute as the commentator was bashing the French.  It wasn’t a news show really; it was sort of childish.  I caught a few sentences where the commentator basically accused the French of being cowards because they won’t stand up to Iran.  

 

The Europeans are somewhat concerned. There is a feeling across the pond that either the US or Israel will bomb Iran; that the recent changes in congress won’t amount to anything and they’re probably right. In fact, if you listen to the opposition like Joseph Biden or Barak Obama, they never say that the invasion was an aggressive act against a country that had not threatened the US in any way; they generally attack the way it was handled, the tactics etc.

 

No serious minded person can deny that the greatest force of terror in the world for some considerable time has been the US government.  It is US foreign policy that has given great strength to the numerous forces that fall under the category of what we might call terrorism.  Terrorism is a tactic, a means to an end; it’s an absurdity to declare war on a tactic.  Marxists traditionally have opposed what we call individual terrorism because it substitutes for the conscious collective movement of the masses, the individual with the bomb or the assassin with the high-powered rifle.  It does not empower the working class but weakens it.

 

I read today that the US is planning to increase spending on funding Fatah in its struggle with Hamas.  Fatah has been an enemy of the US for years as it threatens the expansionary policies of the Zionists.  But the uncritical support politically and the billions spent annually in support of Israel has given Hamas life.  Rather than consider US/Israeli relations or the horrific existence of the Palestinian masses under the Israeli regime, US capitalism is increasing support for Fatah in the hope that at least it will equalize the balance of power between the two Palestinian groups and they can continue killing each other for a while.  After all, he American taxpayer will foot the bill.  The Palestinians elected their representatives but they weren’t the ones the US wanted.

 

In the Arab and former colonial world in general, increased association with the US government will increase support for Hamas and other more independent minded groupings even if they have fundamentalist roots and terrorist tactics.  The US government has no credibility among the masses of the former colonial world and any resistance movement that allies with it will weaken its base.

 

The US played a similar role in Iraq, helping Hussein slaughter leftists, trade unionists and other oppositionists.  The CIA generously handed Saddam the names and whereabouts of the leaders of the Iraqi Communist Party.  With the elimination of the leaders of what was once one of the most powerful political parties in Iraq, along with the pacification of the fundamentalists, Saddam’s reign was secure.

 

US foreign policy’s best success to date has been Al Queda and the Taliban.  As Michel Chossudovsky points out, “”As recently as 1999, US taxpayers paid the entire annual salary of every single Taliban government official.” (1)

 

The success of the Taliban, supported by the US and Pakistan (a dictatorship) was determined a “positive development” by Martin Miller, vice president of Unocal, the company that was hoping for a pipeline through the country to the Arabian Sea.  (2) The US was pleased with the Taliban’s victory. US State Department spokesperson Glyn Davies said that the US found “nothing objectionable” in the Taliban’s imposition of Islamic law.

 

Billions of US tax dollars were spent supporting the Taliban and Bin Laden in their attempt to control Afghanistan and defeat a more progressive secular regime.  The problem for US oil moguls was the regime was pro-soviet and its leader Dr. Mohammad_Najibullahin, in the Afghani communist movement.  The US labor leaders having no independent policies of their own, followed on the heals of US capitalism and refused to support the workers of Afghanistan offering Najibullahin critical support against the seventh century clerics.

 

In the quest for profits nothing is sacred.  Laura Bush’s phony concern for Afghan women didn’t apply when the Taliban visited the state of Texas for discussions with Unocal.  Laila Helms, Jesse Helms’ daughter was hired as a public relations agent for the Taliban government. (3) So much for women’s rights when dollars are to be made.

 

The European capitalist class, although in competition with its American allies, is concerned about the unilateralism that dominates its decision-making.  Europe is much more vulnerable to terrorist attacks than the US and the Europeans have suffered the effects of urban destruction on a scale not experienced in the US. outside of 911 and natural disasters like Katrina.

 

The commentator on CNN last night was undoubtedly reacting to French presidential candidate Nicolas Sarkozy who called on Americans to broaden our horizons.   Americans need to “get interested in the world” said Sarkozy.   He went on: “Beyond the Pacific and beyond the Atlantic, there are men and women like you.  Get interested in the world and the world will learn to love you.” “The world is not just the American Empire.  There’s more to it than that.” (4)

 

Sarkozy lost most of his empire some time ago and his European partners, and by that I mean his class allies, have been forced to take a different approach with regard to imperialist plunder.  Coming from a representative of French capitalism that has a bit of an immigration problem of their own,  also weakens his credibility but his advice should be taken, not necessarily by his friends in Washington but by US workers.  We have allies in Afghanistan.  There were some four hundred factories there before the victory of the Taliban and the former regime would have undoubtedly, despite its pro-Soviet bent, strengthened the working class there as opposed to the Mullahs and their seventh century ideology. Women’s rights would also have improved significantly

 

Mohammad_Najibullah, the leader of the government the Taliban overthrew with US backing and funds, was eventually tortured and killed by them.  The Taliban cut off his testicles and hung him from a lamppost in Kabul for a couple of days to deter any other impure elements from corrupting religious ideology with secular ideas and worker’s and women’s rights.

 

This was a regime whose policies the US state department determined were “not objectionable.”

 

The policies of the US government are determined not by its workers but by its bankers and oilmen. This applies to domestic as well as foreign policy. Any thinking worker sides with strikers against the forces of the state when we are confronted with these choices during strikes.  Even when we do not act on it, the understanding of which side we are actually part of is there.  The same must apply when struggles take place outside of our borders and especially when the US government is involved which is invariably the case.  We must make decisions about global affairs based on class unity with the workers involved not with the governments involved including our own.

 

 

(1) Michel Chossudovsky: War and Globalization

(2) ibid

(3) Karen Talbot “US Energy Giant Unocal Appoints Interim Government in Kabul, Global Outlook #1 Spring 2002 P 70 (Chossudovsky War and Globalization)

(4) Financial Times 2-1-07

 

 

Ken Klippenstein: Will Francesca Hong and Abdul El-Sayed Get Elected?

Will Francesca Hong and Abdul El-Sayed Get Elected?

Washington's plan to block them

KenKlippenstein August 3rd 2026

El-Sayed and Hong

I’ll be covering these races closely. Subscribe so you don’t miss anything!

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As we move closer to the midterm elections, two candidates stand out for their independence from the institutional Democratic Party.

The first is straight-talking chef Francesca Hong, whom I’ve interviewed and is the clear frontrunner to be governor of my home state of Wisconsin. The second is doctor Abdul El-Sayed, who enters Tuesday’s Senate primary in Michigan with a double-digit lead in polls.

Yet the Democratic Party and a compliant mainstream media is not accepting the clear will of voters. Instead, they’re busy manufacturing the sense that if the two candidates are nominated, losses in the general election would be inevitable because they are too “extreme” for ordinary voters.

The evidence for this is largely just vibes. In fact, a leaked memo shows Hong is privately seen by Republicans as the most formidable candidate, as I’ll detail in a moment. But first, take a look at the orgy of fear-mongering by the Party about these candidates.

“The Dem race for governor in WI feels like a slow-rolling car headed for a cliff,” said David Axelrod, Obama’s chief strategist in his 2008 campaign.

Democratic Party elder James Carville went further, declaring “the two-party system is just under tremendous stress” due to the rise of figures like left-wing commentator Hasan Piker, whom Hong has campaigned with. (When asked if she’d condemn Piker, Hong’s characteristically blunt response was simply “No,” as shown in the video below.) 

Party leaders have thumbed the scales in both primary races — Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers in his state, Chuck Schumer in Michigan — each backing the party establishment favorite. The Democratic establishment keeps advancing candidates who aren’t gaining any traction; but instead of asking why they are so out of touch with what the people want, they are resorting to tearing down the popular choices. The Party doesn’t like anyone who it hasn’t anointed and who hasn’t risen through its ranks.

The Democratic Party sits at its lowest level of popularity in at least 30 years. It has been fighting the people’s choices since Zohran Mamdani emerged as mayoral frontrunner in New York last year. When he beat the Party’s candidate last year, the smug reaction from election knowers was that his victory was only possible in a deep blue state like New York.

Turns out that was bullshit. Neither Michigan nor Wisconsin is New York. Nor are they lefty outliers. Trump carried both in 2024!

Now the Party hacks and their elite media buddies are trying to put the fear of god in voters that if they choose the candidate most of them want, it is playing into the hands of the Republican Party, Donald Trump, and so on. Though disguised as a warning, it is actually a threat. 

It bears mentioning that this is not the view of congressman Tom Tiffany, the Republican who will actually have to run against Hong.

“We Need To Take Francesca Hong Seriously,” reads the subject line of a memo prepared for U.S. Tiffany’s gubernatorial campaign by Republican consultants. Leaked and reported on by Jessie Opoien of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, the April memo correctly anticipated Hong’s dominance in the primary. It also described her as “uniquely dangerous in the general election” and that “general election strengths are formidable.” 

Per the memo, as reported by Opoien:

• Hong’s “combination of grassroots momentum, unapologetically progressive ideology, and a platform centered on high turnout makes her uniquely dangerous in the general election.”

• Hong’s platform is “broadly popular and difficult to counter.”

• Her agenda “is built around kitchen-table issues that poll strongly with independents, working families, and even some rural voters.”

• “more moderate and establishment Democratic alternatives would likely produce lower base motivation and depressed turnout.”

Now compare that with the doomsaying national media coverage. It’s almost surreal how different it is.

The “electability” argument is always a claim about what your neighbors will tolerate, made by someone who has never met them, delivered with the confidence of arithmetic. As a campaign staffer once told me, the horse race’s main function is propaganda to induce voters to feel like voting a certain way is prudent or responsible.

This is all about telling people who they can or cannot vote for. Sometimes it’s barely even concealed. Third Way, the centrist think tank, said in a strategy memo this year that Democrats “cannot run candidates who are far outside the mainstream of their district.” 

It’s the very definition of mainstream that is at stake here.

If there’s one thing that ties together Mamdani, Hong and El-Sayed, it is that they have distinct personalities and they talk without the prevarications and doublespeak of what we’ve come to know as “moderates.” Things like democratic socialism are, in my view, a small element of their popularity. That they are willing to directly buck the establishment is their appeal. And when they talk about affordability, it comes from experience and living among normal people rather than the lanyard class that dominates Washington.

As the Republican consultant memo about Hong warns, her “working-class biography and populist economics [could] blunt ‘radical socialist’ framing.”

I have no idea what will happen in the election. Neither does anyone else. But I do know what’s happening in America. People are tired of the establishment, tired of the blow-dried, overproduced version of everything that seeks to manage rather than move.

“I think they’re underestimating voters,” Hong said back in May of the commentariat and their negative predictions. “That has always been a problem for the Democratic Party — that we are not listening to how they are feeling.”

She seems to hear it loud and clear.

Help me step up my coverage of these poorly understood campaigns by becoming a paid subscriber (or chipping into my GoFundMe here) 

 

Theories of inflation part two – heterodox and Marxist

This is the second part of my discussion of the causes of inflation in modern capitalist economies, based on an unpublished paper by Guglielmo Carchedi and me. Part 1 is here.

by Michael Roberts

There are various heterodox views on the causes of inflation. Generally, they argue against the mainstream focus on monetarism, excess demand and inflation expectations as discussed in part one. The heterodox views can be divided into two. First, there are those who suggest the focus should be on the sectoral structure of the economy, namely how supply constraints lead to price surges in certain sectors of the economy and then, through input-output linkages and changes in firms’ pricing behavior, spread to the whole economy. And second, there are theories based on the view that inflation is caused by class conflict ie workers’ demands for higher wages and the response of capitalists.

In the sectoral view, some turn to corporate price ‘mark-ups’ as an explanation of inflation i.e. inflation is caused by monopolies and their power to impose market prices above ‘free competition’ prices. Monopolies can raise their profit mark-ups and sale prices if costs rise, including labour costs.  Stephanie Kelton, the well known ‘modern monetary theorist’, explains that “companies with enough market power can also unilaterally raise prices in a quest for greater and greater profits.” 

Marx would disagree. Yes, the market price of commodities sold can and will deviate from the production price, the price at which all capitals produce commodiities at the same average rate of profit (a rate that is always moving). If the price of production that is based on the average rate of profit in the economy falls, then all individual prices revolving around that should fall as well. But there is a degree of freedom within which some firms might lower their price less than the average or even increase it. However, this ‘monopoly’ ability to do this always has limits. Competition will tend to rule, even with oligopolies. So the market ‘monopoly’ price cannot deviate for long from the price of production.

In the recent inflationary spike after the pandemic slump, the sectoral theory has taken a different form. In this view, inflation is due to supply constraints in key economic sectors, which is then amplified by firms raising markups due to their market power. Supply bottlenecks which spread through sectors in the economy initiate the inflationary process, but then markups by companies can go above the average, so putting additional pressure on prices. Isabella Weber and Even Wasner argue that rising prices in certain “systemically significant upstream sectors” provide an impulse for further price hikes. To protect profit margins from rising costs, downstream sectors propagate, or in cases of temporary monopolies due to bottlenecks, amplify price pressures. 

The evidence for profit-led sectoral driven inflation has some basis in the recent post-pandemic inflation spiral, but can it be considered as a general explanation of inflation in capitalist economies?  Inflation has existed long term in the major economies even when there have been no increased mark-ups by companies or when there are no spikes in raw material prices. Sure, prices in oligopolistic markets are likely to be higher than in more competitive markets, but higher inflation can occur both with fairly competitive or oligopolistic market structures. In the late 19th century, the so-called Gilded Age Era was characterized by the rise of cartels, but with deflation in prices; and the 1990s, often seen as a second Gilded Age with increasing market concentration, experienced a so-called Great Moderation in price inflation ie disinflation (as shown in part one). Indeed, in the last big inflationary spiral of the 1970s, profits actually fell. According to Sylos-Labini, writing then:“the decline of the share of profits in several capitalist countries can be attributed primarily to the persistent increase of direct costs in labor, raw materials, and energy.” I shall return to the discussion about so-called ‘sellers inflation’, profit mark-ups and sector-driven inflation in part four when I analyse the post-pandemic inflationary spike to date.

The second heterodox explanation for inflation is that it is due to class conflict. This heterodox theory rejects Keynesian theory that attributes inflation to wage-cost pushes resulting from excess demand and worker bargaining power. Instead, this theory reckons that wages rise in response to price rises, as Marx argued. But what about the cause of the original spurt in inflation? This will be due to supply disruptions or mark-up power by monopolies – so back to the first heterodox theory. But inflation will continue, depending on whether workers have sufficient labour power to respond, leading to further attempts by companies to compensate by hiking prices further.Thus inflation depends on the balance of class power between workers and capitalists.  But this theory provides no explanation of the initial inflation of overall prices, except the contingent factor of a supply disruption or ‘shock’. And it falls back on the initial trigger for any price surge being due to increased markups or supply constraints as in the sectoral argument above.

There are some overtly Marxist theories of inflation. One ‘Marxist’ explanation of inflation is merely the monopoly mark-up price theory as described above. Baran and Sweezy (1966) explained the cause of inflation as follows: “Keynesian theory assumed free competition; under oligopoly, increased demand leads to rises in prices … and ultimately (as a result of the rising cost of living) to higher wages rather than an expansion of output. The result is general inflation.” Similarly, Kotz (1982) argued that monopolies can set market prices that exceed prices of production. But monopolies since the end of WWII have existed both during the inflationary period (1949-1979) and even increased market power in the disinflationary period (1980-2021). So generalised inflation must be explained aside from monopolies. Indeed, if monopolies have the power to increase uncontrollably their market prices, why do they choose to do so only in very certain circumstances? Specifically, they have chosen to raise their prices significantly only twice in recent economic history (in the late 1970s and in 2021), namely when profitability was low.

Paul Mattick Snr argued that “inflation is an expression of inadequate profits that must be offset by price and money policies … If prices rise faster than wages, then what could not be extracted from the workers in production is taken from them in the circulation process.” (1977, Chapter 3). This is evident. If prices rise faster than wages, there is a pro-capital redistribution at the cost of wages. And if prices grow less than wages, there is a pro-labour redistribution at the cost of profits. But neither explains any cause of the initialrise in the general price level.

Ernest Mandel (1987) attempted a Marxist explanation that involves money: if “paper money circulation has doubled without a significant increase in the total labour time spent in the economy, then the price level will tend to double too.” But why does money in circulation not just match the change in the value of commodities as measured in total labour time? Mandel is close to identifying the relevant factors in inflation, but without an analysis of how they combine.

Harman (1979) correctly identified that the profitability of capital was a key cause of inflation. But Harman adopted a subjective analysis: “in a boom, capitalists feel confident that their goods would sell, even if they increased their prices. … Once the recession sets in, capitalists have to respond … \[by\] contracting markets \[and\] have to slash prices.” This presents the capitalist reaction to a boom and price inflation, but does not explain the cause of inflationary or alternatively disinflationary periods. For example, it cannot explain the persistence of disinflation from the 1980s to 2019. There is no explanation of how movements in profitability are relevant and no recognition of the impact of the monetary authorities.

Choonara (2021) also underscores the role of profitability as the core cause of rising prices: “inflation depends on the interrelation between value creation through the expenditure of labour power, the creation of money (primarily through the credit system), and the relationship between capital accumulation and profit rates.” This is closest to our ‘value theory of inflation’ that I shall deal with in a later post.

The two most thorough Marxist explanations of the causes of inflation are by Anwar Shaikh and more recently, by Greek Marxist economists Stavros Mavroudeas and Athanasios Chatzirafailidis.

Shaikh does not like to call his theory Marxist, preferring ‘classical’. He argues that “modern inflation is the balance between a demand-pull generated by new purchasing power and a supply-response depending on profitability and the degree of growth utilization.” The combination of these two provides “a general theory in which inflation responds positively to new purchasing power because the portion of the latter which is not absorbed by current supply spills over into price increases; and negatively to net profitability, since this raises real output growth; and positively to the growth-utilization rate insofar as the latter inhibits real output growth.”

Where does this ‘new purchasing power’ that represents demand come from?  It comes from new domestic credit from private and central banks, ie in effect an increase of money in circulation.  The supply capacity to meet this increase in demand depends on the profitability of capital, which is the ‘motivation’ for investment.  If the stock of capital rises, it will provide an increase in capacity to produce and allow more ‘growth utilisation’, ie more real output.  If the stock of capital falls, the capacity to produce is lowered. In other words, Shaikh is saying that inflation is caused by aggregate demand exceeding supply capacity. If the profitability of capital rises, then capitalists will increase supply and inflation will be avoided. If the profitability of capital falls, then supply capacity will fall and inflation will emerge.

So inflation is driven up by increased demand (new purchasing power) and by low supply capacity, the latter being caused by falling profitability.  Inflation slows or disappears if new purchasing power is satisfied by rising supply and that will tend to happen when profitability rises. Thus in the period when US profitability fell (1964-82), the increase in supply capacity slowed and inflation accelerated.  In the period 1982-2007, when profitability rose, supply capacity rose and inflation decelerated. Shaikh provides empirical evidence to support this theory, while at the same time, refuting the Keynesian Phillips curve. I have reproduced his graph 15.10 from his magnum opus, Capitalism, p711 and recalculated it.

The graph shows a high correlation (0.63) between rising inflation and the using up of capacity (in other words, a slowing increase in supply) and vice versa. The correlation is very high in the inflationary (accelerating inflation) sub-period 1948-1981 (0.83) and still relatively strong in the disinflationary (slowing inflation) period from 1982-2010 (0.59).

Stavros Mavroudeas and Athanasios Chatzirafailidis define inflation as the phenomenon “in which the total sum of market prices significantly exceeds the total sum of prices of production for an appreciable period in the economy.” A strong and persistent inflationary phenomenon (namely the rise in total market prices above the total prices of production) arises when the capitalists’ demand for more means of production significantly exceeds investment for a considerable period.  

Why would demand exceed investment for periods?  Mavroudeas and Chatzirafailidis fall back on Marx’s reproduction schema as in Volume 2 of Capital.  For them, inflation is due to the systematic over-accumulation of capital and specifically due to an incessant demand for more means of production. Investing in more means of production relative to labour drives up the organic composition of capital, which in turn eventually leads to a fall in profitability which slows investment and delivers weaker output growth. So demand outstrips supply and market prices rise above prices of production and inflation ensues.

Both theories have the merit of placing the role of profitability of capital at the centre of the causes of inflation. Unlike Shaikh, Mavroudeas and Chatzirafailidis emphasise that the supply side in Marxist terms depends on the growth in the value of commodities: “inflation should not simply be perceived as a process in which the market prices of commodities are vaguely rising above an arbitrary “normal” price level. On the contrary, they should have the values of commodities as their “anchors.”  

But in my view, both theories do not provide a complete Marxist theory of inflation.  While Shaikh says that aggregate demand is driven by credit growth or money in circulation, which in my view is correct, he offers no explanation why that demand should accelerate or decelerate. What he does not explain is why demand does not also sink along with a fall in supply capacity and thus avoid inflation. After all, that is what happens in a slump. Also his emphasis on capacity utilisation rather than on the rate of growth in value for the supply side of the inflation equation suggests a Keynesian excess demand theory rather than Marxist value theory.. 

In contrast, Mavroudeas and Chatzirafailidis put the value of commodities firmly as the anchor for prices of production around which market prices fluctuate. But they have no role for money. For them, inflation of prices in a capitalist economy is purely a real, not a monetary phenomenon. They start with the assumption that money is a commodity (gold), which rules out the role of money in inflation. This is unrealistic in modern economies where money can be created by central banks and governments (fiat money) that is not tied to the value of the gold commodity. In modern economies, money growth can diverge from growth in the value of commodities and so affect market prices.  Without money in the story, we cannot explain why demand should outstrip supply and cause inflation.

In part three, I shall present what Carchedi and I call a ‘value theory of inflation’, which incorporates the role of the profitability of capital, changes in the value of commodities and the role of money.  Bringing all these together offers a more comprehensive theory.

Boy George Misses A Golden Opportunity to Remain Silent

 

Richard Mellor

 

I know next to nothing about Boy George except he sang a song titled, Do you Really Want to Hurt Me, or that was a chorus lyric in one of his hits, that’s why, under normal circumstances, I would not bother to comment on him. 

 

But as he’s penned a song sharing his views about Apartheid Israel’s barbaric assault on the Palestinians in Gaza that has been accepted by numerous human rights organizations as well as G*nocide historians, Jewish and non Jewish alike, as a “G*nocide, I feel compelled to say something.

 

In the song that is titled, “We Will Dance Again” we have lyrics like:

“You say genocide, I say war/ When you’re attacked, that’s what the army’s for/ Does it get ugly? You bet it does/ When I know you wanna kill every last one of us.”. In addition to justifying Israel’s G*encode by describing it as a war, he also attacks the pro-Palestinian movement describing those opposing a crime against humanity as, like “sheep”.

 

Celebrities whose world is a parallel universe detached from the experiences of the vast majority of human beings, would do better to keep their mouths shut. And unfortunately many of them who oppose Israel's G*nocide have,  for fear of retribution, this is particularly the case with actors.

 

It’s hard to imagine that almost three years after the hundreds, perhaps thousands of Palestinians broke out of the confines of what has been described as the largest outdoor concentration camp in the world, under siege since 2007, that anyone can refer to the conflict as a “war”. 

 

Israel has one of the most powerful militaries in the world, backed and funded by the United States and other western allies. The Palestinian people, constantly under guard, have no navy, no air force, no army.

 

In response, to the October 7^th attack, the Israel has destroyed Gaza completely and it is impossible to know how many thousands of innocent people lie beneath the rubble. Some estimates put the death toll as high as 500,000 including more than 60,000 children, though it is impossible to tell and the Israeli’s are still killing off the witnesses and refuse to allow independent journalists it to Gaza. The Zionists have now moved in to neighboring Lebanon and are razing villages there displacing over one million people.

 

The non-Jewish population of Israel, in the occupied territories, Israel proper or Gaza, have been attacked for seven decades. Much of the population of Gaza are refugees or children of refugees from villages the Zionist regime destroyed not miles from the camp’s fence and the resident driven in to the strip.

 

Boy George, whose real name is George Alan O’Dowd, is quite offended at the backlash that his song has generated among the wider public and has responded in a statement given to Britain’s Sun newspaper and published in the Independent.

 

“The suggestion that I feel no compassion for Palestinians is both untrue and absurd. I am devastated for the loss of the innocent lives on both sides of this war and I call for peace.”, he writes.

 

He was very disturbed by the attack on the music festival causing him to feel “deep emotions”,  “I could have been there and we know that there were people from more than 40 countries who were,”

 

Has Boy George wondered for one minute who on earth would attend a rock concert a couple of miles from a concentration camp, and what sort of people and country would allow it. 

 

George vomits out the Zionist line again and again arguing that the motive behind the resistance that broke out of Gaza and attacked their captors that day were motivated by a hatred of Jews. This has been the narrative from the beginning but Israel’s brutality has undermined it significantly. Even Piers Morgan, who spouted this line in the early days can’t avoid the obvious, Israel is committing a genocide.

 

The conflict in Palestine is not a religious war any more than the conflict in Northern Ireland, is. The Palestinians are an occupied people in their own land and have every right to resist occupation. Boy George is of Irish ancestry he should understand that better than most. The colonial people that fought the British in Kenya, Malaya, India, Ireland or any of the colonial possessions were not driven by a hatred of the English or British people; they were fighting their oppressors, the colonizers.

 

“I understand that is uncomfortable to defend your friends when a war like this is raging but the woman who sells me bagels is not to blame, neither is my doctor or publicist, manager, ex-boyfriend or my thousands of Jewish friends. This song is for them.”

 

It’s staggering that three years on and witnessing the prominent role young Jews in particular are playing in the movement against the G*nocide and for Palestinians’ right to self-determination, he can have the opinions he does.

 

The lyrics in his song, he writes,   “…doesn’t mean that I don’t have compassion for Palestinians, it doesn’t mean that I agree with what's going on in Israel, but I am always going to defend the people that I love,” 

 

As I re-read his statement I almost feel sorry for him. You love Zionists? 

 

“I am a Jew loving, trans hugging queer hippy and my mother would be proud of me.”. he writes. 

 

If he cared for Jews he would oppose Zionism and its g*nocidal policies that are a danger to Jews throughout the world and fodder for anti-Semites.

Capitalism in Crisis Throws Democracy Out the Window

By Mike Craig

Northern Ireland

I really wish the general public would pay attention to this.

 

We do not live in a democracy. Within the capitalist system democracy is always limited, but because global capitalism is teetering on the brink of collapse, those who own and control it will go to even greater lengths to try and save it at the expense of democracy and international law. 

 

Part of this battle is the attempt to take over the Middle East and remove all threats to Western hegemony. Israel is a key part of this project, and contrary to the idea that Israel controls western governments, the reality is actually the other way around. 

 

The USA, the UK and the EU need Israel as the attack dog against the perceived enemy - any country which doesn't lie down and accept western control, or any country which would threaten the primacy of the petrodollar in global trade. The West's attack dog is a settler colony which suffers from a serious case of siege mentality, the longer the colony continues to exist the more deeply imbedded this mentality becomes. 

 

The g*nocidal tendencies of this have reached a point where even the supporting western governments have become embarrassed by it, nevertheless they still continue to arm the g*nocide and cover for it.

 

Over the last few years we have seen George Orwell's predictions becoming a reality, nowhere more so than in the Middle East, where truth has been turned on its head. 

 

Israel is in breach of several international laws and countries who support it, like the UK, are also in breach of international laws for continuing to support its actions rather than carry out their duty which is to hold it to account.

 

In the UK too, truth has been completely turned on its head. The Government is a collective criminal, it's lapdog media and its leading judiciary are guilty too, yet they compound this by criminalising any protest against their delinquency.

 

This isn't just about Palestine Action, it is an assault on democracy and the real rule of law. 

 

Our Governments and their institutions are arch criminals who hold no value for human life. 

 

We are now entering the period of barbarism which we were warned about by Rosa Luxembourg. 

"The Anti-Zionist Left Must Lead the Fight Against Anti-Semitism"

By John Clarke

Toronto

Gail Asper, a noted ‘philanthropist,’ is ‘pausing funding’ to the Canadian human rights museum in an effort to undermine its Palestinian Nakba exhibit. This needs to be denounced and I've already done so but I’ve seen horrible responses from leftists on social media that go over to KKK like notions of ‘Jew money.’ This leads me to once again, address the issue of antisemitism. 

 

I want to focus on the role that antisemitism plays on both the political right and the left and to argue that ignoring it is entirely wrong. I define antisemitism as animosity towards Jewish people because they are Jewish and not as hostility to the political ideology of Zionism. 

 

The racism that developed out of European colonialism held that the colonized were on the low rungs of a hierarchy in the value of human life. When it came to Jews, however, the focus was on malevolence rather than supposedly stunted development. Notions of biologically determined treacherous qualities drew on religiously based myths about the Jewish ‘Christ killer.’

 

Fascist movements used antisemitism because it offered them a conspiring, unduly influential and dangerously powerful ‘enemy within.’ The Great Replacement theory that alleges that Jews are working to flood ‘white nations’ with Black and Brown immigrants is a striking manifestation of this.

 

Virulent antisemitism is by no means incompatible with support for Zionism. This was true of Arthur Balfour and Donald Trump still personifies it. That’s why vicious white supremacists disingenuously accuse the left of Jew hated, while Zionist organizations ignore displays of antisemitism that come from politicians who arm Israel to the teeth.

 

The MAGA movement is experiencing a rift on this issue, with racist isolationists and antisemites like Tucker Carlson arguing that US support for Israel should be curtailed. On the other side, the defenders of an imperialist role for the US value Israel as a garrison state that upholds Western interests, while getting rid of as many Jews as possible. This disagreement is playing out inside a racist movement within which antisemitism occupies an important place.

 

Leftists are hostile to exploitative and powerful elites and the depiction of Jews as such a formation is at the heart of right-wing racist constructions. Sadly, particularly at a time when the left is significantly weaker and less clear-minded than it has been, such illusions can resonate within it.

 

A powerful Zionist lobby, presented as the spokesperson for a supposedly monolithic ‘Jewish community,’ enables Israel’s crimes and exerts very serious influence in the West. Those who don’t properly understand the connection between imperialist interests and the support that is given to Israel can very easily fall prey to conspiratorial disorientation.

 

This leads to distorted ideas, particularly with regard to the question of Palestine. The most obvious of these is the conclusion that the tail wags the dog. Left social media spaces are full of assertions that Western governments are the dupes of a mysteriously influential Israel. 

 

The Zionist project has always been at the heart of an agenda of US led regional domination. Certainly, a settler colonial project is underway that is based on a supremacist ideology and some level of divergence between Western interests and Zionist aspirations occurs but Israel is utterly reliant on its sponsors and the tail doesn’t wag the dog.

 

Once the manipulative power of Israel’s leaders and supporters is seen as the driving force behind Western support, the next step is to focus on collective Jewish guilt. A section of the left has become almost obsessive on this question. Opinion polls are scoured for evidence of Jewish complicity. The fact that leading Jewish institutions, just like all the major institutions of the Canadian establishment, back Israel to the hilt is presented as the most damning evidence. 

 

Those who adopt such views are certain to reject any suggestion that we should challenge antisemitism. Yet there it is an historically rooted prejudice and there are virulently antisemitic and fascistic currents at work in this society. Threats and violence against Jewish people do happen. The notion that responding to them undermines Palestine solidarity is utterly incorrect in my view.

 

I fully understand that, unlike the period before WW2, Jews in Canada today don’t face the kind of discrimination or disadvantage that Black or Indigenous people experience. The threat of violence that hangs over Muslims is much greater than that which confronts Jews. I also realize that a realistic assessment of the scale of antisemitism is hampered by the use of the false conflation of anti-Zionism with anti-Jewish prejudice. 

 

Despite these considerations, I reject the notion that challenging real manifestations of antisemitism ‘gives comfort to the enemy.’ Actually, one of the great vulnerabilities of the Zionists is their dogged refusal to deal with real antisemitism. They pretended that Elon Musk’s infamous Nazi salute was an ‘awkward gesture’ and the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA) peddled incredibly softly as the fascist led ‘Freedom Convoy’ displayed swastikas. 

 

This disgusting selectivity can be more effectively challenged by opposing real antisemitism than by maintaining that it doesn’t exist or that, if it does, ‘The Jews’ have brought it on themselves. Let’s shake off notions of the malevolent Jewish soul and take up a serious, principled and far more effective opposition to all forms of bigotry and hatred, including antisemitism.