Beyond the fringe II

Slightly to my surprise, one of my regular correspondents has asked for more coverage of the Socialist Workers’ Party as opposed to the Liberal Democrats. So here goes - but first a note on sources.

Of the political thought of Trotsky himself, there are a few works of high quality that I have found illuminating. Most voluminous is Baruch Knei-Paz’s unparalleled survey, The Social and Political Thought of Leon Trotsky. I’ve also learned much from a paper by Norman Geras, 'Political Participation in the Revolutionary Thought of Leon Trotsky', in Geraint Parry (ed.), Participation in Politics. Beyond this, there is little apart from the flawed hagiography by Isaac Deutscher, and an interesting memoir by Trotsky’s former aide Al Glotzer, written once the author had sensibly abandoned Trotskyism and become a Social Democrat.

Very little has been written about the SWP specifically other than by its partisans. Indeed the political tradition of Trotskyism generally, unlike Communism, has had, so far as I am aware, no reliable and objective survey ever written about it. There are two good books on the British scene – British Trotskyism and The Far Left in British Politics - by John Callaghan that cover it, but both are now dated. A brief survey of Trotskyism, by Alex Callinicos – SWP ideologue and Professor of Politics at York – strikes me as self-justifying rubbish. (It’s only fair to add that one Marxist theorist I have immense respect for – Paul Hirst, a friend who died prematurely last year – thought highly of Callinicos. I may be wrong, but I put this down to Paul’s having written various impenetrable tomes on Althusser – also a subject of interest to Callinicos - in his misguided youth, before a startling transformation rendered him both lucid and politically sane.)

But despite the dearth of published material, almost everything you need to know about the SWP is contained in the succinct observation of the left-wing Observer columnist Nick Cohen that the party is totalitarian and parasitic. It’s also antisemitic, and with these two rhyming adjectives it becomes possible to construct a perfectly serviceable piece of doggerel.

This week I shall post brief comments on each of the three characteristics of the SWP that I’ve identified. I may also write something on the economic theories by which the SWP is best-known – state capitalism, and the permanent arms economy – but as these are really not at all convincing as economic explanations and make sense only as part of the SWP’s wider ideology, they will probably fit easily enough into my discussion of the party’s totalitarianism.

I’ve already intimated something of the character of the SWP’s campaigning on the Arab-Israeli conflict, and will merely add one or two details here. While anti-Zionism is not inherently antisemitic, the SWP’s variant of it in my judgement does cross an important and regrettably porous boundary. The party line is provided by an obscure, crude and prejudiced work by a Belgian Trotskyite, Abram Leon, entitled in English The Jewish Question: A Marxist Interpretation and published shortly after the war (in which Leon died in the camps). Unlike most Marxist polemicists, Leon did know the writings of Zionist theorists well, but his own attempt at explaining the emergence of Jewry with reference to the development of capitalism is unintentionally comic. This is how he accounts for the burgeoning of Zionism:

The Jewish bourgeoisie is compelled to create a national state, to assure itself of the objective framework for the development of its productive forces, precisely in the period when the conditions for such a development have long since disappeared.

I hope that my readers will generally share my admiration and support for Israel, though I am aware that some do not. Whatever their views on the subject, however, I do not believe there can be a single one who regards that seriously economically mismanaged nation as the product of the Jewish bourgeoisie’s need for the development of its productive forces.

I’ve noted the inconsistency of the SWP’s position in supporting nationalist movements while vilifying Jewish nationalism. In the past year or so, this has reached the absurd stage of the party’s allying with Muslim particularism; an outstanding example is the publication in the party’s quarterly review, International Socialism, last autumn of the following sentiments by Salma Yaqoob of the Birmingham Stop the War Coalition:

The challenge for many non-Muslims, especially in the West, is to admit the possibility that there are values as universally valid as their own, and that it does not have a monopoly over the production of modernity. For example, the breadth and complexity of the Islamic movement and the Muslim presence, with its contribution to Western culture historically and its current role in extending modernity in the Middle East, needs to be acknowledged.

Encouragingly, there is even an important progressive role for the wearing of the hijab:

It is notable that the majority of the Muslims playing a leading role in the Birmingham Stop the War Coalition were women, confident in their Islamic identity and increasingly confident in their ability to present themselves as leaders of this broad movement. Contingents of young Muslim women, well organised and often more forthcoming than Muslim men, were a striking feature of all our demonstrations and protests. I would attribute this effect to the fact that, by wearing the hijab (headscarf), many of these women are constantly conscious of their Muslim identity when interacting in public. Having to continually combat and overcome perceptions of Muslim women being oppressed, and challenging negative stereotypes of Islam, they are actually more experienced and confident than many Muslim men in engaging with others.

But the SWP’s campaigning evidences uglier forces than mere inconsistency. Take this example from Socialist Worker’s US edition, 17 May 2002, under the monstrous sub-heading – implicitly comparing Israel under Sharon to Nazi Germany – “Is this Sharon’s ‘final solution’?”:

"Nazis never openly declared their intention to massacre Jews and Gypsies," wrote Israel Shamir in a recent article titled "The Jewish state must be de-Nazified as thoroughly as Germany after 1945." "[T]hey spoke of ‘deportation’ and ‘transfer’ as their ‘Final Solution.’ Even in 1938, these ideas did not have such wholehearted support in Nazi Germany as they have now in the Jewish state."

Get the message? Israel is worse than Nazi Germany.

But note that reference to Israel Shamir. Shamir is a Russian emigrant to Israel who trades on his distinctive name to engage in virulent antisemitic tirades. He writes for extreme Right-wing Russian newspapers, and is featured prominently on the web site of the British National Party – appropriately, given his association with neo-Nazis and Holocaust deniers. In the late 1990s he even tried to come to an arrangement with the Holocaust denier David Irving to sell Nazi memorabilia confiscated by the Russians at the end of the war. He is on record as describing the French Holocaust denier Roger Garaudy as a ‘great man’. His vitriolic anti-Jewish bigotry has even been disowned by (some) elements of the anti-Israel movement. The founder of the Electronic Intifada, Nigel Parry, put together a page of links warning his associates against Shamir, whose writings he correctly described as “a classic anti-Semitic repertoire”.

All of this material has been in the public domain for a long time. Yet Socialist Worker has no compunction at citing in its cause a man of far-Right sympathies and highly traditional antisemitic prejudices (revealingly he terms the Jews ‘Christ-killers’, for example). More significant, the SWP has no means of distinguishing its position on this issue from that of the far-Right, whose propaganda it mirrors in important respects.

I shall be dealing later in the week with the variant of Trotskyism that the SWP has made its own, but in a sense the ideological questions are less central to this organisation than they are to almost any other group on the Marxist fringe. Something that will not have been lost on anyone who comes into contact with the SWP is the implicit violence of its sentiment and language, and the intimidatory nature of its agitation. Among repellent and recurring campaigns are attempts by the party’s student wing to ban Jewish societies from campuses (on the spurious rationalisation that ‘Zionism is racism’). So far as I know they have been successful only once in this, and then only briefly – at what used to be Sunderland Polytechnic, in the mid-80s. (One of my rare and doubtless unsuccessful one-liners was when, attending an anti-apartheid rally shortly after this event, I found myself immediately in front of the banner of the Sunderland Polytechnic Students’ Union, and commented on its bearers’ public-spiritedness in taking time off from banning Jews to come and oppose racism.) But the attempts are legion – most recently, according to my information, at Manchester in 2002.

I heard the SWP’s founder, Tony Cliff (himself, irrelevantly, Jewish, whose nom de guerre appears to have been chosen from Mills & Boon), speak on one occasion. He spent a good deal of time expounding to his audience the imperative of building the revolutionary party. As an instance of its success, he cited the case of a member of the National Front who, convinced by the stirring appeal to his class interests, had come straight over to the SWP. Perhaps because I was less surprised at the scope of the party’s potential appeal, I was also a good deal less impressed than most of the rest of Cliff’s audience at the news.

Comments

[Peter Cuthbertson]

I'd second the comment on the SWP. Indeed, it would be interesting to hear your thoughts on politics more widely. You hint at many of your views on European integration, healthcare and education reform, social and cultural issues, law and order and a number of policy areas while rarely posting on them and in defence of them directly.

[Anthony C]

Would we be talking about the same Paul Hirst who wrote "War and Power in the Twenty-first Century"? If so, I was not aware that he had died. Commiserations.

[FredF]

Why don’t you talk about something actually more important: the worrying problem of the rise of the BNP, rather than your usual “shooting fish in a barrel” approach to politics.

[Albert Langer]

Oliver, I gather you are moving on with your main theme concerning the SWP without responding to my detailed comments on some aspects of that (and on your side remarks sympathetic to Zionism) - so the comments section of your previous thread It really is extremely stupid... - is probably obsolete.

Fair enough, it's your blog and you are entitled to choose what you want to respond to.

I'll just conclude here with a pointer to the second posting by Marcus, where he also moves on to your second installment without actually responding to comments. I am simultaneously posting to More from Oliver with a wrap up of my participation in that discussion at Harry's Place, including a shorter list of points on which I hoped that you, as well as Marcus might actually agree with me on.

I'll also wrap up my participation in the previous discussion here by replying to the comments by Yehudit and by Barry Meislin:

Yehudit,

I agree that your link to Dore Gold's article is a good summary of (zionist) claims and I recommend it to anyone interesed in reading a competent exposition of the Zionist case, by a senior spokesperson in Sharon's government.

I don't have time (or inclination) to respond in detail to that, or to the specific points from it that you made.

Instead I draw your attention to the strikingly obvious fact that it actually highlights the accuracy of my observation that "Only Zionists believe that anybody's attachment to any land anywhere 'extends back millenia'."

I'll spell it out. Part of his article puts forward arguments that non-Zionists can take seriously for discussion. This includes the history of the modern Zionist settlement in Palestine from the nineteenth century onwards. We can disagree about that, without simply finding it incomprehensible.

Much of the rest of it however, relates to a specific, rather religious, account of events that we are told happened from Biblical times to the 14th century or so. Actually I exaggerate, his "historical" claims stretch as far forward as the Ottoman empire in the 15th century - then a mysterious gap in the narrative appears, a gap of 4 centuries and he then switches to a comprehensible (though inaccurate) account of modern historical events from the 19th century.

A single phrase from Dore Gold's article highlights what I said:

...Jewish nationhood preceded the emergence of most modern nation-states by thousands of years

That is far too modest. The Zionist concept of "Jewish nationhood" actually precedes the emergence of ALL modern nation-states by literally thousands of years.

Whatever it is that they are carrying on about, this specifically and purely Zionist conception of "Jewish nationhood" has simply nothing whatever in common with the sort of nations and nation-states that genuine historians describe as starting to consolidate no earlier than the 16th century in Europe and are already starting to erode with modernity there.

It does share something in common with other "national myths" such as are often found for example in the Balkans, especially where competing claims go all the way back to the heyday of the Ottoman Empire. Even today, Serbian chauvinists will insist that Albanians should be ethnically cleansed from Kosova because there were Orthodox monasteries there dating back to the 14th century. We now have International Tribunals to deal with such "ethnic cleansers" with their wild historical myths.

The Zionist conception also shares something in common with Islamist fantasies about a restored Caliphate, going back to the 14th century or even the earliest days of Islam (more than half a millenium after Christianity split from Judaism and after Dore Gold's starting point for wild fantasizing.

To fully understand the gap between these Zionist conceptions and modernity, simply contrast his very well written paper with "The New Anti-Zionists" he is replying to. He describes his target as follows:

The new line does not come from Tehran or Riyadh but, surprisingly from largely European intellectuals and certain voices on the fringe American Left, surfacing recently in The Guardian and The New York Review of Books. It proposes the elimination of Israel and is generally accompanied by calls to establish a bi-national Palestinian-Jewish state in its place.[1]

His footnote 1 does not provide any reference to articles in The Guardian, but here is the article referenced (without a link) from the New York Review of Books - Israel: The Alternative by Tony Judt

Since you have recommended Dore Gold as a good summary of the Zionist case, I hope that people interested enough to look at that will also click on the above link to the actual "New Anti-Zionism" he was specifically responding to.

Also here's an example of the sort of Guardian article that I think he was referring to, No, Anti-Zionism is not Anti-Semitism by Brian Klug.

Both authors incidentally, are Jewish, but not Israeli.

To round things out a bit, let's hear from Israeli citizen, and member of the Israeli Parliament, who is not Jewish - Searching for Meaning by Azmi Bishara. (kudos to stephen marks for link from parallel discussion at Harry's Place).

What these three have in common, and what separates them by a vast gulf from Dore Gold, is that they are fundamentally modern people discussing contemporary problems and what to do about them. Dore Gold isn't even remotely interested in trying to come up with solutions to very real contemporary issues. He's just trying to avoid them and try to uphold a status quo that is almost universally agreed to be untenable by taking comfort from his own national myths.

That kind of argument convinces nobody except the true believers.

I certainly agree with you that "...you would have to go to history books for more details. (I mean real history books that use primary sources and accepted methods of interpreting them, not propaganda works)"

Here's one, by a Jewish historian who isn't just writing nationalist myths and propaganda like Dore Gold, or a "party line" based on silly speculations like Abram Leon, but is really trying to actually understand history using the same accepted methods as other historians studying other historical subjects.

A history of the Jews: ancient and modern - Ilan Halevi

Not available through the book trade but easily accessible in research libraries as above.

Finally, since so much of Dore Gold's argument rests on a version of Jewish religion, let's hear from the remnants of the Torah Jews, still practicing essentially the same archaic religion that was the very definition of Judaism throughout the 4 century gap in Dore Gold's article and long before. For a more accurate account of traditional Jewish religious conceptions, prior to the Zionist takeover of almost all Jewish institutions, following the Holocaust, checkout Jews Against Zionism.

These are of course "Jewish Fundamentalists" by any definition, which I have already mentined my hostility towards. However I do have more respect, and less contempt for them than for other pre-modern fundamentalists, because they have a certain integrity in defending their principles which others lack.

Barry Meislin,

I guess you are even more likely to assume I am arguing for the immediate dissolution of the Israeli state after seeing those references.

Actually I don't happen to fully agree with any of them.

Contrary to the analysis of the three writers on contemporary issues, my view is that the Palestinian compromise offer for a two state solution made long ago, has now basically been accepted not only the Arab League and the Quartet comprising the US, UN, EU and Russia, but also by the mainstream Zionist establishment as indicated by the Geneva Accord and by Sharon's current maneuverings.

Much of the zionist hysteria is similar to what I saw happening as Nixon pulled out from Vietnam, with more and more histrionics about "Prisoners of War" (now "terrorism"), to gradually shift the mentality of the die hard supporters of the war towards believing that it was being fought to recover American POWs (a feat easily achieved by withdrawing the troops once people got used to the idea that it wasn't about defeating communist led liberation movements any more).

Likewise Zionists are being got used to the idea that they didn't really spend the last 3 decades trying to annex "Judea" and "Samaria" but were really building all those settlements to house Palestinian refugees and thus avoid them returning to within the 1967 borders and upsetting the "demographic balance" of the apartheid state.

Unfortunately they keep inflicting their natural confusion on the rest of us, just as we have been bombarded with "Rambo" films as though the Vietnam war was about POWs ever since Nixon's retreat from Vietnam.

I think we are about to see the first step towards a settlement, with an Israeli pullout from Gaza, which will be followed by further steps in the direction of the Geneva Accord and beyond as the strategic focus shifts from consolidating the liberation of Iraq to proceeding with "region change" throughout the Middle East as part of the global democratic revolution. The winds of change are blowing.

What will remain when peace has been established and the rest of the region has undergone democratization and modernization is an anachronistic Zionist state in a country that has a large Arab minority and shares its capital city with a modern and democratic Palestinian state. Zionism will either gradually or suddenly lose its grip on the Hebrew speaking population of Israel. Indeed a closer examination of the other parts of Dore Gold's article shows that it already makes major concessions towards post-Zionism.

At each stage in the Zionist retreat into oblivion we shall see similar such articles, each time defending the status quo as though history had ended, in much the same way that Sharon tries to pretend that Gaza might be the end of Israeli withdrawal, but each time defending that status quo with incoherent arguments increasingly at odds with the realities of the modern world.

I've answered fully, but as I said, I'm not really interested in this debate but merely aimed to point out that one can agree with the main thrust of Oliver Kamm's comments about the pseudo-left SWP without having to accept his incidental assertions that the specific anti-zionist views he mentioned amount to a form of anti-semitism.

I'll try to put some of this stuff up at LastSuperpower when we are fully functional again. I can't promise further replies on this topic, as there are far more important things going on in the world at the moment than either Zionism or the SWP.

[WJ Phillips]

Webster's Dictionary defines "anti-semitism" as "opposition to Zionism: sympathy with opponents of the state of Israel". So now we know.

It's always amusing to read these God-gave-the-land-to-the-people justifications for Israel and to recall that Herzl himself was completely cynical about them. Like most Zionist advocates, he was godless. He was quite ready to ponder Uganda, Venezuela or Madagascar as a homeland, but his confederates eventually decided that the Holy Land was easier to sell. Biiiiiig mistake!

[Christine]

Regarding more information on Israel Shamir, I suggest you consult the following article from the Norwegian anti-fascist web magazine Monitor: http://www.magasinet-monitor.net/english/shamiruk0204.htm

[John Palmer]

I really do sometimes wonder at the lack of rigour which charactertises some contributions to this list. I have many - fundamental - objections to the SWP and its politics. But Mr Kramm's attempt to insinuate an anti-semitic character to the SWP (and its antecedent organisations) is ignorant in the extreme. Certainly the SWP tradition has always been firmly anti-zionist. More than anything else that reflects the influence of the many anti-zionist socialist Jews who were so intellectually influential in its birth and development - Ygael Gluckstein, Chanie Rosenberg, Michael Kidron and later Moshe Machover, Richard Kuper, Stephen Marks and many, many others. Many of them (ex-SWP now) are still active in the Jews for Justice for Palestine. Some participants on this list would do well to check them out.

John Palmer

[David T]

I don't think that anybody would dispute the important role played by jewish anti-zionist socialists in the early days of the Fourth International et al. Its interesting that the only troskyite organisation which does not call for the destruction of the State of Israel is the one founded by a man who was born in Ireland: Sean Matgamna.

The thing about the SWP is that it is the most populist of the trotskyite parties. It essentially invented the trotskyite tabloid, and then changed the name of the party to the paper. It is also - as Oliver will no doubt show - fabulously opportunistic. It seems to exist essentially to recruit cadre. In recent years, and before their flirtation/alliance with "muslim particularism", they've branded themselves as the party of true anti-globalisation, with lectures on the evils of GM foods. Before that, they did a nice series of lectures which were clearly a tie-in with the film "Malcolm X". As long as there is an opporunity to recruit, they'll be there ...

And no shame in that. After all, they're a political party, not a debating society.

However, when you follow the star of populism, and adapt your thesis to provide the ideological basis for your current recruitment drive, you shouldn't complain you're branded "opportunistic". And if you're trying to recruit racists, should shouldn't be surprised if people make the quite understandable judgement that you have also become a racist party.

[Oliver Kamm]

Mr Palmer - Thank you for your comments.

First, I did not 'insinuate' an antisemitic character to the SWP's propaganda: I asserted it directly. Secondly, your reference to the SWP's 'antecedent organisations' is your own. I didn't mention those antecedent organisations. My choice of language was deliberate.

For those of my readers who may not be aware of it, let me explain your rationale for shifting the argument from the SWP's recent history to the party's 'birth and development'. As you were a leading member of the predecessor organisation of the SWP, the International Socialists, I understand your wish to protest that organisation's innocence of the charge of antisemitism. You'll be pleased to know I'm content to go along with that up to a point, for it is possible to discern a shift in emphasis in the IS/SWP's arguments on Israel, very roughly corresponding to the periods before and after the Six-Day War. (A similar division marks a significant proportion of the far Left in the western democracies. My friend Werner Cohn has done much work on this division in the position of Trotskyite parties on the Jewish question. I have myself written at some length on this blog on the antisemitism and neo-Nazism of the terrorist wing of the German far-Left in the 1970s.) In the earlier period the IS line appears to me to have been a fairly standard revolutionary appeal to the unity of Arab and Jewish workers. However bizarre I find that position with regard to realism and relevance, I wouldn't necessarily ascribe it to antisemitism. The later period, of which you make no mention while complaining of other people's lack of rigour, is a different matter. Especially since the metamorphosis of the IS into the SWP in 1976/7, the party's propaganda has taken a substantially different line that depicts Israeli Jews as 'colons' and that is - to use the most neutral word I can of the phenomenon - indifferent to Arab antisemitism. That Socialist Worker's US edition can cite as a credible source someone whom anti-Israel campaigners themselves dismiss as an antisemite marks an enlightening further stage in the party's evolution.

As I very carefully said, anti-Zionism is not inherently antisemitic, but the SWP's variant of anti-Zionism crosses an essential boundary. The SWP is the principal conduit for antisemitism in Britain today, and its thuggish intimidation of Jewish students is of a piece with that role. Whether the party makes a further decisive shift in the direction of fascism and overt antisemitism - in the manner of the French Marxist Jacques Doriot, mentor of the wartime traitor John Amery - seems to me an open question.

It's not important, but my name is not Kramm.

[Kit Taylor]

"Whatever their views on the subject, however, I do not believe there can be a single one who regards that seriously economically mismanaged nation as the product of the Jewish bourgeoisie’s need for the development of its productive forces."

Oliver

Given your broadly liberal take on economics, do you have any sympathy with the libertarian argument that pro-Israelis should oppose financial aid to Israel as a subsidy masking harmful economic policy?

[Simon]

David T:
"Its interesting that the only troskyite organisation which does not call for the destruction of the State of Israel is the one founded by a man who was born in Ireland: Sean Matgamna."

That isn't actually true. The AWL may be the only trotskyist organisation in Britain that thinks Israeli jews should have the right to their own nation state (like any other nation, including the Palestinians), but it certainly isn't the only one in the world. Try the LCR and Lutte Ouvriere in France for a start.

I think that banning jewish student socieities for defending the right of Israel to exist (I notice that it never seems to be gentile organsiations that support Israel's right to exist that get targeted), and forming electoral alliances with Islamists, flows form the fact that the Israeli jews are demonised as the only nation on earth undeserving of national rights.

[alister]

quote: "That Socialist Worker's US edition can cite as a credible source someone whom anti-Israel campaigners themselves dismiss as an antisemite marks an enlightening further stage in the party's evolution."

However the Socialist Worker in the US is the publication of the International Socialist Organisation which was expelled from the SWP "international" a few years ago. Part of the same tradition certainly, but with no actual organisational link, indeed there is a degree of hostility between the two. The British SWP had a loose grouping associated with it in the US but has also lost that and has no current US "section".

Many organisations on the left have a "two state" position regarding Palestine and Israel. Try the Socialist Party (ex-Militant) for a start.

[David T]

Simon - thanks. I do buy Lutte Ouvriere when I'm offered it in France, but my french is too dismal to understand it properly.
Alister: I wasn't aware of the S.P.'s position - can you link to an article for me?

[alister]

The SP on Palestine/Israel
http://www.socialismtoday.org/64/Israel-Palestine.html

"For a socialist Palestine alongside a socialist Israel as part of a voluntary socialist confederation of the Middle East with guaranteed democratic rights for all national minorities."

I'm not a member of either the SP or SWP by the way.

[David T]

Alister - I'm very grateful for this.

[Fabian]

Posted correctly here:

Albert Langer was Australia's original Maoist "Jew" against Zionism. His own polemics against Israel are not available online but others have documented how the anti-Zionist line of Brother Langer and the Communist Party of Australia (Marxist-Leninist) -- of which he was Vice-Chairman -- “introduced pro-Palestine positions into the Australian Left” (see The CPA (M-L) and Political/Industrial Violence: Rationale And Results).

That, of course, was during the early to mid 1970s when Brother Albert and the CPA (M-L) had the City of Melbourne enthralled with violent demos, indiscrete armed militia training and calls for a united front of “patriotic classes” for, variously, the overthrow of US imperialism or Soviet social-imperialism (see Living by the Little Red Book, by Mark Dapin, "Good Weekend" 2003-12-13. The Age, Melbourne)
.
Nowadays you can can’t but notice Brother Langer’s postings to international blogs promoting his “pseudo-left” catch-phrase – but you’ll search the web forever looking for his explanation or self-criticism of four decades of political arrogance and ideological failure.

Brother Langer’s sudden discarding of his anti-Zionist line in favour of the “Palestinian [!?!] compromise offer for a two state solution made long ago” (see this thread) is equally vacuumous.

He insists that “Zionists cannot be our allies, let alone our friends” (see thread It really is extremely stupid) but advocates a position that has been overwhelmingly supported by the people of Israel since their State was established and has been the basis of every Israeli peace deal proffered to neighbouring states or the PLO!

Brother Langer has indicated that, yawn, he’s “not really interested in this debate” and “can't promise further replies on this topic, as there are far more important things going on in the world”.

But I will be waiting breathlessly for him to “try to put up” a meaningful insight into how he has developed “some of this stuff.” Perhaps it is time for Harry or the soon-to-be blogger-bludgers at ‘Socialism in an Age of Waiting’ to help Brother Langer get his cutting-edge, www.lastsuperpower.net website “fully functional again.”

[David T]

Oh, Maoists! They're fun.

What is the line of the Peruvian Maoists on Palestine - whose graffiti I occasionally see around town - I wonder?

My guess is that it is "Move Heaven and Earth to Defend the Life of Comrade Gonzalo" or something like that

[pins]

As opposed to these Peruvians, David?

http://www.jrep.com/Columnists/Article-139.html

[David T]

oh, how odd!

[Barry Meislin]

Albert Langer:

While it is generally gratifying to receive a response to any of my remarks, I am beginning to regret succumbing to the temptation of having taken your prior comment in any way seriously.

This only because your current response is a paradigm of masterful confusion (even if such confusion would seem to be, like most things, the fault of the Zionists).

I may well be exposing my lack of imagination to the public view; but I fail to understand how someone can hold that Arafat’s position that Israel must withdraw to the 1967 borders and then allow all the Palestinian refugees (and their descendants) to return to their pre-1948 homes within Israel constitutes a genuine "compromise offer for a two state solution made long ago."

It seems I should have paid more attention to two of your more remarkable contentions in the prior post:

"In the current struggle for modernizing and democratizing the middle east, Zionists cannot be our allies, let alone our friends, because their interests lie diametrically opposed to victory in that struggle."

(Sounds dramatic, and is perhaps even convincing as long as one doesn't pay it much mind; but aren't Zionist sympathizers/apologists like the neo-cons trying to democratize the middle east? And didn't most Israelis elect Ehud Barak to make a proposal for Palestinians statehood?)

"Even George W Bush knows that he can't win Arab hearts and minds in alliance with Israel. The pro-war left ought to be in the forefront of pushing for the necessary break to be made faster."

(Does this mean that once the break with Israel is made, the Arab states then democratize like dominos and modernize like there's no tomorrow?---both of which, Israel has presumably been preventing for the past 56 years.)

Now it is entirely possible that the Arabs have refused to democratize and modernize precisely because of Israel's existence; and that such existence must be somehow "solved" before the Arabs will agree to do something which we all believe (but do they?) to be in their best interest. If this is the case, why not just come out and say that Israel must be eradicated for progress to be made; essentially, for the good of all. Why patronize us with the fervent, if dishonest, belief in the two-state solution?

The mind can only wonder at such creative ingenuity. I should have resisted the temptation.

[Albert Langer]

Barry Meislin,

Thanks for your comments. Despite your tone I agree that you raise issues that deserve a serious response. So I will try to provide one as soon as I can, which unfortunately is unlikely to be over the next few days, but may have to wait until Lastsuperpower is fully operational again. Please check there.

Oliver,

I will also respond to "Fabian" and his neo-nazi description of me as a 'Maoist "Jew"'. That will be shorter and therefore also sooner. First, however I would like to give you an opportunity to disassociate yourself from what appears to be the use of your blog by Fabian to substitute neo-nazi abuse for your still missing response to my actual arguments.

Is "Fabian" a regular commentator and is he welcone here?

[Albert Langer]

What the heck, even though it's 6am in Melbourne and I really should get some sleep as I have to focus on more urgent things over the next few years, I simply cannot resist a quick reply to Barry Meislin right now...

[barry]
... I fail to understand how someone can hold that Arafat’s position that Israel must withdraw to the 1967 borders and then allow all the Palestinian refugees (and their descendants) to return to their pre-1948 homes within Israel constitutes a genuine "compromise offer for a two state solution made long ago...."

[albert] The right of refugees to return is a fundamental human right which the Palestinians cannot, will not and should not abandon.

The practical reality is that the large majority of those entitled to return will prefer to return to the Palestinian state in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem rather than to the Israeli state where they would join the million or so Arabs within the 1967 borders as second class cities.

[barry, first quoting albert]
"In the current struggle for modernizing and democratizing the middle east, Zionists cannot be our allies, let alone our friends, because their interests lie diametrically opposed to victory in that struggle."

(Sounds dramatic, and is perhaps even convincing as long as one doesn't pay it much mind; but aren't Zionist sympathizers/apologists like the neo-cons trying to democratize the middle east? And didn't most Israelis elect Ehud Barak to make a proposal for Palestinians statehood?)

Yes, many of the neo-cons who support democratizing the middle east are also zionists.

In the very same comment that Barry is responding to I said, quite clearly:

"Contrary to the analysis of the three writers on contemporary issues, my view is that the Palestinian compromise offer for a two state solution made long ago, has now basically been accepted not only the Arab League and the Quartet comprising the US, UN, EU and Russia, but also by the mainstream Zionist establishment as indicated by the Geneva Accord and by Sharon's current maneuverings." (emphasis added)

I would also say that the mainstream Zionist leadership in the US, not just the neocons, and not just the old Israeli establishment that negotiated the Geneva accords is also moving towards support for a compromise similar to the Geneva Accord, as are the majority of Israelis.

There is still a solid zionist consensus against the Palestinian right of return - at least as strong as the Afrikaner consensus in favor of maintaining Apartheid in say 1985. But apartheid ended 5 years later and the winds of change are blowing strongly.

In the 1950s the US was strongly opposed to democracy in the middle east and supported the most reactionary anti-democratic tyrannies in each country, from Baath fascists to Saudi feudalists, for much the same reason that it supported military "gorilla" dictatorships in Latin America - to suppress communism (and also in the hope that dependent regimes hostile to their own people would provide oil more cheaply than independent democracies).

Through the 1970s the US continued that policy in its contest with the rival superpower.

That policy has not really coincided with US interests for decades. Its continuation, even while the "gorilla" regimes were being dismantled in favor of Parliamentary sysems in Latin America, South Africa, Indonesia, the Phillipines, Taiwan, South Korea reflected Israeli interests far more than it reflected US interests.

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Kuwait war, Israel has been clearly recognized as a "strategic liability" rather than a strategic asset in policy making circles (though not among "opinion leaders").

Since 911 the US leadership has been forced to face up to the fact that Israeli interest in being surrounded by weak backward Arab regimes rather than strong modern rapidly industrializing democratic states ran directly counter to US interests.

Bush's statement that "tolerating" Arab tyrannies has "not made America more secure" is a classic. The reality is that actively supporting Arab tyrannies has made America very insecure indeed. US policy makers now know that there is no way to eliminate terrorist attacks emanating from the backwards swamps of the middle east without "draining the swamps" and that means modernizing and therefore also democratizing the whole region.

By warmly embracing Sharon, and making defence of Israel a subordinate part of the "war on terror", Bush has carefully prepared public opinion for an acceptance that a "two state solution" is vital to US national interests. An end to Palestinian terrorism can easily be achieved in exactly the same way that Nixon achieved "peace with honour" and the triumphant return of all American POWS - by accepting defeat and withdrawing the occupation forces.

Barry's belief that Ehud Barak offered a two-state solution long ago reflects the success of that transformation in the views of "opinion leaders" and their unthinking followers.

He is welcome to celebrate the forthcoming establishment of an independent Palestinian state and the handover of zionist settlements in the West Bank to house returning Palestinian refugees as being just what zionism always wanted and to rationalize the zionist defeat as being a great success in overcoming the evil Palestinian leaderships vicious plots to prevent the zionists achieving their ancient dream of a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital.

Its a pity that Ehud Barak himself won't go along with the charade and is angrily denouncing the Geneva Accords as sellout of basic Zionist principles.

Both die hard zionists and the pseudo-left have a similar world view which makes it impossible for them to imagine that either the US or Israel is retreating from its previous positions. The blogosphere resounds with their polemics, but meanwhile the world moves on.

[barry, first quoting albert]

"Even George W Bush knows that he can't win Arab hearts and minds in alliance with Israel. The pro-war left ought to be in the forefront of pushing for the necessary break to be made faster."

(Does this mean that once the break with Israel is made, the Arab states then democratize like dominos and modernize like there's no tomorrow?---both of which, Israel has presumably been preventing for the past 56 years.)

[albert] No, the Arab tyrannies will not "democratize like dominoes" - they will continue to resist democratization. But the combination of a modern democratic state in Iraq and in Palestine will both set an example and undermine their demagogic attempts to divert hostility to their own tyrannical regimes into "solidarity against imperialism and zionism". The process that will follow could be as slow as in Latin America or as rapid as in Eastern Europe but the global democratic revolution will certainly sweep through the Arab world.

The remainder of Barry's comments are too incoherent to be worth replying to.

Hmm, that took 1hr 20minutes. I hope it was worth it.

[Barry Meislin]

I am absolutely delighted (and reassured) to discover that one so utterly confused finds me incoherent....

[Oliver Kamm]

Mr Langer - Anyone is welcome to post comments here provided they are relevant to the subject and conform to certain conventions that I've previously stated (e.g. no obscene or 'unparliamentary' language). Putting the word 'Jew' in inverted commas when not a quotation strikes me as redundant at best, and I could understand your taking some offence at it, but the mere term 'Maoist Jew' doesn't breach those conventions. It is moreover dwarfed by your own off-hand use of the term 'neo-Nazi' to denote the comments you find exceptionable. 'Neo-Nazism' is so grave a charge to make of someone that it requires substantiation if it's not to debase the discussion altogether. (I have myself used the term in relation to causes I have written about here - notably sections of the German Left in the 1970s - and have presented at some length the evidence for that term's aptness in the context.)

Please be aware, as I have said, that this is a moderated forum, which requires a certain degree of civility to other contributors. Your own remark above that your interlocutor's comments are 'too incoherent to be worth replying to' comes close to that boundary. If in your judgement a contributor's comments are too incoherent - or eccentric, or vapid, or crankish, or frivolous - to merit a response, then the proper course is not to respond. As you have already noted, that is the approach I myself adopt in such cases.

[Albert Langer]

Oliver,

I responded seriously to those comments by Barry Meislin that were worth responding to, despite their tone, and ignored those parts that were simply incoherent, while mentioning that was the reason for doing so. A glance at Barry's postings on this page, comparing the parts I responded to with the parts I described as too incoherent, and his subsequent riposte, should be sufficient to clarify the criteria I was using.

I also responded seriously to your postings and to Yehudit, without any adverse comment on the tone or on parts that I chose not to respond to.

I have also acted in accordance with your own advice in following my usual policy of just ignoring comments that are "too incoherent - or eccentric, or vapid, or crankish, or frivolous - to merit a response" - such as those from David T seeking to join "Fabian" by associating me with Peruvian "Maoists".

However I disagree with your implication that the abuse of me by "Fabian" was even remotely "relevant to the subject", let alone that I should have ignored it if I took offence.

"Fabian" said nothing that could plausibly be misunderstood as being anything to do with the subject but instead claimed that Albert Langer was Australia's original Maoist "Jew", and that others have documented how the anti-Zionist line of Brother Langer and the Communist Party of Australia (Marxist-Leninist) -- of which he was Vice-Chairman -- “introduced pro-Palestine positions into the Australian Left” (see The CPA (M-L) and Political/Industrial Violence: Rationale And Results.)

I described that, and his theme about Maoist "violence", as a "neo-nazi description" and "neo-nazi abuse". I was not taking offence at the use of quotation marks and in general I do not bother to "take offence" at "politically incorrect" language. I was deliberately making a grave charge and I certainly agree with you that such charges should be substantiated if they are not to "debase the discussion altogether".

I gave you the opportunity to disassociate yourself from "Fabian". As you have not done so, and thus saved me the trouble, you are now stuck with my referring to him as your supporter, until you do disassociate yourself. I will now substantiate the grave charge of neo-nazism against your supporter. (I should add that it would be opportunist and pathetic to try and accuse you of neo-nazism on the basis of some remarks from one of your supporters, just as I regard your attempts to label the SWP that way as failing to substantiate the grave charges you made).

The accusations that 'others have documented' against me, and which you have now published twice, without disassociating yourself from them after an invitation to do so, are lifted directly from an academic paper by Dr. Jim Salaem at the URL provided by "Fabian".

The reason for the obsession of neo-nazi fascists like Salaem with "Maoist violence" and jewish Maoists, echoed by your supporter, "Fabian", is explained in the following, more or less accurate, paragraph from the article your supporter references to "document" his abuse and allegations of violence:

On January 31 1971, a mass rally on the Yarra Bank in Melbourne drew thousands of Melbourne Jews, ‘anti-fascists’ and the WSA supporters to protest the activities of the neo-nazi ‘National Socialist Party of Australia’ (NSPA). Langer incited a considerable part of the crowd to ignore prominent Zionist leader of the Jewish Ex-Servicemen’s Association, Abraham Cykiert, and march on the Nazi headquarters in Carlton. In the ensuing riot, the building was ransacked. (29) ...

I did in fact help organize a resort to force to suppress a neo-Nazi group in Melbourne after it launched an "action program" of violent attacks on left bookshops and jewish owned retailers with protection and some encouragement from the Victoria Police Special Branch (subsequently dissolved in the aftermath).

It was not armed force, and we did not engage in "indiscrete armed militia training", but it certainly was a "violent" demo. It is also true that we got substantial mass support from within the Melbourne jewish communty and bitter opposition from its Zionist leadership.

I can certainly understand why an especially clueless Zionist, like "Fabian", might think that academic paper would be a useful source for a "documented" personal attack on me as a substitute for the evident inability of other Zionists here to actually deal with my arguments.

However, even the most clueless Zionist should have realised what "others" he was referencing in the subsequent paragraphs:

The Maoists made another enemy: Cykiert. From late 1971 until 1973 he met in secret with Cass Young. (36) Precisely how the meetings were first initiated could not be determined. Yet, this unholy alliance was ‘logical’. Zionists could employ a neo-nazi anti-semitic group on several levels. The Nazis could operate against pro-Palestine Left groups and ensure the Zionist structures had time to ‘reintegrate’ into controlled groups, those Jews who had followed Langer in the Carlton riot. The subterranean Maoist/Zionist struggle continued until 1979, when the Maoists lost effective control over 3CR radio which had to its credit, intensified the spread of anti-Zionist, and pro-Palestinian propaganda in Melbourne. Vanguard published a welter of anti-Zionist material in the 1970’s and Langer subsequently founded a ‘Jews Against Zionism And Anti-Semitism’ to reply to mainstream Jewish sympathy for Israel. It was perhaps this anti-Zionist line taken by the CPA (M-L) and the Zionist reply to it, which introduced pro-Palestine positions into the Australian Left. Cykiert urged the Nazis to act against the CPA (M-L), and from my interpretations of discussions with Young in November 1981 and January 1982, suggested the NSPA would enjoy support if it did so.

As it happens I am fairly well known in the Melbourne left as having assisted in dislodging supporters of the CPA(ML) from control of Community Radio 3CR while simultaneously defeating a Zionist attempt to have that station branded as "anti-semitic" for its broadcasts in solidarity with the Palestinians. Also, I was never a Vice-Chair of the CPA(ML), as claimed by Salaem and echoed by "Fabian", (although I am embarassed to admit that I was closely associated with them for nearly a decade until it split in 1976-7).

More important is the echo by "Fabian" of Salaem's crediting the CPA(ML) and I with having introduced anti-Zionist and pro-Palestinian positions to the Australian left.

In fact the left has always had an anti-Zionist tradition since before Zionism finally settled on Palestine as its target for colonization. Since Jews first left the ghettoes there has been an important jewish component in all left and even liberal political trends, which traditionally treated Zionism as a vicious enemy of anything progressive and a cowardly proposal to retreat from the fight against anti-semitism back into a new ghetto.

But that is merely incidental. My point is that "Fabian" drew his abuse against me, as well as his claim that I was a Vice-Chair of the CPA(ML), from precisely the paragraphs of the academic paper that are the most unambiguous of those identifying the author as a neo-nazi with the usual paranoid fantasies about bolshevik-jewish and zionist conspiracies.

Those paragraphs continue:

The relationship between Young and Cykiert was known to many in the former NSPA; the author is further advised the subject was discussed at a disorderly meeting of the Victorian Jewish Board Of Deputies after this fact was publicly exposed by me in the 1980’s. I also state here for the first time in print, that in January 1973, after an ‘information-collecting-visit’ to Young’s Nazi headquarters, I was driven by him to Melbourne city. Curious as to his conversation, I subsequently concealed myself, and witnessed a meeting commence between the two conspirators in Queen Street, Melbourne...

I doubt that anybody bothered to respond to Salaem's revelations in 1980. I certainly didn't when I first read this paper years ago, and I am not aware of Cykiert having bothered either.

I will mention however, that following the capture of the entire Nazi membership list in the raid on their HQ, it was widely disseminated and, perhaps as a reult, it may well be that many of their active members, not just Cass Young, received visits politely inquiring about their future intentions, no doubt including some from jewish ex-servicemen such as Cykiert.

It is certainly no coincidence that immediately after the list was captured and disseminated that "Nutzi" group completely disappeared from the Melbourne scene (without any visible evidence of the further "struggles" that the author reports fantasies about).

The author of that academic paper, Salaem, is a white-racialist extremist who prefers to be described as an Australian Radical Nationalist Revolutionary. His doctoral thesis provides some valuable insight into the important distinctions between a stricter definition of "neo-nazi" on the one hand, and what he calls "nuztis", various sorts of fascists and other quite distinct trends on the extremist right, on the other hand, as well as useful information on specific neo-nazi and other violent extremist groups he was closely familiar with from first hand involvement.

My description of him as a neo-nazi fascist is not mere abuse, but consistent with the normal (loose) use of that term fully justified by his occasional lapses into obviously paranoid anti-semitic raving such as the paragraphs from which "Fabian" "documented" his abuse as well as by the parallels between his own ideology and the "Strasserism" version of nazism.

Also worth mentioning is Salaem's criminal conviction for violent revenge on an informer against a fellow neo-nazi, as documented in the introduction to his doctoral thesis proudly displayed at the same web site.

"This Thesis was conceived under singular circumstances. The author was in custody, convicted of offences arising from a 1989 shotgun attack upon the home of Eddie Funde, Representative to Australia of the African National Congress. On October 6 1994, I appeared for Sentence on another charge in the District Court at Parramatta. I had been convicted of participation in an unsuccessful attempt to damage a vehicle belonging to a neo-nazi informer. My Thesis-proposal was tendered as evidence of my prospects for rehabilitation and I was cross-examined about that document."

While shotgun attacks on representatives of the ANC might not pose any difficulties for supporters of the well documented alliance between Israel and the Apartheid regime in South Africa, only a totally clueless Zionist would have no qualms about citing the ravings of neo-nazis convicted of violent revenge against betrayals of their neo-nazi comrades.

I believe I have substantiated my "grave charges".

So I ask you again, Oliver, is "Fabian" a regular poster here and is he welcome?

Hopefully, "Fabian" will not attempt a reply to this exposure and will just change his hotmail account and either slink off elsewhere or resume posting here under a different pseudonym.

But I'm more interested in your reaction, Oliver. An apology would be nice but what I am really hoping for is that this demonstration will persuade you that it is necessary to take seriously my critique of your making the "grave charge" of anti-semitism against the SWP.

It is quite possible for a rapidly degenerating opportunist formation like the SWP to engage in pathetic united action with Muslim particularists like the MAB without justifying such accusations.

You ignored my analysis of the specific quotes you cited to substantiate your grave charges in They really are extremely stupid....

How about responding to them now, in the light of the fresh insight into how opportunism need not necessarily involve anti-semitism provided by your own, now indisputable, failure to identify where precisely your supporter "Fabian" was actually coming from?

You endorsed there a silly remark by "maor" that voting rights for Arabs who are Israeli citizens refutes any comparison between Apartheid and Israel, (which rules over a segregated population of Palestinians with no voting rights in the West Bank and Gaza).

That is an example of the sort of "debate" I am simply not interested in. Which is why I ignored it as "too incoherent - or eccentric, or vapid, or crankish, or frivolous - to merit a response".

What I am hoping for is simply a response here and now to my detailed argument then, that whether you agree with such comparisons with Apartheid or not, you have simply not substantiated your grave charge of anti-semitism by referring to them.

I accepted before that you were entitled not to respond. But you ought to take my point more seriously now after your own experience with "Fabian".

PS If you are also inclined to throw in personal attacks based on attempting to 'document' my history, then instead of "searching the web in vain", like "Fabian", you will find from the front page of the currently minimal Lastsuperpower web site that "Fabian" refers to, an article about SIAW which includes a link to a 1990s journal, "Red Politics" that could provide you with some better ammunition.

Unfortunately my much earlier polemics with the CPA(ML) and with Zionism occurred in the late 1970s and 1980s and are consequently not currently available online.

[MeTooThen]

Those that have contributed above at length, with much passion and, I should say, considerable erudition, fail to state the obivious and the most significant reason why there is no peace in and around Israel, it is unwelcomed by her neighbors.

Since its inception and following the near-annihilation of European Jewry, there has been an unrelenting genocidal war against the Jews in Israel waged by the Arab States and their Palestinian Arab proxies.

The road map to peace, and the Geneva Accord, like Oslo, are a fiction.

Mr. Langer, and his Jewish comrades on the Left will be slaughtered, without mercy or hesitation, whether in Tel Aviv, London, Paris, Brussels, Melbourne, New York, or Timbuktu, for the sole reason they are Jewish, long after each and every Jew in Israel has been murdered and the land returned to the Arabs.

No, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Fatah, Hezbolah, the Iranian Theocracy, the Wahhabists, will hunt you down dear comrade, wherever you are, because you are an Infidel, and forever will be. Yes, you could hope (certainly not pray) for d'himmitude, but alas, their formulation is that it is better for you to die than live a Jew.

And no, your fealty to the proletariat will not save you, just as it didn't save the Jews under Lenin, Stalin, or Hitler. New fascists, same Jew.

Until the Left, and the Center, and the Right (although not the BNP mind you) begin to understand this, then and only then, will the solution to the war in Israel come.

When the Palestinians sue for peace, they will be given it fully, immediately, and largely without condition.

Sharansky said it best (I paraphrase here) that in the 1930's the Jews in Europe will told to leave and go to Palestine, now 70 years later they are told to leave Palestine.

[Albert Langer]

"MeTooThen" writes:

Those that have contributed above at length, with much passion and, I should say, considerable erudition, fail to state the obvious and the most significant reason why there is no peace in and around Israel, it is unwelcomed by her neighbors.

Since its inception and following the near-annihilation of European Jewry, there has been an unrelenting genocidal war against the Jews in Israel waged by the Arab States and their Palestinian Arab proxies.

[albert]
A short answer is given by Rabbi Yisroel Dovid Weiss:

Friends, there will be no peace in the Middle East until their is no state of Israel.

Rabbi Weiss continues:

Of course immediately part of the solution is, we’d like to see the West Bank and Gaza settlements dismantled. The people living there must leave as soon as is humanly possible.

But, this is only one part of the solution. Yes, the immediate decision in keeping with common sense, is to begin a Palestinian state. But these solutions are only for the interim and only a part of the solution.

The true Torah solution, the key to peace is the immediate return of Palestine to the Palestinians in its entirety including the Temple Mount and Jerusalem.

This would, of course, include a full right of return for all Palestinian refuges That is what elementary justice demands. This is the path of the Torah and of common sense.

The Jewish people have many mitzvos (commandments) to pursue in their exile. Fighting and killing Palestinian children are not among them.

Of course, today, millions of Jews reside in Palestine. Whether some, all or none of them might stay under Palestinian rule is, of course, up to the land’s rightful rulers, the Palestinians.

This will inevitably begin the process of true peace with justice and healing between the Palestinian people and the Jewish people.

In the meantime, though, given that at present many Jews living in the Holy Land are victims of Zionist propaganda what path should be pursued?

For our part the obligation remains steady. It is to educate the Jewish community about the doctrinal errors and practical evils of Zionism.

It is to join our Palestinian cousins in protest against the evils of Zionism. It is to pursue peace with all men and all nations. It is to practice our faith. It is to worship the Creator with humility, with modesty and piety.

But let us go a step further and examine what the impact of Jewish anti Zionism might be on the Islamic world. First, it is important both practically and morally that Palestinian and general Islamic ideology not confuse Zionism and Judaism and by so doing leave themselves vulnerable to the charge of anti - Semitism.

Further, it could well prove beneficial to the Palestinian cause if they would publicize thier good relations with anti Zionist Jews thus undercutting the stereotype of them in the Zionist dominated media as bigots and baseless haters.

This coalition of anti - Zionist Jews and Palestinians who see the inhumanity of Zionism might well become quite a moral force for good in the world.

In any event, let us resolve to leave here this evening with our mutual moral compasses set right. Let us understand that Torah Jewry is in no way an antagonist of the Palestinian people in particular or of the Islamic world in general.

The hour is late. The civilian death toll mounts daily. Innocents on all sides suffer.

May it be the Creator’s Will that the state of Israel be peacefully dismantled speedily in our days, that Jew and Palestinian live yet in peace with each other around the world and in the Holy Land and that speedily in our days all mankind may merit the advent of Divine Redemption where G-d’s Kingdom will be accepted.

If even jewish fundamentalists, with their archaic religious beliefs, can see the obvious, why should I bother arguing with the pathetic ravings of Zionists like "MeTooThen" and/or "Fabian"?

For the record, I do not agree with neither the traditional (and indeed "fundamentalist")religious conceptions on which the views of Rabbi Weiss are based nor the medium term solution he proposes to deal with the fact that millions of jews (and other non-Palestinians) now live in Palestine:

Whether some, all or none of them might stay under Palestinian rule is, of course, up to the land’s rightful rulers, the Palestinians.

The reality is that despite their origins as colonial settlers seeking to drive out the indigenous Arab community, there is now a Hebrew speaking nationality in Palestine that now has as much right to live there as the Afrikaner colonial settlers now have to live in South Africa. They need no permission from any "rightful rulers" but merely a willingness to live at peace, and on the basis of equal rights (both individual and national) with others (Palestinian Arabs) that also have a right to live there.

While that willingness is absent due both to Zionism on one side and islamist and Arab nationalist extremism on the other side, only the interim solutions endorsed not just by Rabbi Weiss, but also an overwhelming consensus of world opinion are feasible - immediate dismantlement of the Zionist settlements in the West Bank and Gaza to enable an independent Palestinian State there, with Jerusalem as its capital (shared with an Israeli state, still dominated by Zionism).

That is a necessary pre-condition for undermining the Zionist and islamist and Arab nationalist extremism that currently makes it impossible for the two peoples to live in a single state.

But I doubt that we shall have to wait for the Moshiach before further steps become possible.

Certainly principled anti-Zionism is no longer confined to secularists and atheists on the left or the tiny minority of fundamentalists like Rabbi Weiss. Such views are are already becoming almost "mainstream" (though still a small minority and not yet any more than "almost"). See for example the publication of an explicitly anti-Zionist article in Tikkun. That article refutes the "MeToo" line, again from a traditional jewish religious outlook, but with a less "fundamentalist" tone more comprehensible to "mainstream" liberal readers of that publication.

Zionism promised an independent state that would protect the jews that fled Europe with a jewish army, using hysterical rhetoric like that displayed by "MeTooThen". What they have actually achieved is a dependent client of the USA, that is almost universally despised (along with its counterparts in Hamas et al), as an Apartheid regime and a rogue state with an army and airforce of terrorist bombers.

The majority of jews, who preferred and still prefer, safe "exile" in America, Australia, Europe etc to conquering Palestine by killing Palestinian children, have voted with their feet. If their hearts truly yearn for Zion, that yearning exhibits itself only in excessive blogging for Zion.

The minority that followed the pied piper are learning a more painful lesson and it will take longer for them. But they are learning too.

I do not need lessons from Zionists on what islamists would do to jews if they were allowed to succeed. We know that already from what they have done to "fellow" Muslims - and they weren't just trying to hit the largest jewish city in the world when they killed thousands in New York.

The Zionist Mossad (israeli intelligence) thought they were being really clever when they encouraged Hamas to setup its "islamic charities" to undermine the Palestinian nationalist movement with a less dangerous opposition, just as the US imperialist CIA thought it was really clever to spend billions of its own and Saudi cash to train an organize islamist terrorists from around the world to join a "jihad" against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan instead of a national liberation struggle. Both are now suffering the consequences of "blowback" and desperately trying to blame everyone except themselves.

No, dear Zionist, Hamas et al will not be allowed to hunt me or anyone else down. Fateh troops will crush them in Gaza if they continue their terrorist attacks on civilians when they no longer have the cover of "resistance to Zionist occupation" with which to attract sympathy from the victims of that occupation. If Palestinian troops are unable to do it without help - they will receive help, from armies flying the flags of the USA, Russia, the EU and the UN - the same armies that crushed fascism in Europe.

But one army will be of no help at all. The pathetic "jewish Army" of Israel - that has already comprehensively demonstrated its incapacity to protect jews anywhere and is the only regional army that had to be excluded from the near universal Coalition that liberated Kuwait because of its well deserved odious reputation.

Some of those armies have already joined the fight to crush the islamist and fascist enemy in Iraq. Others will join that fight too - side by side with the Iraqi people. But no Zionist army will ever be asked to join that fight, and you, dear Zionist, already know the reason why.

[MeTooThen]

Mr. Langer responds venomously above.

Predictably, he omits any reference or evidence that the Palestinians (or their Iranian or Wahhabist Masters) actually want or are working to achieve peace.

Furthermore, with astonishing gall, he claims the flags of the UN, EU will crush fascism in Palestine, on behalf of Fatah no less! This is as ridiculuous as it is risable. Our dear comrade told us of the flags of the armies that previously crushed fascism before will do it again in Palestine (or wait is it Israel, because there is only one state now?) Before when? WW II? The Balkans? And tell us which armies? Belgium? France? Germany? Spain? The Netherlands? Switzerland? Denmark? Italy? These countries crushed fascism? Are you serious?

And who exactly would condone the deployment of US troops in Israel (outside the World's Zionist Masters of course)?

The UN will crush Hamas? The UN will fight on behalf od Israel, in Israel, with like, guns and stuff? And the UN will crush fascism? As it did to the Baathists in the "oil for food" scam?

Again, are you serious?

And yes, it was the Mossad that created Hamas. No mention of the "Black Hand".

And how convenient, a Torah scholar that wishes for the dismantling of Israel. We have been down that road before, in 1947 and 1948 to be exact. Or quoting from Tikkun, now there's the mainstream!

You see dear comrades, not only is the "borderless cosmopolitan" responsible for the atrocities of the Apartheid state (where Arabs can vote, work, and live where they please within that state), but they are also responsible for the terror committed by the Palestinian Arabs, and the Jews themselves do even want there to be an Israel!

What to do?

Indeed.

There will be no peace because the Arabs do not want it. No mention from comrade Langer regarding 1948, 1967, 1973, etc. War against Israel? What war? And pathetic military, the IDF? Seems the Arabs got a full dose of Whup Ass in Six Days.

As far as protecting Jews anywhere, I didn't know it was up to the IDF to keep synagogues from being torched in Montreal, Los Angeles, and Paris. Nor was I aware that it has ever been possible to keep someone in a free society from putting on a vest packed with nails and bolts, loaded with Semtex, from committing mass murder in a disco, bus, or Seder ceremony, and stop them 100% of the time.

And no, to say the IDF was kept out of the two Gulf Wars because of their "odious reputation" is absurd on its face and borders on the delusional.

And no, there will be no protection for you dear comrade, no matter how far you stick your (collective) head in the sand. This is not a lecture from a pathetic Zionist. I am neither. And if comrade Infidel, you don't believe me when I say you will be high on the list of those to be exterminated, just ask your local Imam. Better yet, you don't have to, because you already know the answer.

[Oliver Kamm]

Mr Langer - I followed the link that you commented on at length, and recognised it immediately as one I too have linked to when explicating the views of the far-Right (specifically those of the founder of the Red Army Fraction, Horst Mahler). You are right in your designation of it, but not, as I understand it, of my correspondent's use of it.

The point that my Israeli correspondent Maor found funny in your comments was your insistence that the UN General Assembly's resolution in 1975 that Zionism was a form of racism demonstrated the mainstream quality of that belief. I found it funny too. I think perhaps you should look into the background of that decision - who moved it, for what purpose, and who supported it.

You may be assured that I am not in the least "inclined to throw in personal attacks based on attempting to 'document' [your] history": my interest in your autobiography is a good deal less than you suppose.

While some people (of whom I am not one, for reasons I have intimated) do appear interested in engaging you in debate, I would appreciate it, if you wish to make use of the comments facility on this blog, if you would desist from accusing them of being clueless and of engaging in pathetic ravings. Please take this as a mild and cordial warning: if you don't heed it, I shall take appropriate action in line with my stated policy on comments.

[Fabian]

Albert Langer’s reply to my brief posting devotes considerable attention to Dr J Salaam’s The CPA (M-L) and Political/Industrial Violence: Rationale And Results. While praising that document’s descriptions of various sorts of fascists and violent extremist groups as “valuable insight” and “useful information”, however, he declares any of Salaams observations of his own activities “paranoid anti-semitic [sic] raving”.

Unfortunately for Brother Langer’s claim, Salaam’s comments were clearly to praise him not to bury him. Salaam credits the Communist Party of Australia (Marxist-Leninist), Brother Langer himself, his “Jews Against Zionism and Anti-Semitism” group and the community radio station 3CR, which broadcast the group’s programs, with intensifying the spread of anti-Zionist and pro-Palestinian propaganda in Melbourne.

And that is true. Although Jews Against Zionism and Anti-Semitism was overwhelmingly rejected by Melbourne’s Jewish community which too easily recognised it as a Maoist front group, the controversy stimulated by the group’s leaders, particularly Brother Langer and fellow Maoist, Victor Zbar, speaking as Jews, against Israel, elevated anti-Zionist and pro-PLO propaganda out of the universities and the (Maoist and Trotskyist) radical left and into Melbourne’s mainstream political arena and media.

The group’s name was a parody of the religious Jews against Zionism organisations whose views are still often quoted by Brother Langer (but with which “for the record” he must tell us, he does not agree) with an “Anti-Semitism” tag to provide cover for the Maoists’ years of violent confrontation with a politically inconsequential, rag-tag gang of local neo-Nazis.

It is this use of political violence that attracted Salaam -- who appears to hide nothing of his white-racist-nationalist politics and associates and convictions for political violence -- to research the CPA (M-L) to “see in the Maoist organization particular ideas of great worth in the struggle to construct a Nationalist party able to challenge State power”.

The CPA (M-L) has been described elsewhere (”Living by the Little Red Book”, by Mark Dapin, Good Weekend, 13 Dec 2003, The Age/SMH) as “an obsessively secretive, fantastically disciplined organisation to which hardly anybody beyond its public leadership has ever admitted belonging … former comrades still have trouble talking about it”.

So much so, it seems, that Brother Albert, the original “point” man for the CPA (M-L) at Melbourne’s universities and high schools, only reluctantly admits his embarrassment (see in this thread, above) for “closely associated with them” for nearly a decade. Astonishingly, he admits not to being a party member, nor a central committee member, nor a prominent leader … just a simple soul, “closely associated.”

His unfamiliar coyness is also reflected in his claim that he “assisted in dislodging supporters of the CPA(ML) from control of Community Radio 3CR while simultaneously defeating a Zionist attempt to have that station branded as ‘anti-semitic’ [sic].” It is well known that he opposed the CPA (M-L) control of 3CR only after he split with the party (because of his support for the “Gang of Four” in China) and was simultaneously protecting his own faction’s rapidly weakening influence through the station’s anti-Zionist programming.

In “Living by the Little Red Book”, however, his former wife Kerry (who remains a close collaborator in his cutting edge but “currently minimal” www.lastsuperpower.net website) fearlessly disclosed her recruitment to the CPA (M-L). A chapter on student activists in 1969 in the recently published left-wing history, “Radical Melbourne 2”, commenting admiringly of the then “militancy and discipline of the Maoists”, also highlights Brother Langer’s membership of the CPA (M-L) at the time.

Sister Kerry is, moreover, a credible and forthright source of basic information on the indiscrete armed militia training that Brother Langer claims never happened.

In “Living by the Little Red Book” she relates how Maoists proposed a Monash University “People's Militia” funded by the Student Council. A campus-wide referendum rejected that idea but endorsed the less-aggressive-sounding Monash People's Defence Corps. "We'd all go out and practise karate or something like that, one afternoon a week," she reportedly said. "Later, the [Maoist] Military Groups appeared … I was in communications … taking a message from the beginning of a demonstration to the end.”

Others took their guns and rifles to the Young Communist League's Camp Eureka “and practised firing them”. No doubt the Australian Security and Intelligence Organisation has numerous photographs of Brother Langer’s “non-existent” armed Military Groups whose “weapons training”, it is reported,” was a measure of the Maoists' seriousness.”

Brother Langer, I believe Oliver Kamm to be far too generous to you and your intent. The only point I give to you is one for chutzpah.

[Oliver Kamm]

You may be assured that I am not being generous in my assessment of Mr Langer's intent or his political position. Knowing - and reading, as I dutifully have done here - the fringe character of that position, I am disinclined to engage it in debate, but I am concerned that Mr Langer should not feel that his opinions are being in some way disadvantaged in this forum. To that end, I have given him a great deal of leeway - far more than I normally would from anyone else in this forum - to express his views as he wishes. Unfortunately I am unable as yet to get him to understand that, as Hubert Humphrey presciently remarked, the right to free speech does not entail a right to be taken seriously.