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By Shamus Cooke

Trump’s threats against Venezuela escalated recently from the economic to the military: after announcing sanctions he threatened that all military options were “on the table.” Trump’s actions were perfectly timed to lend support to the U.S.-backed opposition in Venezuela, whose ongoing violent rebellion aims to topple the government of democratically elected President Nicolas Maduro.

The apex of violence was focused on stopping the recent elections to the National Constituent Assembly (ANC), convened by President Maduro to rewrite Venezuela’s constitution with the goal of resolving the current social-economic crisis.

The ANC was tasked to become the most powerful governmental body while in session. Part of Maduro’s motivation in convening the ANC was to break the political deadlock that started when the U.S.-backed opposition gained control of the Venezuelan parliament, the National Assembly.

The wealthy opposition promised to prevent the ANC elections from taking place, while Trump promised economic sanctions if the ANC election wasn’t cancelled. The other usual suspects of Latin American counter-revolution also condemned the ANC elections: Spain, the Vatican, and the Organization of American States (OAS) were among other governmental and western NGOs that denounced the ANC, since they recognized that the U.S.-backed opposition would be deflated if the ANC were successful.

The western media that condemned the ANC elections has consistently failed to condemn the ongoing street violence by the U.S.-backed opposition, who used attacks on voting centers, roadblocks, economic sabotage and “general strikes” to prevent the election from taking place.

But the elections happened, and the unexpectedly high turnout rattled the nerves of the opposition, who didn’t expect the traditional base of Chavismo — the working and poor — would come out by the millions to support a broad diversity of candidates within the Chavismo Left.

The Chavismo Base Revived, For Now

The international media covering the election took zero notice of the enthusiasm from Venezuela’s poorest neighborhoods. A U.S. labor delegation that travelled to Venezuela to witness the elections was impressed by the broad participation and long lines at various voting centers in poor neighborhoods. SEIU 1199 Executive Vice President Estela Vasquez made notice of the lack of western media attention:

“One thing that I did think was significant is that I didn’t see any international media. No reporters from the New York Times, no cameras from CNN, no cameras from Fox Television, or any other international media… covering the poor working class neighborhoods that are the backbone of this revolutionary process in this country,”

The enthusiasm for the election that Vasquez noticed was echoed by a prominent left critic of Maduro, Stalin Perez Borges, who said:

“July 30 [the election] was also a tsunami within the ranks of Chavismo that propelled even those who are unhappy with the government to participate and send a message to the domestic and international right that we have not yet surrendered to imperialism nor are we willing to kneel before the neoliberal plans that the politicians and economists of the [opposition] have prepared for us…the [election] result has led to a recuperation of confidence as a social force, and provided a glimpse of the possibility for Chavismo to once again be able to call itself the majority.”

Because the opposition boycotted the elections, the ANC consists overwhelmingly of representatives of the left, where there lives a diversity of revolutionary political opinion. A third of the ANC was specifically reserved for representatives of trade unions, communal councils, indigenous groups, farmers, students, and pensioners, all sectors that have been radicalized by their experience under Chavez and by the violent actions of the opposition.

The class basis of the Constituent Assembly — the poor and working class — provides hope that this governmental body can provide real revolutionary initiative to resolve key issues that have been demoralizing the Chavismo ranks while empowering the wealthy opposition.

The ANC will not fix every problem and it will likely not usher in a socialist economy, but radical measures can precipitate a revolutionary dynamic that carries with it a logic of its own. The left in Venezuela is more dynamic than the Stalinist images accorded to it by the western media and U.S. Left.

Ultimately, the very convening of the ANC means that Maduro has moved to the left; and it was this leftward shift that provoked enthusiasm from the Chavismo rank and file. Convening the ANC surprised everyone and carried enormous political risks, especially in the middle of an opposition uprising backed by U.S. imperialism: if the masses did not participate in the elections the government would be exposed as lacking a broad social base, and such a weakness would have been instantly exploited by the Trump-supported opposition. But Maduro proved that he has a bit of Chavez in him yet, having correctly predicted that the masses would consider the ANC as a revolutionary tool to be used against the oligarchy.

Much of the international left has either not recognized Maduro’s shift to the left or not realized its significance. Their error is rooted in a misunderstanding of the Venezuelan revolution, which has always been a contradictory movement rooted in the poorest neighborhoods of Venezuela, yet reflected through a bureaucratic prism at the top; a process that under Chavez retained, at times, a call and responsive dynamic that propelled the base to take action, which, in turn resulted in more pressure on the leadership to move left. Such a fluctuating, complicated phenomenon is difficult to pigeonhole, and requires a more nuanced analysis than the intellectually lazy “pox on both houses” approach that has long-infected the U.S. left.

It’s true that there are powerful sections of Maduro’s bureaucracy who plan to use the ANC simply to out-maneuver the wealthy opposition and maintain their power and, if possible, to strike a deal with the opposition should the opportunity arise. Such a betrayal would, in effect, mark the end of Chavismo and prepare the ground for total victory of the opposition.

But the victory of the bureaucrats in the ANC isn’t a foregone conclusion, as some cynics on the left would have you believe. Maduro doesn’t command Chavez’s authority; he lacks the charisma and he’s been lacking in revolutionary initiative. The divisions within Chavismo’s upper layers opens up further opportunities for the impatient ranks that can push the project forward against the will of even the more conservative sections of leadership.

The job of the international left is to highlight the possibilities, amplify the program of the revolutionary wing and to educate people internationally about what’s at stake in order to reduce the interventionist options of Trump’s imperialism.

The majority of left analysis regarding the Venezuelan crisis fails at these basic tasks, focusing wasted energy on Maduro’s shortcomings while proposing nothing of substance to win the fight in progress. The ranks of Chavismo need concrete solutions not endless denunciations.

The central question is not whether one is pro-Maduro or pro-opposition, the question is “how do the revolutionary forces resolve the current crisis” and “what strategy should revolutionaries deploy?” Most of the left has nothing to say about these basic questions, while refusing to even discuss the relevance of the Constituent Assembly.

The working class in Venezuela recognizes that their fate depends on the outcome of the current struggle; they are in a fight for their lives and hope to use the Constituent Assembly as a weapon. The slogan “No Volveran” remains a revolutionary demand of Chavismo that declares the oligarchy will never return to power. But unless bold action is taken to drive the revolution forward the victory of the opposition is inevitable, and such a nightmare is currently trying to kick in the front door.

False Solutions From the Left

The current intensified class fight cannot be wished away, it’s based on the material conditions embedded in the economy: the unfulfilled needs of the working poor versus the opposition’s demand to retake the state apparatus and privatize public resources. The two sides cannot “make peace” with another round of elections or negotiations, yet this is exactly what many pro-revolution analysts are promoting as “solutions” to the crisis.

One such mistake can be found in the analysis of Carlos Carcione from Marea Socialista, a grouping who until recently was in coalition with the other socialist parties inside of the ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV).

The analysis put forward by Carcione contains some important critiques of Maduro’s government, but a key error is his “solution” to the crisis, which was put forward at the end of a recent interview:

“…the only democratic road, which cannot be captured by either of the two elites [Maduro’s government and the opposition] that are instigating violence, is the struggle to renew the Constitution of 1999.”

The demand to “renew the Constitution” is a talking point taken directly from the wealthy opposition. To renew the Constitution means to disband the Constituent Assembly and carry on with the electoral process on its normal timeline, as if a life or death crisis wasn’t engulfing the nation that requires revolutionary action now. It’s as if Carcione believes that erasing the ANC would be a “pause button” to the conflict.

Such a “demand” will find zero resonance in the Chavismo rank and file; they’ve voted more in recent decades than any other population in the world, and their voting for the Constituent Assembly was itself a showcase of democracy that Carcione oddly fails to recognize as important or legitimate.

The demand to “renew the Constitution” also fails to acknowledge that the opposition is skillfully using the elections to the National Assembly to retake power and undermine the government, by exacerbating the crisis and talking openly of overthrowing Maduro.

Elections to the National Assembly have become the path to power for the oligarchy, while a more directly democratic path has emerged with the Constituent Assembly elections, an infinitely more representative body than the National Assembly with actual capabilities of taking revolutionary action.

Ultimately one’s attitude towards the situation in Venezuela shouldn’t be decided by legal or so called democratic norms, but by which actions promote the interests of the working class and poor and push the revolution forward.

A similar non-solution to the crisis was put forth by Eva Gollinger, a longtime promoter of Chavismo who has been an increasingly vocal critic of Maduro. Gollinger’s critique of Maduro is often spot on, but her solution falls into the fantasy realm, where both sides realize they’re guilty of excess and thus agree to dampen the rhetoric for the good of the country:

“Voices of moderation need to emerge without fear of being branded traitors or opportunists, as has been happening to anyone publicly criticizing the government or opposition. The opposition leadership and its international backers must immediately condemn all violence….The opposition must accept the legitimacy of President Maduro and his administration and allow him to fulfill his presidential term, which ends in 2019. In return, the parliament should be allowed to assume its full mandate without further obstacles. Fair elections overseen by an independent electoral council should be held within the timeframe stipulated by law instead of being manipulated by political parties or foreign pressure.”

Gollinger certainly has good intentions, but her “solutions” are daydreams that ignore the material interests radicalizing both sides: the ranks of Chavismo need radical solutions to the crisis and the U.S. backed opposition will continue to take radical, right-wing action to regain state power. There hasn’t been a “reasonable middle ground” between these two extremes in decades, if ever, in Venezuela.

Revolutions are notoriously absent of moderation. Chavez himself was accused of being an extremist every time he took action against the oligarchy, which earned him the love and respect of the broader population in Venezuela and inspired revolutionary movements across the hemisphere.

Maduro’s moderation is precisely what has demoralized his base and empowered the U.S.-backed opposition. The working class of Venezuela does not have moderate demands, they require revolutionary action against their class enemies before the wealthy regains the state power to use against them. Moderate actions cannot attack the drastic inequality that pervades Venezuela to this day.

The left “demand” to renew the Constitution is a return to a dead end: one of the limitations of Chavismo was the over reliance on a representative democracy, as opposed to direct democracy. The energy of the revolution was funneled into constant electioneering, and the representative system wasn’t representative enough, allowing politicians to be unaccountable to the movement that opened the door to careerism, while the slower moving legislative system allowed the demoralization to creep in.

The Constituent Assembly is a legitimate tool of revolution that can be used or wasted. Wishing for the return of the conditions that precipitated the crisis is an odd “solution.” The opposition chose to boycott the ANC elections because they hoped for a U.S.-backed coup. Let their miscalculation be their undoing.

What actions should the Constituent Assembly take?

Instead of warning incessantly of authoritarianism the left should be advocating revolutionary solutions: ones that stem the power of both the oligarchy and Chavismo upper-bureaucrats, a “revolution within the revolution.” Divisions among Chavismo’s leadership make such a scenario possible, and it’s desperately needed.

Agitational demands from the Chavismo base in a time of flux can move mountains. Economic solutions that incorporate more socialist policies at the expense of the oligarchy-controlled private sector are also crucial to advancing the revolution, since the capitalists have used their ownership over important economic sectors — like food production — to sabotage the economy.

Some of the below demands have been discussed in different sectors of the Chavismo left, and may find expression in the Constituent Assembly if left groups organize effectively. Ultimately demands that empower the working class at the expense of the oligarchy have the potential to inspire the broader population to action, keeping the revolutionary flame lit:

1. Remove the economic power of the oligarchy by nationalizing the sectors of the economy that have been used in economic sabotage, especially food production, the banking sector and international trade.

2. Strategically default on the foreign debt repayments that are bankrupting the nation, so that the money can be used for basic necessities and rebuilding the economy. The high interest debt repayments are shifting billions of dollars from the Venezuelan state into the pockets of rich foreign investors.

3. Fully fund and expand the key victories of Chavismo: education, health care, pensions, and housing while increasing the power of localities to administer these programs. Ensure that wages are rising above inflation for all wage workers. Pay for these initiatives by drastically raising taxes on capital gains, property, inheritance, and other oligarchy-targeted measures.

4. Jail the oligarchs who promote street violence and participate in economic sabotage. A longstanding demandamong the Chavismo ranks is to take a firmer hand with an opposition who’s grown accustomed to no consequences for violent behavior.

5.  Attack corruption of black market dollar profiteering by nationalizing foreign trade.

6. No reconciliation with the oligarchy and their patron, U.S. imperialism. Any “deal” cut by the opposition will be intended to stall the revolutionary process and require economic concessions that come at the expense of the Chavismo base. The opposition has proven that they will never accept a government they don’t directly control. With each new uprising they test the resolve of the government and its popular support, and when this support dissipates a successful coup — either militarily or legislative — is inevitable.

7. Use the National Constituent Assembly as a weapon of the revolution by taking the above actions while expanding direct democracy, enshrining increased constitutional power of communal councils, labor unions and other social-political bodies of the Chavismo rank and file to directly exercise state power.

If the ANC doesn’t take bold actions soon, the new constitution won’t survive the national referendum vote. And if the Chavismo rank and file don’t see a pathway to a better, more stable life with the ANC they will abstain, and the U.S.-backed opposition will have an unobstructed path to power.

Another reason the ANC needs to take radical action immediately is the upcoming gubernatorial elections that the opposition plans to participate in. These elections can be easily won by the left if the ANC takes swift action that inspires people to the polls.

Conclusion

Time is short. The ANC gave itself two years to fulfill its mission, but the enthusiasm generated by the election will fade quickly if revolutionary action isn’t forthcoming, or if the masses conclude that the new legislative body is content on maintaining the current balance of power instead of smashing it. Maduro’s bureaucratic/administrative maneuvers have outlived their usefulness, and projecting this strategy onto the ANC will transfer the disease of demoralization onto an otherwise healthy body.

The several co-occurring crises in Venezuela require a shift of power to the masses at the expense of the capitalists: any action that the ANC takes that promotes this while encouraging the self-activity of the working class will help refresh the cycle of bottom-up activity that flourished under Chavez but has waned under Maduro.

The street violence of the U.S.-backed opposition that has killed over 100 people and included two coup attempts will not subside on its own, especially when Trump has prioritized Venezuela for regime change. Successive U.S. presidents have understood the special “threat” to imperialism that Venezuela has posed, even if much of the left doesn’t. Defeating Trump requires that Venezuelans move towards socialism, while requiring that socialists in the U.S. actively support this movement.

If the new constitution is a lifeless document it will fail the referendum vote and catapult the opposition into power. However, if the path to the constitution is full of revolutionary action the people will respond enthusiastically, and the broader hemisphere will be re-infected by the revolutionary energy that originally birthed the “pink tide.”

But the pink tide politics that eschewed western imperialism and neoliberalism has reached its ideological limits, demanding deep socialist inroads against the capitalists who’ve frustrated the project. A “red tide” can rejuvenate the revolutionary forces across the hemisphere and easily drown out the recent victories of various counter-revolutions. Venezuela remains the focal point of hemispheric revolution, to be won or lost, supported or ignored.

Shamus Cooke is a social service worker, trade unionist, and writer for Workers Action (www.workerscompass.org).

14 August 2017

By Skwawkbox

Mike Prysner is a former US Army soldier turned documentary-maker, who produces and co-writes The Empire Files for Latin American broadcaster teleSUR English with Abby Martin. He was, until recently, in Venezuela covering the troubles there.

Mike generously gave the SKWAWKBOX his time for a lengthy interview from Los Angeles on the real situation in Venezuela from his first-hand experience. What he related is eye-opening.

And it’s very different from the line we’re being fed by the UK’s press, broadcasters, pundits and right-wing MPs – and it’s startling from the outset.

“When I heard Corbyn condemn violence on both side, I was angry

You’ve heard about attempts by the UK Establishment to weaponise Venezuela against Jeremy Corbyn?

When I heard that Jeremy Corbyn had condemned violence on both sides in Venezuela, I was angry at first – because 80% or more of the violence is being committed by anti-government protesters. Their violence has far surpassed anything committed against them – and what has been done to them has been deliberately provoked.

But then I began to recognise the skill in his statement – forcing everyone to confront the reality of what’s happening on the ground there. The reality bears little resemblance to what’s being presented to people.

You recently returned to the US from Venezuela. What were you doing down there?

I was there with a team from teleSUR, meeting government leaders, people on street, chavistas [supporters of the socialist government, after late President Hugo Chavez] and in opposition areas, seeing what’s it like in different areas.

“The BBC is responsible for some of the most disingenuous portrayals

And it’s not like we’re being told here in the UK?

The BBC is responsible for some of the most disingenuous portrayals. They’re showing violent protesters as if they’re some kind of defenders of peaceful protesters against a repressive police force, but in reality peaceful protests have been untouched by police.

What happens is that the guarimbas [violent, armed opposition groups] follow the peaceful protests and when they come near police, they insert themselves in between the two. They then push and push and push until there’s a reaction – and they have cameras and journalists on hand to record the reaction, so it looks like the police are being aggressive.

We were once filming a protest and a group of guarimbas challenged us. If we’d said we were with teleSur, at the very least they’d have beaten us and taken our equipment. But we told them we were American freelance journalists – they need Americans to film them and publicise them, so we were accepted.

But they said to us, “Don’t film what we do – just what they do to us.”

The battles with police are actually quite small, but they’re planned, co-ordinated to disrupt different area each day to maximise their impact – but in most places life is pretty normal. It’s all about the portrayal. The US media mobilise everything for guarimbas – there will be maybe 150 people but it’s made to look bigger and tactics are 100% violent– trying to provoke a response.

And the level of police restraint is remarkable – the government knows the world is watching. One evening protesters were burning buildings for around two hours, with no intervention by the police. They only react when the protesters start throwing petrol bombs at the police or military, or their bases – but as soon as they do react, the guarimbas film as if they’re victims of an unprovoked attack.

The Supreme Court was set on fire, lots of government buildings have been destroyed – all by the supposed ‘victims’.

The targets of protesters have been the government’s low-cost city buses, beating the bus drivers; they’ve attacked food stockpiles – which is odd when they claim to be protesting about food shortages. One government food stockpile of 50 tonnes was burned. They even attacked a maternity unit, forcing the women to flee.

We saw people on the highway pulled out of vehicles and the vehicles taken to build barricades – even then the police response was extremely restrained, even minimal. I’ve seen protests far more harshly policed in the US.

Telesur English has been keeping a running tally of deaths. So far there have been well over a hundred – and 80% or more have been from opposition violence – a female national guard officer shot in the throat by snipers, people set on fire [warning: graphic video] for supporting the President, a lot shooting at the police and military, along with random shootings of civilians. There have been at least two roadside bombs targeting police convoys.

Some protesters have real guns but there are home-made guns and rocket-launchers as well. Some protester deaths have been caused by their own home-made weapons blowing up on them. Lots of people have been killed at the burning traffic barricades.

There have been well over a dozen chavistas who were followed away from peaceful pro-government rallies and killed on their way home or in restaurants by guarimbas.

But the external perception is being controlled. Lopez and the others have their own media apparatus, coordinating the perception-management. There’s a wealth of evidence that lot of protesters are getting paid, people arrested and then trying to get out of charges by confessing to being paid to cause trouble.

Also bringing kids out to protest – cynical to bring kids out and put them on front line to get photos and blame govt.

So it’s safe to say that the opposition protesters are not fighting for democracy?

Democracy is absolutely not their aim. This is a small group of people led by the owners of large monopoly corporations. The opposition can’t win at the ballot box – they’ve tried but can’t reverse the left-wing gains and a huge majority of the people are behind the government. So they’re trying to bypass democracy, that’s why violence is the tactic.

The political motives are clear – they don’t like the government giving benefits to poor people and they want the huge corporate monopolies back. One man interviewed said he was protesting because he wants to be entrepreneur and make money, not have the government giving money to the poor.

There are no anti-government protests in poor areas, only in the well off areas, protesters are wearing expensive jewellery – the rich areas are also where most of the deaths have occurred.

There’s also economic violence. The opposition leaders are owners of large corporations and they are trying to tank the economy. If Maduro lines up international finance, they have intervened to prevent the loans going through.

The one loan that did go through recently – Wells Fargo, I think it was – became the subject of big PR campaign against it – the opposition is trying to make things worse for people.

They’re even creating shortages – of the nine commodities in shortest supply in Venezuela, a single company owned by an opposition leader is responsible for seven of them – and there are stockpiles, but they’re kept out of circulation to create shortages. And of course, where the government has warehoused supplies ready for distribution, those have been attacked – like those 50 tonnes of food that was burned.

Diapers and toilet paper are shown as in short supply – they are in the stores, but it’s easy to get both on the black market. There’s no shortage, it’s just being channelled elsewhere – again, by those opposition-controlled corporations.

The violence is to create the perception of a failed state to set the scene for outside powers to make ‘humanitarian’ interventions. They’re claiming a Maduro ‘dictatorship’ – but these are same people who overthrew the government in 2002, installed a dictatorship, cancelled the legal system and immediately set about reversing social gains.

The only way they can rule in Venezuela is a fascist-style dictatorship maintained by huge force and that’s what they’re aiming to create.

The two opposition leaders that were arrested at home the other day were involved in an attempted coup that resulted in 30-40 deaths in 2013/14 – and end up on house arrest, which shows the lie of the repressive regime. They’re still actively working to overthrow the government – they were on the phone day before they were re-arrested, planning to overthrow the government.

There’s a lot of evidence of foreign assistance, too. The US, of course, but also Colombia and other right-wing South American regimes. Police have found stockpiles of gas-masks, explosives, weapons. Chavez’s success inspired left-wing governments in Brazil and other countries and the right-wing governments are determined to roll back those gains. Weapons and supplies have been seized coming over the border from Colombia, they’re a key player.

The US government has given around $30 million since 2009 but funds are also channelled via NGOs.

So if the opposition protester numbers are small, what are the rest of the people doing?

The vast majority of people are solidly behind the government. For every big opposition demo there’s at least one huge pro-government, peaceful chavista demo.

The ordinary people are extremely active in combating the economic war – volunteers from poor areas producing/distributing goods that are in shortage. The people are extremely politically aware and educated and they’re absolutely committed to overcoming this attack on their society.

One side is fighting with democracy while the other side is fighting with lynchings and violence – but it’s not what is being shown outside.

People are also organising huge mass meetings about the new constituent assembly to educate, explain what it is, how it works, how to run for it – there’s a lot of effort to build democratic engagement.

“Maduro has even been delaying the vote to give the opposition more time to engage but they’re not interested

The US/European media has portrayed the Constituent Assembly as an anti-democratic measure – you’re saying it’s not?

On the contrary, it’s an attempt to entrench the democratisation of Venezuela by creating a body that can amend the Constitution. The government is trying to make it harder for the right wing to roll back the democratic revolution, the concept of local communes, LGBT rights etc.

It’s exactly the democratic process that’s called for in the constitution – the big lie is saying the government has banned the opposition from taking part. On the contrary, the government has made huge efforts to get the opposition to participate but they decided to boycott it because it doesn’t suit their aims.

Maduro has even been delaying the vote to give the opposition more time to engage but they’re not interested.

All the Constituent Assembly is is just real, radical, grassroots democracy. The western media are saying Maduro will ban other parties but it’s completely untrue. They’re portraying a repressive, violent regime – but dozens of national guard and police have arrested and charged for excessive violence, even though they faced extreme provocation. This is not what it’s being made to appear.

“Venezuela is not in an economic crisis, it’s in an economic war

Mike, you’ve been incredibly generous with your time. How would you like to round off your comments?

The perception outside Venezuela is completely at odds with the reality on the ground. The whole ‘failed state’ thing – it’s just issues in economy being blown up. Unemployment in Venezuela is only 6.6%, foreign debt payments are being made on time. GDP is rising.

Venezuela is not in an economic crisis, it’s in an economic war.

Of course there are problems from the fall in oil prices, but all the things being portrayed big in the media are created by the opposition – the violence, the shortages. There’s an attempt to create an opportunity for the western, mainstream media to say ‘this country is screwed’ so it can be ‘rescued’.

But it’s not the government screwing up the economy – that’s being done by big corporate monopolies. It’s not the government instigating the violence – that’s originating with the protesters, who are backed and even paid by corporations and even outside governments. And it’s all for the purpose of overthrowing democracy, not saving it.

10 August 2017

By Robert J. Burrowes

A wonderful thing about observing and analyzing the human mind is that there is a seemingly infinite variety of phenomena to observe and analyze. I sometimes wonder if it is even remotely possible to master this subject but, even if it is not, at least it provides an unending source of ‘entertainment’.

The phenomenon that I want to discuss in this article is what Anita McKone and I call the ‘magic rat’.

Before proceeding, let me emphasize that the ‘magic rat’ is an incredibly dangerous psychological disorder that afflicts most political and virtually all corporate leaders, notably including those in the United States, thus rendering them incapable of responding intelligently and appropriately to the ongoing crises in human affairs. And, tragically, it afflicts most other people too, which is one reason why it is difficult to muster a strategic response to these crises, even at grassroots level.

In describing this disorder, I also want to emphasize that it never occurs in isolation. Individuals afflicted by this disorder will invariably have a multiplicity of other disorders too, not necessarily labeled ‘disorders’ in the psychological literature.

So what is the ‘magic rat’, and why can’t it be trapped?

When a human being is terrified to consider a particular fact or set of facts, their mind has an enormous variety of unconscious mechanisms for preventing them from doing so. The most obvious version of this phenomenon which has been identified is known as ‘denial’. See ‘The Psychology of Denial’ .

However, the ‘magic rat’ is a different phenomenon which most humans routinely use (unconsciously) to avoid having to respond to frightening circumstances. The nature of these frightening circumstances varies from one individual to the next although patterns can be readily observed in many contexts.

In 2003, Anita had a dream in which a rat was running around and I was chasing it and hitting it with an iron bar. However, each time that I appeared to land a blow on the rat, the rat simply disappeared and reappeared somewhere else. And so my chase resumed. I just couldn’t pin it down.

This psychological phenomenon is readily observed and many people will be able to recall this from their own experience. The ‘magic rat’ occurs when someone is given information that terrifies them. It is important to understand that their fear is unlikely to be readily displayed and it will often be concealed behind some behaviour, such as an apparently ‘rational’ argument or ‘off-hand’ comment in response, or perhaps even a joke.

The frightening information might be personal but it might just as readily be information of any other kind, such as in relation to something that happened historically or about the state of the world. What matters is that the person to whom the information is presented is (unconsciously) terrified by it and responds (again unconsciously) by employing the ‘magic rat’.

The ‘magic rat’ is simply the mechanism by which an unconscious and terrified mind instantly switches its attention from something frightening to something more pleasant to avoid having any time to consciously engage with the presented information. The switch happens instantaneously precisely because the person is so terrified by the information that their mind takes their attention away from it in a moment. If their mind did not do this, the person would be compelled to consider the information and to respond to it.

As Anita and I discussed this phenomenon recently, we could easily recall four different responses by the ‘magic rat’ that we have observed. In no particular order, the first response is for the terrified person’s unconscious mind to shut out the frightening information so effectively that it might well have never been uttered/written; they then proceed as if it had not been.

The second response is for the person frightened by the information to instantly switch the topic of discussion to something else that feels safe (so that they do not have to engage with the information). In some contexts, this might look like a ‘rational’ response but, in fact, closer examination will reveal that their response is irrelevant to the issue raised previously. This version is probably the most difficult to identify simply because most of us have learned to largely ignore what we probably (but incorrectly) perceive as ‘red herrings’.

The third response is to ‘throw out smoke bombs’, as Anita describes it, so that the whole issue is clouded by distractive ‘noise’ designed to distract the attention of the person/people presenting the information in the first place so that they are lured into discussing a less frightening subject. These ‘smoke bombs’ can take many forms, including introducing irrelevant information to confuse you or offering a sarcastic comment as the preliminary to any response (which, of course, will be wide of the subject).

The fourth response is to attack you verbally or physically, because your information is considered an attack on them against which they must immediately and aggressively defend themselves. This version of the problem is sometimes labeled ‘kill the messenger’.

There are no doubt other versions of the ‘magic rat’: what matters is that the person in question is so frightened that they find a way to avoid dealing with the issue that makes them scared.

The purpose of the ‘magic rat’ mechanism is to enable an individual to remain feeling safe in the delusion that they have created for themselves and it is vital that the truth does not penetrate this delusion.

Why would an individual want to (unconsciously) use a delusion to feel safe? For the simple reason that, as a child, the individual never felt safe but was also never given any time or the necessary conditions to both feel this fear while feeling safe, and to actually be safe for most of the time. So because evolution did not equip any individual to live in a permanent state of feeling terrified, the child has no ‘choice’ but to (unconsciously) generate a delusional sense of safety in the unsafe environment. Once the child has done this, however, the delusional state becomes ‘permanent’ and is ‘defended’, both consciously and unconsciously depending on the context, using mechanisms such as the ‘magic rat’ described above.

So is this problem very prevalent? Unfortunately, it is ‘everywhere’. For instance, if you take the information I have presented above and consider this the next time you listen to or read something from Donald Trump, you will have an excellent opportunity to observe and identify the ways in which his mind routinely uses ‘magic rats’ to avoid dealing with reality. See, for example, his decisions in relation to the environment and climate, summarised in ‘A Running List of How Trump Is Changing the Environment’ . You might also ponder the extraordinary violence that this man suffered, as a child, at the hands of those adults who were supposed to love him. In addition, you might consider the phenomenal danger to humanity of having this individual in charge of the world’s largest nuclear arsenal and its primary human, environmental and climate destroyer: the US military.

But Trump is not the only person afflicted with this psychological disorder. Members of both houses of the United States Congress, with only a few exceptions, also routinely display this disorder although, it should be emphasized, it is often combined with other disorders as they terrifiedly submit to the directives of the insane neocon elite driving US foreign policy and its perpetual war against life.

For instance, it has just been graphically highlighted, yet again, by the recent (virtually unanimous) Congressional decision to impose sanctions on Russia, Iran and North Korea for reasons which are readily refuted by the verifiable evidence if you are not too terrified to consider it. See, for example, ‘Intel Vets Challenge “Russia Hack” Evidence’ , ‘The Mask Is Off: Trump Is Seeking War with Iran’ , ‘Trump Intel Chief: North Korea Learned From Libya War to “Never” Give Up Nukes’ and ‘ With the European Union Livid, Congress Pushes Forward on Sanctions Against Russia, Iran and North Korea’ .

You will also have no trouble identifying this disorder in Israeli or Saudi Arabian leaders either. Again, however, they are far from alone.

Most importantly though, the ‘magic rat’ is almost invariably evident when adults are challenged to consider their phenomenal violence – ‘visible’, ‘invisible’ and ‘utterly invisible’ – against children, which leads to the terrified and dysfunctional outcomes described above (as well as all of the other terrified and dysfunctional outcomes). See ‘ Why Violence? ’ and ‘ Fearless Psychology and Fearful Psychology: Principles and Practice ’ .

So if you don’t even want to know about this violence, the good news is that your ‘magic rat’, if you have one, will ensure that you never even consider looking at these documents (or don’t get past the first page). The problem, for humanity as a whole, is that if too many people are too terrified to even consider the truth, then we are in deep trouble from which I can see no exit. Because if we are to extricate ourselves from this mess, we must start with the truth, no matter how terrifying.

Is there anything you can do next time you see someone use their magic rat? Yes. You can reflect that they sound terrified to consider the information in question. If you feel capable of doing this, bear in mind that you might then need to also listen to their terrified response, which might be aggressive as well. For a fuller answer to this question, see ‘ Nisteling: The Art of Deep Listening’ .

Moreover, if you ever notice your own mind being taken away from information that frightens you, see if you can take your attention back to what you found frightening and feel your fear. The information, in itself, is not going to cause you any harm. It is, after all, simply the truth and you are infinitely more powerful to know the truth and hence be in a position to respond to it, even if it scares you initially.

So if you feel able to respond intelligently and powerfully to reality, which means that you can contemplate information that is terrifying to many, then you might consider participating in the fifteen-year strategy of ‘ The Flame Tree Project to Save Life on Earth ’ and signing the online pledge of ‘ The People ‘ s Charter to Create a Nonviolent World ’ . And if you want to develop an effective strategy to resist one or the other of the many threats to our survival, consider using the strategic framework explained in Nonviolent Campaign Strategy .

We cannot trap the ‘magic rat’ that afflicts so many individuals but we might be able to assist some of them to recover from this psychological disorder. We might also be able to mobilise those not afflicted (or not so badly afflicted) to respond powerfully to frightening information about the state of our world.

Sadly, however, many people will use their ‘magic rat’ until the day they die. The important point is that we do not let these people, like Donald Trump, decide the fate of humanity.

Robert J. Burrowes has a lifetime commitment to understanding and ending human violence. He has done extensive research since 1966 in an effort to understand why human beings are violent and has been a nonviolent activist since 1981.

9 August 2017

By Telesur

The funds have now become a mainstay of the U.S. State Department congressional budget for foreign operations.

Since at least 2009 the U.S. Department of State has budgeted at least US$49 million in total to support right-wing opposition forces in Venezuela who are now in their seventh week of violent protests to oust democratically-elected President Nicolas Maduro.

According to the 2010 budget justification, which designated US$6 million that year to Venezuela’s “Economic Support Fund” the budget “will support efforts to preserve and expand democratic space through programs that strengthen and promote civil society, citizen participation, independent media, human rights organizations, and democratic political parties.”

In a more detailed breakdown of the 2011 US$5 million budgeted for Venezuelan economic support, the budget indicates that US$1 million was designated specifically for the support of “political competition and consensus building.”

Throughout its budget justifications for Venezuela, the State Department repeatedly emphasizes its concern over the “increasingly authoritarian tendencies” of the governments of the late President Hugo Chavez, and current President Nicolas Maduro, in spite of regularly scheduled elections that are internationally recognized.

The 2009 budget reiterated support and continued funding for the Organization of American States in order to deploy teams of “democracy practitioners” to Venezuela and Bolivia where they say “democracy is threatened by the growing presence of alternate concepts such as ‘participatory democracy’.” The nature of the activities carried out by these teams is unclear in the budgets.

OAS General-Secretary Luis Almagro has led a campaign to ousted Venezuela from the regional organization and on April 26, the body voted to hold a meeting on the situation in the country, which Venezuela called a violation of its sovereignty, leading President Nicolas Maduro to announce the nation’s formal withdrawal from the group.

In its 2011 budget, the State Department wrote,

“The United States has a major interest in preserving and strengthening Venezuelan democratic institutions.”

Since the beginning of Venezuela’s Bolivarian Revolution, with the democratic election of former President Hugo Chavez in 1998, the oil-rich nation has been repeatedly attacked as “undemocratic.” President Maduro has reiterated that elections will be held on schedule in 2018, but the opposition has demanded his immediate removal, seeking foreign intervention in its destabilization campaign.

The revolutionary government has significantly eroded the political and economic hegemony the U.S. had over Venezuelan oil, which holds one of the largest petroleum reserves in the world. Prior to the election of Chavez, in spite of its vast resource wealth, Venezuela was plagued by sharp class inequalities.

According to United Nations sources, poverty rates in Venezuela were nearing 60 percent before 1998, and by 2015 were halved to less than 30 percent in spite of an economic crisis triggered by falling oil prices. Under the Bolivarian government, health care has been made widely available through the Barrio Adentro program, and average life expectancy has steadily risen.

The U.S. government is silent on the widespread violence of the right-wing opposition groups that they fund, which in 2014 resulted in 43 deaths, of which the opposition was responsible for more than half.

Currently, violent protests by the right wing calling for Maduro’s ouster continue into their seventh week and have already resulted in at least 50 deaths and many more injuries, exceeding the causualties of the opposition violence in 2014. In spite of the government calling for dialogue and participation in its constituent assembly debates, the opposition has refused to participate and called on supporters to continue protests.

Indicating an awareness that their regime change efforts are not well-received among the mass of the people, the 2008 budget wrote,

“Democracy in Latin America, as it has been promoted by the developed countries, is being increasingly defined by populist voices as exploitative and imperialist.”

According to a 2007 U.S. strategic document leaked by former CIA-whistleblower Edward Snowden in 2013, Venezuela was seen as the main adversary of the United States in the Western Hemisphere. The country was listed as one of the top six “enduring targets for the NSA,” along with China, North Korea, Iraq, Iran and Russia.

7 August 2017

By Robert J Barsocchini

In 1945, US president Harry Truman (who had dictatorial control over the atomic bomb) and his advisor James Byrnes intentionally prolonged the US war with Japan until, and apparently so that, they could target Japanese civilians, without warning, with atomic bombs.

The bombings were planned and carried out, as Alperovitz notes in an almost thousand-page study, in a way that “specifically avoided significant war” and “industrial installations”, and instead deliberately “target[ed] large numbers of civilians” so as to make the most “profound psychological impression” possible.

The documentary record illustrates that the important actors, including Truman and Byrnes, believed clarifying the terms of Japanese surrender and/or allowing a Russian declaration of war would end the war. Truman and Byrnes alone decided to defy these findings and reverse course, changing the US momentum and going out of their way to alter the surrender terms so they would not be clarified, and made efforts to delay the Russian declaration of war so fighting would continue until the atomic bombs were ready.

The record further reveals the high-level actors, including Truman and Byrnes, did not believe a US invasion would be carried out in the absence of atomic bombings. Contingency planning shows that if an invasion had been carried out, it would have been be months later and would have involved between 40,000 and 46,000 US deaths at the extreme high end (subsequent studies have found it may have involved as few as 0 or possibly 7,000 to 8,000 deaths), not 500,000 or a million – figures with no basis in the documentary record that were later invented to help try to justify to the public (in a successful propaganda effort) the US targeting, killing, and prolonged torture via radiation of large numbers of civilians. (The US has repeatedly performed non-consensual human experimentation with radiation.)*

After industrial-scale targeting of civilians throughout Japan, and after wiping out hundreds of thousands of civilians in two cities with two different kinds of nuclear bombs, the US, in a “carefully worded response”, accepted Japan’s surrender (which US planners believed would occur without atomic bombings or a US invasion) on August 11th. Japanese officials, who did not witness the bombings and did not know they were much different from what the US had already been doing, said the surrender was largely a result of the the impending Russian entry into the war. On August 14th, the US hit Japan with a “grand finale”, bombing Honshu with 1,014 planes in the biggest single TNT bombing raid in history up to that point.

Before the atomic bombings, Truman had drawn a connection to the US Declaration of Independence’s Protocols of the Elders of Zion-style reference to “merciless Indian savages” by referring to the “merciless” “Jap” “savages” (“the Japs are savages… merciless…”), a probably-inadvertent, subconsciously ingrained repetition postcolonial scholars would note illustrates a through-line in US thought from origins in dehumanizing and wiping out civilian inhabitants of land and stealing resources coveted by US nationalists to doing so in many other global locales. After US targeting of civilians in Germany, Truman also noted German civilians had to “atone for the crimes” of the German dictatorship, a logic identical to that of Osama bin Laden in rationalizing killing 3,000 US citizens on 9/11/01 as the US killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqis via siege.

James Byrnes, the sole man who went against the grain of all other top officials involved and convinced Truman to prolong the war so as to nuke Japanese civilians, went on, as a politician in his home state, to oppose the burgeoning grassroots civil-rights movement.

After the atomic bombings, major propaganda efforts were undertaken to cement an “acceptable”, though invented, rationale for the bombings in the public mind – a project that continues to be effective today, as US nationalists who have not studied the record continue to passionately insist on and believe the myths that the planners who decided to carry out the atomic bombings (Truman and Byrnes) thought a US invasion of Japan would take place and result in 500,000 or 1-million US deaths, that they thought the atomic bombings were necessary, that they were trying to end the war as soon as possible, and that they gave warning before carrying out the bombings. None of these claims are accurate.

Another noteworthy point is that when people in the US are asked whether they believe targeting civilians is ever acceptable, they mostly say no (though just barely; global polling has found “Americans are the most likely population in the world to believe military attacks targeting civilians are sometimes justified”). But when asked whether they think nuking civilians in Hiroshima and Nagasaki was justified, they still mostly say yes (though the number has been declining for years).

This may be an illustration of what George Orwell described as “doublethink” – holding two contradictory notions in mind at the same time – and may also relate to the self-serving notion that oneself or a group with which one feels associated is excused from laws and moral principles to which others must adhere, an idea prevalent in the US and which stems in large measure from the self-idolizing and self-serving attitudes of the religious and nationalist extremists who created the US state through slavery and the extermination or removal of the people occupying the lebensraum. However, thanks to propaganda efforts and psychological components of nationalism, most in the US may be unaware, or ideologically unable to accept, that the planners deliberately targeted civilians in the atomic bombings and sabotaged peace efforts, intentionally prolonging the war, to do so.

Robert J. Barsocchini is an independent researcher and reporter whose interest in the discrepancy between Western self-image and reality arose from working as a cross-cultural intermediary for large corporations in the US film and Television industry.

7 August 2017

By Mark Landler and James Risen

25 Jul 2017 — President Trump, searching for a reason to keep the United States in Afghanistan after 16 years of war, has latched on to a prospect that tantalized previous administrations: Afghanistan’s vast mineral wealth, which his advisers and Afghan officials have told him could be profitably extracted by Western companies.

Mr. Trump has discussed the country’s mineral deposits with President Ashraf Ghani, who promoted mining as an economic opportunity in one of their first conversations. Mr. Trump, who is deeply skeptical about sending more American troops to Afghanistan, has suggested that this could be one justification for the United States to stay engaged in the country.

To explore the possibilities, the White House is considering sending an envoy to Afghanistan to meet with mining officials. Last week, as the White House fell into an increasingly fractious debate over Afghanistan policy, three of Mr. Trump’s senior aides met with a chemical executive, Michael N. Silver, to discuss the potential for extracting rare-earth minerals. Mr. Silver’s firm, American Elements, specializes in these minerals, which are used in a range of high-tech products.

Stephen A. Feinberg, a billionaire financier who is informally advising Mr. Trump on Afghanistan, is also looking into ways to exploit the country’s minerals, according to a person who has briefed him. Mr. Feinberg owns a large military contracting firm, DynCorp International, which could play a role in guarding mines — a major concern, given that some of Afghanistan’s richest deposits are in areas controlled by the Taliban.

In 2010, American officials estimated that Afghanistan had untapped mineral deposits worth nearly $1 trillion, an estimate that was widely disputed at the time and has certainly fallen since, given the eroding price of commodities. But the $1 trillion figure is circulating again inside the White House, according to officials, who said it had caught the attention of Mr. Trump.

The lure of Afghanistan as a war-torn Klondike is well established: In 2006, the George W. Bush administration conducted aerial surveys of the country to map its mineral resources. Under President Barack Obama, the Pentagon set up a task force to try to build a mining industry in Afghanistan — a challenge that was stymied by rampant corruption, as well as security problems and the lack of roads, bridges or railroads.

None of these hurdles has been removed in the last eight years, according to former officials, and some have worsened. They warn that the Trump administration is fooling itself if it believes that extracting minerals is a panacea for Afghanistan’s myriad ills.

“It would be dangerous to use the potential for resource exploitation as a selling point for military engagement,” said Laurel Miller, a senior analyst at RAND who served until last month as the State Department’s special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan. “The barriers to entry are really quite considerable, and that kind of argument could fuel suspicion about America’s real intentions in Afghanistan.”

But for Mr. Trump, as a businessman, it is arguably the only appealing thing about Afghanistan. Officials said he viewed mining as a “win-win” that could boost that country’s economy, generate jobs for Americans and give the United States a valuable new beachhead in the market for rare-earth minerals, which has been all but monopolized by China.

China already has a $3 billion contract to develop a copper mine about 25 miles southeast of the Afghan capital, Kabul. Officials said Mr. Trump was determined not to spend American lives and treasure in Afghanistan only to watch China lock up its rare-earth deposits, which are used to make products from wind turbines to computer chips.

Mr. Silver, the chemical executive, may head an effort to maximize the rights for American companies to extract these minerals, according to a senior official.

Mr. Trump’s interest also reflects how his military advisers have struggled to present him with other persuasive reasons to send troops to the country, where the United States has been at war since 2001.

The White House’s review of Afghanistan policy — led by Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and the national security adviser, Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster — was supposed to be finished by the middle of July. Instead, it bogged down after Mr. Trump expressed displeasure with a proposal from General McMaster for a modest troop increase and a multiyear commitment to the country.

Policy meetings have become increasingly heated, officials said, as Mr. Trump and his chief strategist, Stephen K. Bannon, have squared off against General McMaster. Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson is also said to be unhappy with the current proposals.

Vice President Mike Pence, not General McMaster, will lead a meeting Wednesday of National Security Council principals on Afghanistan. Some officials said that reflected General McMaster’s isolation; others said that the general welcomed Mr. Pence’s involvement and that the two were closely aligned on the policy.

But Mr. Trump, it is clear, is not. In June, he grudgingly agreed to give Mr. Mattis the authority to send additional troops — a number believed to be about 4,000 — as a stopgap measure to stabilize security in Afghanistan. But Mr. Mattis has not yet used his authority, perhaps reflecting his recognition that the commander in chief is uncomfortable with it.

When reporters last week asked Mr. Trump at a meeting at the Pentagon whether he planned to send more troops, he answered, “We’ll see,” and added, “ISIS is falling fast,” suggesting he viewed the counterterrorism threat in Afghanistan as declining.

Worried that Mr. Trump will be locked into policies that did not work for the last two presidents, Mr. Bannon and the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, have brought in outside voices, including Mr. Feinberg and Erik D. Prince, a founder of the private security firm Blackwater International. Both have urged using more private contractors and giving the C.I.A. an oversight role in the conflict.

In addition, Mr. Feinberg has reached out to people involved in the Obama administration’s effort to build Afghanistan’s mining industry. Some warned him that the prospects for a profitable business are worse now than in 2009, given the decline in commodities prices and the deteriorating security in areas where the deposits are believed to lie.

Afghanistan’s deposits of copper and iron ore are trading at about a third of their 2010 prices. Most of the undiscovered deposits of rare-earth minerals are believed to be in Helmand Province, large parts of which are controlled by the Taliban.

“There are undoubtedly minerals to be exploited in Afghanistan, which could help provide economic stability to the country in the future,” said Daniel F. Feldman, a former special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan. “But given all the obstacles, it could be many years before mining yields dividends for the Afghan people.”

One advantage is that the Trump administration would have a willing partner in the Afghan government. During the Obama administration, President Ghani resisted the rapid development of the mining industry, largely because he worried about the threat of widespread corruption that would come with it.

But as soon as Mr. Trump was elected, Mr. Ghani reversed his position, contacting the Trump team and promoting Afghanistan’s mineral wealth. He realized that Mr. Trump would be intrigued by the commercial possibilities, officials said.

Mr. Trump has said little publicly about Afghanistan since being elected. But his thinking about what the United States should reap for its military efforts was made clear in another context soon after his inauguration. Speaking to employees of the C.I.A., the president said the United States had erred in withdrawing troops from Iraq without holding on to its oil.

“The old expression ‘To the victor belong the spoils,’” Mr. Trump declared. “You remember?”

Mark Landler is a White House correspondent at The New York Times. In 24 years at The Times.

James Risen is an author, reporter and investigative journalist who has exposed various illegal activities by the US government and who is facing imprisonment for refusing to reveal the identity of one of his sources.

A version of this article appears in print on July 26, 2017, on Page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: Mineral Wealth In Afghanistan Tempts Trump.

7 August 2017

By Rima Najjar

I first heard of Ariel Gold through a Haaretz article that described her in the headline like this:

Jewish Mother and BDS Activist: Code Pink’s Ariel Gold vs. Israel’s Travel Ban: The pro-Palestinian provocateur is under attack after a newspaper alleged that she ‘tricked’ her way into Israel last month. She says she will be ‘heartbroken’ if the authorities ban her from ever returning.

Apparently, she tricked border police by deleting “her anti-Israel Facebook posts, going as far back as 2012”, according to  Israel Hayom, a widely-circulated daily newspaper in Israel that “outed” her.

Another Israeli sheet wrote:

The Wailing Wall wailed just a little louder on Tuesday, when two Jewish American, Code Pink activists Ariel Gold, of Ithaca, NY and Ariel Vegosen, of Oakland, CA, unfurled a banner at the old Wall that read, “American Jews support BDS.” … Representing the women’s peace organization, Code Pink, the two activists—both named after an angel, a modern Jewish city in Samaria, and a Disney mermaid—proudly expressed their “Jewish opposition to the Israeli occupation of Palestine” and endorsed “the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement [a link here is provided to an article headlined: Illinois, Latest State to Oppose BDS, Takes Concrete Action against Boycotters] as a nonviolent strategy to bring about a just peace in Palestine and Israel.”

Jewish Voice for Peace played a video clip of Ariel Gold reporting on the al-Aqsa boycott demonstrations form Jerusalem.  Gold also posted a video clip of Anat Cohen, a Jewish colonist in Al-Khalil (Hebron) attacking her.

Most recently, she posted a document of an order of protection issued against Cohen by an Israeli court: “Success — Jerusalem court issues order of protection for me against notorious illegal Hebron settler Anat Cohen. She cannot make contact with me in any way, cannot threaten me and cannot harass me.”

The travails of Ariel Gold, an American Jew, in the Jewish state are instructive on many levels.  The attacks against her as a Jew championing Palestinian rights are standard fare, long a part of Israel’s defamation campaign of such Jews in Jewish communities worldwide, but Ariel Gold is a new kind of Jewish critic of Israel.  She is a BDS activist, which means she advocates for all Palestinian rights.  Palestinians today, as Ali Abunimah expressed it, are reclaiming the right to demand all their rights

… their rights in full, an end to Israel’s colonial racism against Palestinian citizens of Israel, an end to occupation, colonization and siege in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and the right to return.

This was not possible throughout the long decades of the “Peace Process”, when even discussing Palestinian right of return was taboo and the “right” of the Jewish state to “exist” was sacrosanct.

The injunction against Anat Cohen that Ariel Gold posted is startling on many levels, as comments on the post indicate.  Many of the comments on her Facebook post congratulate her and fear for her safety from a woman they describe as a lunatic who, among other things, has been throwing dirty diapers at activists, both international and Palestinian (some of those commenting have had first-hand experience with this!).

Given that Israel’s battalions (as many as seven by last count) are in Hebron for the sole purpose of safeguarding the illegal Jewish presence in the heart of a Palestinian Arab city, a few commenters rightly doubt the efficacy of the document:

Hula Coots: Ariel you are smarter than that, do you reallllly think this piece of paper will stop that leach, or stand up in any court? Let’s be real, this is Israel. That’s why she does it, she knows that no one will stop her, they praise maggots like this.

The most scathing comments, which in the euphoria of Gold’s “victory” over the system were sparse in the thread, have to do with the legal double standard Israel uses in its dealings with Jews and the Palestinian Arabs whose territory it is occupying:

Russell Ward: Isn’t it this a very clear instance of apartheid: you can get this order, very justifiably, but if you were Palestinian suffering the same abuse you couldn’t. Different laws in the same place depending on your race/nationality.

Virrginia Sheppard Lapham: But what if you were Palestinian? Would you have even gotten into Court? Be safe!

The fact is, had Ariel Gold been a Palestinian activist, she would have gotten to an Israeli military court in chains, like Issa Amro of Youth Against Settlements, with whom she delivered CODE PINK: Women for Peace petitions to the U.S. State Department, demanding protection for Palestinian human rights defenders in Hebron.

Ariel Gold’s injunction may be “a crack in the justice system” as some of the comments on her post claimed, but it is a crack in the wrong justice system, the one that sells “Jewish and Democratic”.  The people Israel calls “Arabs” and “Jews” (in the same vein as American Western films refer to “cowboys” and “Indians”) are governed by two sets of laws each.  Ariel Gold, as a Jew in the West Bank, tellingly appealed, not to the Palestinian legal system, but to the same legal system that governs Anat Cohen, the Jewish settler.

Although Israel’s Basic Laws protect the rights to equality of groups like women or people with disabilities, it denies the right to equality to Palestinian citizens of the Jewish state through discriminatory laws concerning citizenship.

Furthermore, Israel’s rule of law takes on a catastrophic dimension for Palestinians in the context of  the judicial arm of the occupation, which is described in an academic paper as, “a process of judicial domination that facilitates extensive control of the [Israeli] military authorities over the Palestinian civilian population through their judicial powers.”

Unlike Ariel Gold, many Jews who see themselves generally as liberal or progressive or humanists nevertheless continue to criticize Israel “for its own sake” or for the sake of Judaism, as Rabbi Michael Learner, the editor of the Zionist magazine Tikkun: to heal, repair and transform the world, does in 2014:

All my life I’ve been a champion of Israel, proud of its many accomplishments in science and technology that have benefitted the world, insistent on the continuing need for the Jewish people to have a state that offers protections from anti-Semitism that has reared its head continuously throughout Christian and Islamic societies, and enjoying the pleasures of long swaths of time in which I could study in Jerusalem and celebrate Shabbat in a city that weekly closed down the hustle and bustle of the capitalist marketplace for a full twenty-five hours … [But] Israeli behavior toward Palestinians is destroying Judaism and creating a new kind of hatred of Jews by people who never before had any issue with Jews.

Here, in contrast is British MP George Galloway explaining why Israel is in Palestine to a young Jew from the north of London who kept insisting, like Michael Lehrer above, that “Jews have a right to Palestine because they lost six million people in the Holocaust and suffered throughout history”:

The Jews have suffered racist anti-Semitism down the ages in many, many EU countries, including our own. They were subject to regular discrimination at best and pogroms at most, that’s undoubtedly true. The one place in the entire world the Jews were neither discriminated against nor subject to pogroms was the Muslim world. In fact so much that was the case that when Christianity came back to power in Spain in Andalusia, in the western extent of the Islamic empire, when the Muslims left, the Jews left with them, because they feared the Christian anti-Semitism, which would be unleashed in the wake of the departure of the Islamic civilization in the West, that’s why so many Jews are to be found, even today, and were to be found in profusion before the creation of the state of Israel in countries like Morocco and along the north African coast, because under the protection of the Muslims, the Jews left Europe and went to live in N Africa.

The Palestine that was wiped off the map when Britain granted you somebody else’s country had Jews living side by side with Christians and Muslims for centuries without the slightest taste of discrimination or violence or pogroms. So what happened is that Christian anti-Semitism in Europe, which massacred 6 million Jews in the greatest crime in human history was paid for, not by the Christian countries of Europe that either practiced or turned a blind eye to that anti-Semitism, but was paid by the very people who were completely innocent of that Holocaust, who had never persecuted the Jews, who had never pogrom-ed the Jews, and that seems to me to add insult to the injury suffered by a people whose country was wiped off the map, who were dispersed into exile to make way for a Zionist idea, which was granted to European Jews, because these were the first settlers, granted to European Jews, by Britain, as you have failed to acknowledge that Britain had no right to give away somebody else’s country – one country given to a second people land that actually belonged to a third people – it seems to me an all round injustice, don’t you think, Alex?

It was long before the Holocaust that Britain stepped in. Britain stepped in in 1917 with the Balfour Declaration made by the British Minister Balfour on our behalf to a group of atheistic Zionist Jews; I made the point about atheism because it is not a Biblical claim as if God was an estate agent. The men to whom Israel was promised were atheistic Jews; they were not only not speaking for all Jews, they represented at that time in 1917 a tiny proportion of the world’s Jews, Most of the world’s Jews supported communist or socialist parties, Zionist represented a sliver of Jews at the time and these are the people to whom Britain promised the land belonging to a third people without consulting either the British or the world Jews and least of all consulting the Palestinians.

Ariel Gold is a different breed of Jewish activist for Palestine.  She poses a real threat to the existence of Israel as a Jewish state with all that such a state embodies in Apartheid, racism and injustice to Palestinian Arabs. Her situation highlights the contradictions that the much-bandied about term “Jewish and Democratic” holds.

Here she is, an American Jew in the occupied West Bank, appealing to a court in illegally annexed and occupied Jerusalem to protect her against an illegal Jewish settler in Hebron.

Rima Najjar is a Palestinian whose father’s side of the family comes from the forcibly depopulated village of Lifta on the western outskirts of Jerusalem.

4 August 2017

By Dr Ramzy Baroud

Neither Fatah nor Hamas have been of much relevance to the mass protests staged around Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem. Neither have American pressure, half-hearted European ‘concern about the situation’ or cliché Arab declarations made one iota of difference. United Nations officials warned of the grim scenarios of escalation, but their statements were mere words.

The spontaneous mass movement in Jerusalem, which eventually defeated Israeli plans to change the status of Al-Aqsa was purely a people’s movement. Despite the hefty price of several dead and hundreds wounded, it challenged both the Israeli government and the quisling Palestinian leadership.

Israel shut down Al-Aqsa compound on July 14, following a shootout between three armed Palestinians and Israeli occupation officers. The compound was reopened a few days later, but Palestinian worshipers refused to enter, as massive security installation, gates, cameras and metal detectors were installed.

The people of Jerusalem immediately understood the implication of the Israeli action. In the name of added security measures, the Israeli government was exploiting the situation to change the status of Al-Aqsa, as part of its efforts to further isolate Palestinians and Judaize the illegally occupied city.

The Israeli army occupied Palestinian East Jerusalem in 1967, annexing it in 1981 in defiance of international law and despite strong UN objection.

For 50 years, Jerusalem has endured daily battles. The Israelis fought to expand their influence in the city, increase the number of illegal Jewish settlers and cut off Jerusalem from the rest of the Palestinian Territories; while Palestinians, Muslim and Christians alike, fought back.

Al-Aqsa compound – also known as Haram Al-Sharif or the Noble Sanctuary – is the most symbolic element in the fight. It is a microcosm of the fate of the occupied city, in fact the fate of the entire Palestinian land.

The compound has been administered by Islamic Waqf, through an Israeli-Jordanian understanding. Many Israeli politicians in the Likud Party and the Netanyahu-led rightwing government coalition have tried to change this.

Palestinians understand that the fate of their mosque and the future of their city are tightly linked. For them, if Al-Aqsa is lost, then Jerusalem is truly conquered.

This fight, between Palestinian worshipers and the Israeli army happens every single day, usually escalating on Friday. It is on this holy day for Muslims that tens of thousands of faithful flock to Al-Aqsa to pray, oftentimes to be met by new military gates and army regulations. Young Palestinians, in particular, have been blocked from reaching Al-Aqsa, also in the name of security.

But the struggle for Jerusalem can rarely be expressed in numbers, death toll and televised reports. It is the ordinary Palestinians’ constant fight for space, for identity and to preserve the sanctity of their holy land.

In the last two years, the fight escalated further as Israel began expanding its illegal settlements in East Jerusalem and rightwing parties issued a series of laws targeting Palestinians in the city. One such law is the call for prayer law, aimed at preventing mosques from making the call for prayers at dawn, as has been the practice for a millennium.

Palestinian youth, many born after the failed Oslo Accords, are fed up as the Israeli military controls every aspect of their lives and their corrupt leadership grows more irrelevant and self-serving.

This frustration has been expressed in numerous ways: in non-violent resistance, new political ideas, in art, music, on social media, but also through individual acts of violent resistance.

Since the most recent Al-Quds Intifada – Jerusalem uprising – started in October 2015, “some 285 Palestinians have died in alleged attacks, protests and (Israeli) army raids,” reported Farah Najjar and Zena Tahhan. About 47 Israelis were killed in that same period.

But the Intifada was somehow contained and managed. Certainly, human rights groups protested many of the army killings of Palestinians as unnecessary or unprovoked, but little has changed on the ground. The Palestinian Authority has continued to operate almost entirely independent from the violent reality faced by its people on a daily basis.

The shootout of July 14 could have registered as yet another violent episode of many that have been reported in Jerusalem in recent months. Following such events, the Israeli official discourse ignores the military occupation entirely and focuses instead on Israel’s security problem caused by ‘Palestinian terror’. Politicians then, swoop in with new laws, proposals and radical ideas to exploit a tragic situation and remold the status quo.

Considering the numerous odds faced by Palestinians, every rational political analysis would have rightly concluded that Palestinians were losing this battle as well. With the United States fully backing Israeli measures and the international community growing distant and disinterested, the people of Jerusalem could not stand a chance.

But such understanding of conflict, however logical, often proves terribly wrong, since it casually overlooks the people.

In this latest confrontation, Palestinians of Jerusalem won, presenting an impressive model of mobilization and popular solidarity for all Palestinians. The Israeli army removed the barricades and the metal detectors, pushing Israel to the brink of a political crisis involving angry politicians, the army and internal intelligence, the Shin Bet.

The people’s victory was a massive embarrassment for Mahmoud Abbas, the President of the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah. He tried to ‘piggyback off the protests’ but failed, reported the Atlantic.

Other factions, too, moved quickly to mobilize on the people’s victory, but their efforts have appeared staged andinsincere.

“Today is a joyful day, full of celebration and sorrow at the same time – sorrow for the people who lost their lives and were injured,” a protester told Journalists, as thousands stormed the gates of Jerusalem armed with their prayer rugs, flags and voices hoarse from chanting for nearly two weeks.

“This is very much a grassroots movement – this isn’t led by Hamas or Fatah, the traditional political leaders of the Palestinians,” journalist Imran Khan reported from outside the compound.

This grassroot movement was made of thousands of women, men and children. They included Zeina Amro, who cooked daily for those who held steadfast outside the compound, was shot by a rubber bullet in the head, yet returned to urge the men to stand their ground the following day.

It also includes the child Yousef Sakafi, whose chores included splashing water over people as they sat endless hours under the unforgiving sun, refusing to move.

It also includes many Palestinian Christians who came to pray with their Muslim brethren.

Conveying the scene from Jerusalem, television news footage and newspaper photos showed massive crowds of people, standing, sitting, praying or running in disarray among bullets, sound bombs and gas canisters.

But the crowds are made up of individuals, the likes of Zeina, Yousef and many more, all driven by their insistence to face injustice with their bare chests in an inspiring display of human tenacity.

Of course, more violence will follow, as the Israeli occupation is enriched and relentless, but ordinary Palestinians will not quit the fight. They have held resolute for nearly 70 years.

Rational political analysis cannot possibly fathom how a nation undergoing numerous odds can still mobilize against an army, and win.

But the power of the people often exceeds what is seemingly rational. Almost leaderless, Palestinians remain a strong nation, united by an identity that is predicated on the pillars of human rights, resistance and steadfastness.

Dr. Ramzy Baroud has been writing about the Middle East for over 20 years.

3 August 2017

By Rania Khalek

Feminist scholar Valentine Moghadam discusses Western liberal delusions around Islamism, guerrilla movements and the Arab Spring.

Feminist author and scholar Valentine Moghadam participated in the Iranian revolution of 1979. But after the downfall of the Shah, she and her leftist comrades “were crushed immediately by the Islamists,” Moghadam told me. “That’s why so many of us are in exile and so many others were executed, tortured, arrested.”

Now a professor of sociology and international affairs at Northeastern University, where she is director of the Middle East and international affairs programs, Moghadam’s experience in Iran continues to influence her approach to the region and Islamist movements more generally. Much of her academic work, including several books, has focused on women’s movements in the Middle East and the implications of Islamism on their lives.

“It’s really on the basis of my experience in Iran that I have come to be totally suspicious of and opposed to any kind of Islamist movement,” she explained. “The lesson that I and many Iranians learned from the Iranian revolution and the Islamization that occurred almost immediately was that Islamist movements are very strong in the region and that Islamist movements are not good movements. They are not emancipatory, they are not egalitarian, they are not women friendly and they make things worse than the previous status quo,” she said.

In the 1980s, Moghadam was often a lone voice railing against U.S. support for the Afghan mujahideen, or anti-Soviet rebels, a subject she has written about extensively. She was particularly alarmed about the well-being of Afghan women and stunned by the silence of Western feminists and liberals as their governments funded a right-wing insurgency that sought to strip women and girls of basic rights.

In her book Globalization and Social Movements: Islamism, Feminism, and the Global Justice Movement, Moghadam attributed “the silence and confusion of the 1980s…to the anti-communism of liberal feminist groups, to an idealization of ‘Islamic guerrillas,’ to a misplaced cultural relativism, or to ignorance about Afghanistan.”

She expressed a similar critique of the feminist and leftist response to the conflict in Syria, where the U.S. tried to weaken the Syrian government by funding and arming a patchwork of religious fundamentalist groups that often worked side-by-side with Al Qaeda. In a strange affront to traditional leftist principles, large segments of the American left either stayed silent or expressed support for the armed insurgency, often whitewashing and denying its explicitly anti-democratic and sectarian agenda.

As’ad AbuKhalil, a professor of political science at University of California-Stanislaus, has observed that Syria coverage at the typically adversarial progressive program Democracy Now! has become indistinguishable from the one-sided State Department narrative promoted by establishment outlets. The Socialist Worker, the media arm of the International Socialist Organization, has published one piece after another glorifying the extremist-dominated insurgency and painting anyone opposed to it as “pro-Assadist.” One piece referred to the fighters in Al Qaeda’s Syria affiliate, Jabhat al Nusra, as “decent revolutionaries.” And Jacobin, a self-styled “leading voice of the American left, offering socialist perspectives on politics, economics, and culture” routinely publishes articles that whitewash the armed groups in shocking terms. A January 2017 piece in Jacobin claimed that Jaysh al-Islam and Ahrar al-Sham, two of the most fanatical armed opposition groups in Syria, “support national democratic transition” where “people will be able to choose their own representatives.”

This characterization couldn’t be further from the truth, as both groups are explicit about their intention to impose an Islamic state that woudl eradicate Syria’s tradition of pluralism. Until 2014, Ahrar al Sham worked arm in arm with the Islamic State, or ISIS. The groups had a falling out not over ideology, but over allegiance and tactics. Ahrar al Sham continued to work with Al Qaeda until a power struggle in the province of Idlib brought the two Islamist groups to loggerheads. Meanwhile, Jaysh al-Islam famously used caged Alawite families as human shields. Tellingly, Jacobin articles have repeatedly referred to the areas under the control of these groups as “liberated.”

Moghadam believes that these flawed analyses are rooted in the left’s enthusiasm for the Arab Spring, combined with ignorance about the Middle East, and as with Afghanistan, a romanticization of guerrilla movements.

Guerrilla groups that the American left has traditionally supported, like those that sprang up across Latin America in the post-colonial period, “had very clear and emancipatory social and economic and cultural projects which were quite explicit and they often included quite openly the emancipation and participation of women,” whereas the insurgencies in 1980s Afghanistan and today’s Syria “are Islamist and have absolutely no such emancipatory or egalitarian projects or programs.”

“A lot of hopes and aspirations, excitement and anticipation were pinned on the Arab Spring,” explained Moghadam. “I always took a more cautious approach to it because … the main opposition and the stronger alternative political movements to those authoritarian regimes were Islamists precisely because most of these authoritarian regimes … had not allowed the development and the growth and expansion of left-wing, progressive or even liberal activities.”

As a result, Moghadam cautions against “knee jerk support for any group that rebels against an authoritarian regime.” Instead, she advise that “leftists and feminists, when they are confronted with something like a rebellion in a country like Syria, should immediately ask themselves: Who are the rebels, what do they stand for? What is this regime, what does it stand for, what has it accomplished? And where would left-wing Syrians, where would Syrian women have more room for maneuver?”

I spoke to Moghadam in detail about the American left’s response to the war in Syria, the problem with Islamist movements and what a proper feminist response to right-wing rebellions against authoritarian regimes might look like. Below is a transcript of our conversation, lightly edited for clarity.

RANIA KHALEK: You have written extensively about the US-backed Islamist insurgency in Afghanistan in the 1980s and the silence at the time from feminists. I see a similar dynamic around Syria, where the US has funded and armed a sectarian and fundamentalist insurgency. Many feminists and leftists in the US have been supportive of this armed insurgency, despite its right-wing and fundamentalist agenda. Why do you think that is?

VALENTINE MOGHADAM: There is a certain amount of ignorance about the Middle East on the part of some of these groups and organizations. I think that ignorance might also be tied to a certain romanticization of rebellion, guerrilla groups and so on. It’s certainly the case that the rebels in Syria, just like the mujahedeen of Afghanistan in the 1980s, were nothing like the sorts of rebels and guerrilla groups that left wing organizations have traditionally supported. They’re nothing like, let’s say, the Vietcong or Fidel Castro and Che Guevara’s groups, nothing like the Nicaraguans or the El Salvador groups. The movements that I just mentioned had very clear and emancipatory social and economic and cultural projects which were quite explicit and they often included quite openly the emancipation and participation of women. These other groups, the more contemporary ones, many of them are Islamist and have absolutely no such emancipatory or egalitarian projects or programs.

The mujahedeen of Afghanistan in the 1980s, they were even opposed to the left-wing government’s plan for compulsory schooling for girls, and this in a country that was about 98 percent illiterate. And the United States supported them over a modernizing left-wing government. At the time, I was one of just a handful of people who were just appalled by the way almost the entire world, with the exception of course of the socialist block, had turned against Afghanistan and were cheering on the Mujahedeen. It was incomprehensible to me.

RK: Was it because of the way the media portrayed the Mujahedeen? Was it that people just weren’t aware of what their actual agenda was?

VM: I think there were several things going on. One was that this was still a time when the Soviet Union was in place, so there was an atmosphere of anti-communism in most of the western world. This was sort of the waning days of the cold war, but the cold war was still present. And so, anti-communism and cold war sentiments and anti-Soviet sentiments certainly played into all of this.

The American media, including human rights organizations, really played this up. The shocking misinformation and disinformation about, for example, education policy on the part of the left-wing government in Afghanistan at the time was that this was no more than Sovietization of schooling and a kind of ideological brainwashing of young Afghan minds. They were stooping that low to try to put the left-wing government and their Soviet allies in the worst possible light. This is a country that was 98 percent illiterate and the government was trying to bring the country into the 20th century and yet all these westerners were crafting the crudest form, but it was an effective form, of anti-Soviet and anti-Afghan government propaganda to steer people’s potential support for what the government was doing toward support for the tribal Islamist rebellion.

RK: This doesn’t sound so different from other propaganda at the time. There was a lot of propaganda around Nicaragua, but it doesn’t seem to have been as effective as it was with Afghanistan.

VM: If we’re just now focused on why left-wing movements were asleep, it was different because they were more familiar with and more knowledgeable about Central America than was the case with Afghanistan and think this is also the case with Syria, though Syria is a bit more complicated. But I do think that there’s a bit more knowledge of and familiarity with Central America, because of Cuba and the proximity but also the democratic transitions that had occurred in Argentina, Brazil and Chile. So people were much more familiar with what was going on in Latin America than what was going on in Afghanistan. There’s just a lot of ignorance about the Muslim majority world.

RK: In news articles from the 1980s Afghanistan war, I’ve noticed a great deal of excuse-making for the mujahideen’s opposition to girls going to school. A 1988 New York Times, for example, blamed the Afghan government’s ‘Marxist ideology’ for provoking the mujahideen’s extreme misogyny. What’s that about?

VM: There was a certain cultural relativist argument that was being bandied about. It’s a certain arrogant notion that these people have their own culture and it is not correct to impose western values and policies and procedures on their cultures. This idea that schooling is western rather than a universal notion of development and modernization, that this was somehow an imposition of the Soviet Union rather than recognizing that there was a certain social stratum of Afghans who themselves had been educated in various countries.

[Founding member of the Afghan communist party People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan] President Nur Muhammad Taraki had been educated in India for heavens sakes. And these people were very eager to be able to extend the benefits of schooling and awareness and knowledge and skills to their countrymen and countrywomen, yet this was derided and denigrated, again propagandistically I think, as a form of cultural imposition and wrong-headed cultural policy. As if things were never imposed in Western countries too, I mean we’ve had compulsory education in America for what, over a century or more? That has happened in lots of countries. In lots of countries there’s compulsory conscription, even compulsory voting. These were very very weak arguments in terms of their logic and ethical content but they were effective unfortunately because the more you repeat this kind of disinformation and lies, the more effective they become.

RK: That bring us to the Syria issue. Across the political spectrum, everyone except for a few minor groups has been incredibly supportive and cheering on the rebel takeover of Syrian cities.

VM: That’s been really quite shocking to me on a number of levels, but let’s go back to why that occurred. Let’s go back to January, February, March of 2011. The Arab Spring had erupted. There was a great deal of celebration, of optimism. A lot of hopes and aspirations, excitement and anticipation were pinned on the Arab Spring.

I remember that time very well because I was more or less in the midst of it as a scholar. And I was being interviewed at the time about the possible prospects and outcomes. I always took a more cautious approach to it because, yes, the region was filled with authoritarian regimes and dictatorships but I also knew that the main opposition and the stronger alternative political movements to those authoritarian regimes were Islamists precisely because most of these authoritarian regimes–there are some exceptions, Tunisia is an exception, Morocco is an exception to a certain extent–but most of these regimes had not allowed the development and the growth and expansion of left-wing, progressive or even liberal activities. In Egypt, Mubarak had been far more oppressive than Ben Ali of Tunisia had been and really clamped down on civil society. I knew that in Egypt the main opposition force that would come to power was the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamists and that’s exactly what happened. I felt the same way about some of the other countries.

So, if I had to choose between an authoritarian regime ruled by the secular Republican Baath party in Syria and some unknown Islamist groups, I would definitely prefer the secular Republic and albeit authoritarian regime of Bashar al-Assad. And yet others didn’t understand this. I might’ve understood it because of my experience with the Iranian revolution.

At that time of the Iranian revolution we were all in favor of the revolution but we were leftists and the leftists were crushed by Islamists. The lesson that I and many Iranians learned from the Iranian revolution and the Islamization that occurred almost immediately was that Islamist movements are very strong in the region and that Islamist movements are not good movements. They are not emancipatory, they are not egalitarian, they are not women friendly and they make things worse than the previous status quo.

So I’ve been extremely opposed to regime change anywhere for two reasons. One is because in principle I’m opposed to this kind of regime change on the part of Western powers because I think that’s just a form of blatant imperialism. But secondly, it’s because of the likely outcomes, which Islamist groups coming to power or something even worse, which is the collapse of these societies and political systems into the kind of chaos we have seen in Libya.

Part of the lies is that Assad is responsible for ISIS. It’s really interesting but also quite appalling because ISIS was formed out of the mess the US created in Iraq. Al Baghdadi is an Iraqi who was also in an American prison and then he formed ISIS. It’s precisely because of destabilization of the region from external intervention and regime change and attempted regime change that you have seen ISIS expand throughout the region. So none of this is the fault of Assad or anyone else. It is really the fault of the United States, England and France that really pushed for a regime change in Libya and compelled NATO into bombing the heck out of Libya and quite a number of Libyans died.

And look at Libya today. It’s just a complete mess and no one’s taking responsibility for it and no one’s been held to account for it and yet the lies are that Assad is responsible for this.

RK: He’s responsible for plenty of stuff, but not this.

VM: Right. Early on in 2011 he did make the mistake of harshly putting down those protests. But let’s face it, a lot of countries have harshly put down protests. At the time I remember pointing out, look what the UK did to Northern Ireland, to the IRA. There was a great deal of hypocrisy going on at the time. Yes, Assad’s regime made a mistake by repressing the protests, but also yes, a lot of countries have done that, including our much-vaunted democracies. And their mistake, actually their crime was then to immediately finance and arm the armed rebellion, which by the way is against international law. You’re not supposed to arm non-state actors. But they started to do that, in particular their proxies in the region: Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and so on.

So it’s true that the Syrian regime has been incredibly violent, but to a great extent it’s been forced to be because states do not simply put down their weapons and cry uncle. No state does that. If you look at the United States, even if you have just two or three armed militia groups that crop up every so often in places like Idaho or Texas, they react very, very harshly to them.

I actually blame all this terrible violence in Syria on these outside external forces. By encouraging and arming the rebellion, countries like the US and England and Turkey and Saudi Arabia and so on have simply been prolonging the misery of the Syrian people and creating chaos in that country. If they had not interfered back in 2011, 2012, 2013, there would have been some resolution that would have occurred organically between the government and the opposition. Either the government would have totally won and crushed the opposition on its own, and that happens time and again in our world, or there would have been some compromise.

RK: That would have been much better than seven years of violence and bloodshed. As much as I would love to see leftist movements and revolutions sweep across the region, that just isn’t the case.

VM: To the extent that there are left-wing groups and movements, they’re very small and weak, unfortunately. They simply cannot compete or compare with Islamist groups and movements. After all Islamist groups and movements have been getting their funding and logistical support from these big powers. If it’s not Saudi Arabia, then it’s Qatar or the Emirates or Turkey. We know that the CIA has also been supporting its so-called “moderate” rebels in Syria.

In the old days, of course, we had left-wing guerilla groups and progressive groups, but that was when the Soviet Union existed, so they could get some support from them, but we just don’t have that anymore.

RK: That’s what people with the Arab communist parties told me, that they can’t compete with the right-wing nationalist and Islamist groups because they have such a big funding stream and the leftists get nothing. The other thing I think is new in the region is this element of sectarianism that has become progressively worse. A lot of it has to do with the US, Saudi Arabia and their allies trying to counter Hezbollah and Iran by promoting anti-Shia sentiments and empowering Sunni extremist groups. In Syria, a major part of the rebel agenda has been the elimination of minorities. Was sectarianism this prevalent in Afghanistan?

VM: To some extent, but not as bad as it is today. The Taliban were more sectarian because they were almost exclusively Pashtun and almost exclusively Sunni. They carried out some horrific campaigns against Shia Hazaras and so on. But what is going on in the region today is really very troubling and disturbing and I think again the United States is largely responsible for it. It created this monster in Iraq. By invading and occupying Iraq, it opened up this Pandora’s box. Bush’s friend Maliki in particular became very sectarian and there was of course a legitimate resistance that developed in Iraq, but they turned increasingly violent and sectarian themselves, singling out Shia. This has spread across the region.

The other culprit is Saudi Arabia. For 30 years Saudi Arabia has been funding and encouraging and promoting a very draconian anti-feminist, anti-egalitarian Wahhabi Islamic ideology. Meanwhile, the US invades and occupies Iraq. One unintended consequences is the Shia government then becomes friendly with Iran. The United States is really concerned about this. Saudi Arabia is concerned about this. And then they keep pouring more fuel to fire by igniting and promoting sectarian divisions and differences.

The most extreme version of this is ISIS and the way they have systematically been targeting non-Sunnis all over the place.

I do want to say something about this sort of odd position of American left-wing media and groups, their utter silence over treatment of non-Muslims and non-Sunnis in the region. This systemic targeting of Christians, Yazidis, Alawites, Shias but also of secular Muslims, and not only in the Middle East but in other countries too, like Bangladesh, Pakistan—there’s utter silence about this. Absolutely nothing is being said about this targeted killing and mass migration from the region of all the religious minorities. And meanwhile at the same time that nothing is being said about that, we hear all this talk about Islamophobia.

RK: It seems to me that people are scared to touch on this topic because they don’t want to play into Islamophobia at a time when Muslims are being targeted by the U.S. government.

VM: Yes, there is a problem of Islamophobia in the United States and Europe, too. But any critique of Islamophobia has to be accompanied by or has to be a part of a larger critique of discrimination, oppression and the marginalization of all the religious minorities. And that includes the religious minorities in Muslim-majority countries. I would like to hear CAIR (Council for American Islamic Relations) and organizations like that talk about this, but they won’t. And to the extent that they will not, then for me Islamophobia becomes more marginal to some of the bigger issues and problems of the region, which is external intervention, regime change, the arms trade and the chaos that that creates.

RK: One thing I’ve noticed about the region is left-wing groups embracing Hezbollah. They oppose Islamism, but they don’t feel threatened by Hezbollah and instead view them as resistance to Israel and al Qaeda and ISIS. It’s an interesting dynamic.

VM: I was very suspicious of Hezbollah for a quite some time. But it’s interesting that more recently, they seem to be playing a more positive role especially in connection with Syria and trying to protect the integrity of the Syrian political system and the current regime there. It’s an extremely unpopular statement that I’m making and very, very controversial, but I think that just at this moment Hezbollah seems to be playing a positive role as I believe Iran is, even though people like me have suffered from the Islamization of the Iranian republic. But to be very objective about it, I think that both Hezbollah and the Iranian regime are correct to be insisting on the viability and integrity of the Syrian state. As for how the Lebanese view Hezbollah and what is the role of Hezbollah in Lebanon, that’s not for me to decide.

RK: Just to wrap it up, what should the feminist leftist response be to a conflict like Syria?

VM: I think that leftists and feminists, when they are confronted with something like a rebellion in a country like Syria, should immediately ask themselves: Who are the rebels, what do they stand for? What is this regime, what does it stand for, what has it accomplished? And where would left-wing Syrians, where would Syrian women have more room for maneuver? That is the question we always have to ask ourselves when we’re faced with something like this; not just this knee-jerk support for any group that rebels against an authoritarian regime. You have to ask yourself, what is the likely outcome and what does this rebel group stand for?

Rania Khalek is an independent journalist living in the Washington D.C. area.

31 July 2017

By Kevin Zeese & Margaret Flowers

The Coalition Against Foreign Military Bases is a new campaign focused on closing all US military bases abroad. This campaign strikes at the foundation of US empire, confronting its militarism, corporatism and imperialism. We urge you to endorse this campaign.

On the occasion of its announcement, the coalition issued a unity statement, which describes its intent as “raising public awareness and organizing non-violent mass resistance against U.S. foreign military bases.” It further explains that US foreign military bases are “the principal instruments of imperial global domination and environmental damage through wars of aggression and occupation, and that the closure of U.S. foreign military bases is one of the first necessary steps toward a just, peaceful and sustainable world.”

While the US sought to be an imperial force beginning just after the US Civil War and then escalated those efforts at the turn of the 20th Century, it became the dominant empire globally after World War II. This was during the time of de-colonization, when many traditional empires were forced to let their colonies become independent nations. So, while the US is the largest empire in world history, it is not a traditional empire in which nations are described as colonies of the US empire. Nations remain independent, at least in name, while allowing US bases on their soil and serving as a client state of the United States. They are controlled through the economic power of the US, World Bank and International Monetary Fund. The US has used regime change tactics, including assassination and military force, to keep its empire intact.

Commentators have described the United States as an “empire of bases.” Chalmers Johnson wrote in 2004:

As distinct from other peoples, most Americans do not recognize — or do not want to recognize — that the United States dominates the world through its military power. Due to government secrecy, our citizens are often ignorant of the fact that our garrisons encircle the planet. This vast network of American bases on every continent except Antarctica actually constitutes a new form of empire — an empire of bases with its own geography not likely to be taught in any high school geography class. Without grasping the dimensions of this globe-girdling Baseworld, one can’t begin to understand the size and nature of our imperial aspirations or the degree to which a new kind of militarism is undermining our constitutional order.

Our military deploys well over half a million soldiers, spies, technicians, teachers, dependents, and civilian contractors in other nations. To dominate the oceans and seas of the world, we are creating some thirteen naval task forces built around aircraft carriers whose names sum up our martial heritage — Kitty Hawk, Constellation, Enterprise, John F. Kennedy, Nimitz, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Carl Vinson, Theodore Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, John C. Stennis, Harry S. Truman, and Ronald Reagan. We operate numerous secret bases outside our territory to monitor what the people of the world, including our own citizens, are saying, faxing, or e-mailing to one another.

We do not know the exact number of US military bases and outposts throughout the world. The Unity Statement says “the United States maintains the highest number of military bases outside its territory, estimated at almost 1000 (95% of all foreign military bases in the world). . . . In addition, the United States has 19 Naval air carriers (and 15 more planned), each as part of a Carrier Strike Group, composed of roughly 7,500 personnel, and a carrier air wing of 65 to 70 aircraft — each of which can be considered a floating military base.”

The annual Department of Defense (DoD) Base Structure Report says the DoD manages a massive “global real property portfolio that consists of nearly 562,000 facilities (buildings, structures, and linear structures), located on over 4,800 sites worldwide and covering over 24.9 million acres.” They value DoD property located in 42 nations at over $585 billion. It is difficult to tell from this report the number of bases and military outposts, which has led analysts like Tom Engelhardt to describe US empire as an “invisible” empire of bases. He points out the US military bases are rarely discussed in the media. It usually takes an incident, like US soldiers being attacked or a US aircraft being shot down, for them to get any mention in the media.

Many of the bases remain from previous wars, especially World War II and the Korean War:

According to official information provided by the Department of Defense (DoD) and its Defense Manpower Data Center (DMDC) there are still about 40,000 US troops, and 179 US bases in Germany, over 50,000 troops in Japan (and 109 bases), and tens of thousands of troops, with hundreds of bases, all over Europe. Over 28,000 US troops are present in 85 bases in South Korea, and have been since 1957.

The number of bases is always changing as the US seeks to continuously expand its empire of bases. Just this week the US is opening a military base in South Korea, which is described as a city of 25,000 people. The Washington Post reports:

“We built an entire city from scratch,” said Col. Scott W. Mueller, garrison commander of Camp Humphreys, one of the U.S. military’s largest overseas construction projects. If it were laid across Washington, the 3,454-acre base would stretch from Key Bridge to Nationals Park, from Arlington National Cemetery to the Capitol.

* * *

Now, the $11 billion base is beginning to look like the garrison that military planners envisaged decades ago.

The Eighth Army moved its headquarters here this month and there are about 25,000 people based here, including family members and contractors.

There are apartment buildings, sports fields, playgrounds and a water park, and an 18- hole golf course with the generals’ houses overlooking the greens. There is a “warrior zone” with Xboxes and Playstations, pool tables and dart boards, and a tavern for those old enough to drink.

Starting this August, there will be two elementary schools, a middle school and a high school. A new, 68-bed military hospital to replace the one at Yongsan is close to completion.

Also this week, it was reported that the United States has created ten new military bases in Syria. This was done without permission of the Syrian government and was exposed by Turkey in protest against the United States.

There is a cost to these bases, not only the $156 billion in annual funds spent on them, but also the conflicts they create between the United States and people around the world. There have been protests against the presence or development of US bases in Okinawa, Italy, Jeju Island Korea, Diego Garcia, Cyprus, Greece, and Germany. Some of the bases are illegal, as the unity statement points out, “The base that the U.S. has illegally occupied the longest, for over a century, is Guantánamo Bay, whose existence constitutes an imposition of the empire and a violation of International Law.”  Cuba has called for the return of Guantánamo since 1959. David Vine, the author of Base Nation, describes how these bases, which seek to project US power around the globe, create political tensions, are a source for military attacks and create alliances with dictators. They breed sexual violence, displace indigenous peoples, and destroy the environment.

The unity statement of the Coalition Against Foreign Military Bases concludes by urging all of us to unite to close US bases around the world because:

U.S. foreign military bases are NOT in defense of U.S. national, or global security. They are the military expression of U.S. intrusion in the lives of sovereign countries on behalf of the dominant financial, political, and military interests of the ruling elite. Whether invited in or not by domestic interests that have agreed to be junior partners, no country, no peoples, no government, can claim to be able to make decisions totally in the interest of their people, with foreign troops on their soil representing interests antagonistic to the national purpose.

Please endorse the statement and join the campaign to remove US military bases from foreign soil.

Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers co-direct Popular Resistance.

30 July 2017