FUCK THANKSGIVING

Whether it's here, or south of that fucking border, fuck thanksgiving. Fuck the pioneers, fuck the founding fathers, fuck slavery, fuck genocide, and fuck racism. Fuck the entire edifice on which this wretched system has been built. To quote Karl Marx:

'Capitalism comes into the world dripping from head to foot, from every pore, with blood and dirt'.

And read this fine article from the Final Call newspaper:

No Thanks to Thanksgiving

BY CHARLENE MUHAMMAD -NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT- | LAST UPDATED: NOV 20, 2012 - 3:49:00 PM

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Genocide, slavery, crushing debt and depression

Truth uncovers lies, exploitation tied to Thanksgiving yesterday and today

(File Photo) Plymouth, Mass., police offi cers lead away a handcuffed American Indian protester arrested during a Thanksgiving protest in Plymouth. The American Indians say they never ceded the site of the fi rst Thanksgiving to the Pilgrims. Photo: AP Wide World Photos/Jim Rogash

(FinalCall.com) - Family gatherings around massive feasts, excessive shopping sprees, and expressions of gratitude are the traditional things associated with Thanksgiving but a dark history of atrocities and exploitation imposed on Native Americans and enslaved Africans still remains hidden, indigenous activists say.

The Thanksgiving myth perpetuated each year is that Pilgrims, Puritans and others came to America in search of religious freedom, but these settlers actually forced others to join their religion, observed Marilyn Vann, president of the Descendants of the Five Civilized Tribes Association.

“It is good for people to be thankful, meet with family and friends and worship God. But the Europeans’ society was not good for people of color and the reality historically is that when they came into power, they killed others and set up a society that enslaved people of color,” Mrs. Vann told The Final Call.

Every year the United American Indians of New England mark a National Day of Mourning. Participants fast from sundown the day before through the afternoon on Thanksgiving to mourn their ancestors, genocide committed against their people, and theft of their land.

Artist's depiction of "The first Thanksgiving". The story history tells is that Pilgrims, Puritans and others came to America in search of religious freedom, but many say these settlers actually forced others to join their religion. Photo: MGNOnline/Courtesy Wiki Commons Indigenous peoples must gain a true knowledge of themselves, then unite and correct those lies and myths that helped to make the “thanksgiving” lie acceptable —–Student Minister Abel Muhammad, Latino representative of the Nation of Islam, who is of Mexican descent.

This year’s 43rd annual Day of Mourning, dedicated to political prisoner Leonard Peltier, is Nov. 22 in Plymouth, Massachusetts. The American Indian Movement leader is serving two life sentences for killing two FBI agents on the South Dakota Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. He was convicted in 1977. Mr. Peltier and his supporters have long maintained he is innocent and framed by the FBI.

American Indian Activist Leonard Peltier

“Given the history of the invaders as they came to this land for gold, for glory and in their idea for God ... they tried to stomp out anything that wasn’t White or that was connected to the earth that they couldn’t control. So they exterminated many of my people, then brought my African relatives so they can continue doing their bidding,” said Hector Perez Pacheco of the Aztlan Mexica Nation Harmony Keepers. It is a warrior society dedicated to protecting Native American sacred ceremonies.

Greed was the European’s motivation then and now but though their land may be occupied, Native peoples still maintain their sovereignty whether others recognize it or not, he declared.

“They have robbed from us more than the land, more than the minerals. But it’s the knowledge of self,” Mr. Pacheco said. “The main thing about so-called Thanksgiving is they’re robbing our identity. They’re robbing our identity from our African roots, from our European roots, from all those things, and they’re still telling everybody everything’s okay and it’s not okay.”

“It’s all about money. It was when they came and it still is about money, not to maintain and survive but to exploit and destroy the ability for others to survive,” Mr. Pacheco continued.

One solution is to return to history to build people’s consciousness, he said.

Even with broad access to the truth through historians and internet research, old attitudes and ideas about what really happened to Native Americans and the truth of Thanksgiving still prevail, said Nation of Islam Student Minister Abel Muhammad.

Misinformation and outright lies have plagued people’s thinking for centuries, but things must change now, he said.

“Even though we know of the atrocities committed against the indigenous people, too little is being done to educate, acknowledge, and most importantly, correct the attitudes and thinking that led to the celebration of the genocide of the indigenous,” Mr. Muhammad stated.

Indigenous peoples must gain a true knowledge of themselves, then unite and correct those lies and myths that helped to make the “thanksgiving” lie acceptable, said the Latino representative of the Nation of Islam, who is of Mexican descent.

“The false images of savage Indians must be countered by their natural brilliance because after all, it wasn’t savages who taught the White man how, when and what to plant for food to survive in the Western hemisphere,” he noted.

With this year’s 43rd commemoration of the National Day of Mourning, Mr. Muhammad will be grateful for his ancestors’ sacrifice, culture and tradition, particularly that of great American Indian activist Russell Means, who died on Oct. 22.

“As Brother Russell Means said, ‘Look around you. You already have nothing! You experience the worst poverty, the worst health, the worst environmental problems, the worst of everything, plus they have stolen your territory, your freedom, and your self-respect. Wake up!’ That’s what our people need, and perhaps our brother going to the ancestors can be a base for us to unite and the wake-up call we needed,” Mr. Muhammad said.

Native Americans should acknowledge their roots but not in some cheap way trivializes the real value of knowing their history as indigenous people, but a real knowledge of themselves, he said.

Having a day to give thanks is an ancient tradition in most cultures, not just for Native Americans, according to Mark Anquoe of the International Indian Treaty Council and American Indian Movement.

“Naturally, people feel the need to give thanks for what they have. At the same time, we should be most thankful that we still find the spiritual strength to continue the struggle for justice and for our people,” Mr. Anquoe said.

First Europeans were taking land for agriculture but now the notion of resources has changed to coal, uranium and oil, Mr. Anquoe noted. While those ancient struggles evolve or may look a little different, they never go away, he said.

“They’re still using African Americans as slave labor by pushing everyone into the prison industrial complex, which is a current form of slavery. So you still have the theft of land and use of slave labor,” Mr. Anquoe told The Final Call.

From Europeans enslavement and oppression of both Native Americans and Blacks, a sacred relationship formed and both groups must nurture it for a better future for their children, he said.

If not, the false legacy of long lines and mass spending on Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving and official opening of the holiday shopping season, will prevail.

Credit card spending during this time of the year leads to massive debt as Black Friday spending hit a record $52 billion in 2011, according to a National Retail Federation survey.

The human costs of the Black Friday shopping frenzy have also grown.

Black Friday fights are becoming more common, and deadly.

A woman pepper sprayed customers, including children, at a Walmart in San Fernando Valley, Calif., to gain an advantage over electronic shoppers during Black Friday last year. A man was shot at a San Francisco Bay Area Walmart in an attempted robbery in 2011. In 2008, a Walmart employee in Long Island, N.Y., died after being trampled by a stampede of hurried shoppers, shortly after doors opened on Black Friday.

But questions loom about sales this year as Walmart workers have planned a Black Friday walk out. Workers are protesting company retaliation against those who speak out for improved conditions, including better pay, affordable health care and better working conditions, according to members of OUR Walmart (Organization United for Respect at Walmart.)

“This is a period of gratitude but also of financial binging. Black Friday comes along and corporations somehow convince people that they must shop at the mall, as if it’s the law,” said Dr. Boyce Watkins, a professor at Syracuse University, political analyst, and founder of the Your Black World Coalition.

Whether eating, drinking or spending too much, people use holidays to binge, he noted. Some view celebrating the holiday as a tradition and don’t mind it but others act in moderation, except where spending’s concerned, he said.

The corporate pressure means people spend money they don’t have to buy things they don’t need, ending up deeper in debt and regret, Dr. Watkins said.

“Americans are huge consumers. Black people are even huger consumers. Unfortunately, you don’t actually have to have it in order to go out and buy it. You’ll have people that will be deep in debt, behind in their bills, no money in their savings account, but still will be spending like a fool at the malls and that’s a common occurrence and it’s not just a Black thing. It’s a thing. It’s an American thing,” Dr. Watkins said.

Diamond companies have convinced people that spending two months’ salary on an engagement ring is the way to prove they love a woman. But there are other more creative ways than succumbing to the pure marketing genius of Black Friday, he insisted.

Retailers have manipulated customers so much that consumers are begging them to take their money, said the economist. But the sad part is, people aren’t going to stop, despite the high financial, personal and social costs, he said.

“But what you can do is you can encourage people around you to rise above it and reject that. You can’t control what everybody else does but you can control what you do,” Dr. Watkins said.

MORE ON THE RACIST MEDIA...FROM THE MEDIA

This article is from Al-Jazeera. Despite their being a world player in the global media wars, they have a tendency to write better researched, more in depth articles than the shit-slinging western garbage. Read this article on media racism against the Palestinian people....

Few facts, a lot of racism: Palestine in US media

Western media has been struggling to question the Israeli narrative when it comes to conflict and perspective. Last Modified: 24 Nov 2012 16:33 inShare Email Print Share Feedback

Western media often fails to adequately cover Israeli 'militarism' espoused by the "Dahiya" doctrine [AFP]

The worst time to try to grasp a political conflict is during a military confrontation. And yet, it is only at such times that the US media covers the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis. On November 20, one day before the ceasefire was reached between Palestinians and Israelis and eight days after Israel broke the prior truce by assassinating Ahmed Jabari, Gary Rudoren, the husband of the New York Times' Jerusalem Bureau Chief, Jodi Rudoren, disbosomed himself of his anxieties about seeing his wife enter the fray of F-16 and drone strikes on Gaza: "We've been in Israel for five months now. It's been in my head since the beginning that at some point there would be a need for her to cover a situation." It was a rare instance of honesty - even if inadvertent - for the Times. Mr Rudoren unapologetically conceded that Ms Rudoren had been absent in covering the ongoing "situation" in Palestine. One can only wonder what the Jerusalem Chief for the US paper of record had been up to since she replaced the problematic Ethan Bronner, introduced herself on Twitter and set up housekeeping in the West Jerusalem home that was stolen from the family of noted author Ghada Karmi, a family that was forced to flee during the expulsion of Palestinians in 1948. Eye on Gaza Rudoren turned her attention to Gaza when she arrived - like most foreign journalists - in the middle of the recent violent attack. Her dispatches read more like postcards back home from a witless tourist who happened to land in the midst of a conflict zone and whose casual racism - while unsavory - is not surprising given her sheltered and uninformed background. But Jodi Rudoren is not your racist neighbour or family member and should not be uninformed; she is the Jerusalem Bureau Chief of the paper of record - a paper reaffirming itself as willing to trade in overt racism where Palestinians and Arabs are concerned. Follow the latest developments in the ongoing conflict  Of repugnant note: In writing about the funeral of the al-Dalu family, of which 12 members were killed in Gaza, Rudoren coolly inserts her own orientalist fantasies of Palestinians: "But the tone [of the funeral], far more fundamentalist than funereal, was also a potent sign of the culture of martyrdom that pervades this place, and the numbness that many here have developed to death and destruction after years of cross-border conflict." While Rudoren has attempted to qualify and soften her outrageous commentary on Palestinian lives in response to pointed criticism, she had already exposed the racist and condescending position from which she views Palestinians. In her lack of respect or empathy for Palestine, Rudoren is not all that different from other US commentators on the Israeli assault on Gaza Strip. US mainstream media largely ignore the reality of life for Palestinians - whether in Gaza, the West Bank or the diaspora - until there is a surge in violence or an attack on Israelis. The ongoing suffering and losses experienced by Palestinians at the hands of the Zionist state is simply not discussed. While the callow and callous nature of Rudoren's words is appalling, any exposés on death, grief and destruction are of little real value when they appear in a newspaper that has done nothing to clear the fog of the "intractable conflict" that leads people on all sides of the political spectrum to throw up their hands and conclude the situation is just a big "mess". Tortured balance The NYT is not alone. The New Yorker book-ended its coverage of the carnage with two pieces by militant Israelis cheerleading Netanyahu's crackdown on Hamas. Introducing the recent escalation in bloodshed on November 16, Avi Issacharof congratulated Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu for proving that he is not a man of restraint. And on November 21, Ari Shavit commented on the ceasefire, saying, "It also proved that when Israel manifests sanity, some of its neighbours respond with sanity, too." This was after he established the "context" in which Israel launched "Operation Pillar of Defence": "For after Israel tried occupying Gaza and tried peace in Gaza and tried unilateralism in Gaza and tried brutality in Gaza we learned that nothing works in Gaza. With more than a million and a half inhabitants squeezed into a hundred and forty square miles of despair, Gaza has no solution, at least none based in reality. Gaza contains within it all the poison of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. For Gaza is not merely a place. It is where all the sins of the Jewish national movement and all the sins of the Palestinian national movement have created an unbearable human condition that forms the bile duct of the Middle East." The New Yorker also published three articles critical of Israel's assault on Gaza and to its credit two of them were written by Palestinians, including prominent political analyst Yousef Munayyer. Again, one has to question how much impact these worthy articles can have toward achieving clarity in the highly biased atmosphere the magazine has established. Earlier this year, The New Yorker published a seven-page feature on Meir Dagan, former head of Mossad, as well as a blatantly propagandistic fiction piece by a former Israeli soldier that blames Palestinians when Israeli soldiers shoot them.  Palestinian man shot dead on Israel-Gaza border In The New Republic, Nathan Brown places his hope for "peace" as dependent on Hamas' ability to "transform" itself into - presumably - the equivalent of the West Bank's domesticated (read: quisling) Palestinian Authority. The magazine had given space on November 16 to Israeli author Yossi Klein Halevi to introduce the "current round of fighting" as a result of the non-existent "peace process", and lament that fighting would distract voters in the upcoming Israeli elections from important domestic issues. The Atlantic served up Jeffrey Goldberg's plea to his American readers that they not compare the number of dead Palestinians and Israelis, but rather assess the differing "intentions" between Israeli strikes and Hamas' rockets. "The Israeli body count isn't low because Hamas is trying to minimise Israeli casualties. Quite the opposite: Hamas's intention is to kill as many Israelis as possible." In other words, he'd like the American public to not only disregard the reality of what occurs when Israel bombards one of the most densely populated places on earth, but also be the judges of thoughts, which can be divined by utilising the wise principle of the United States' radicalisation theory that identifies "being Muslim" as the second step to becoming a terrorist. Slate Magazine's two articles included Dahlia Lithwick's paean to the 1979 Camp David Accords between Menachem Begin and Anwar Sadat, contrasting it with today's "mess"; and William Salaten - channelling Alan Dershowitz - putting the blame for the escalation squarely on Hamas (and Egypt) and arguing that Israel only strikes military targets. The US media intentionally ignores unambiguous Israeli policies pertinent to the ongoing conflict such as the Dahiya doctrine and the policy of preemption, which was presciently explored by Andrew Bacevich in his November article forHarper's Magazine. As talk of "intentions" regarding attacks on civilians consumes media coverage of the recent escalation, any reasonable discussion must include this information. The Dahiya doctrine refers to an Israeli "security" tactic to target and destroy civilian life so as to deter resistance. In the words of the 2009 Goldstone Report, the Dahiya doctrine involves "The application of disproportionate force and the causing of great damage and destruction to civilian property and infrastructure and suffering to civilian populations." Lest anyone forgot this explicit policy of targeting civilian infrastructure, Israeli Interior Minister, Eli Yishai helpfully reiterated it on November 17: "The goal of the operation is to send Gaza back to the Middle Ages." And despite that policy being on flagrant display yet again during the eight day bombardment of Gaza, with police stations, media centres, banks, a football stadium, as well as the buildings of the ministry of culture and education and homes being decimated, "Dahiya" does not make an appearance in US coverage. The press is largely silent about  these policies. The failure of the US press to adequately cover Israeli militarism clearly extends to American militarism as well. The massive Israeli arms arsenal is primarily provided by US indebted coffers. Moreover, President Barak Obama temptedNetanyahu to accept the offer of the ceasefire on the table by promising to increase military assistance to Israel, help prevent arms smuggling into Gaza, and fund more Iron Dome and anti-missile systems. Acknowledging these realities in its coverage of Palestine would afford the press the ability as well as the compunction to scrutinise and challenge the talking points put forth by the Israeli government and military during times of violent onslaught. Therefore, it's unlikely that these realities will be acknowledged any time soon. Charlotte Silver is a journalist based in San Francisco and the West Bank. She is a graduate of Stanford University.  Follow her on Twitter: @CharEsilver The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera's editorial policy.

THE FRAME-UP

The Palestinian people have been made to look like "terrorists" in the eyes of the world, or at least in the eyes of the world who don't feel the need to dig any deeper than cheap sensationalist headlines and unsubstantiated accusations. The crimes against the Jewish people during world war two were committed by europeans, mainly germans, so why are the Palestinians being forced to pay for those crimes? It's a long and complex story, but the bottom line is, the same logic used to force the Jewish people out of their homes is being applied to the Palestinians now. Continue...

Revolution #213, October 10, 2010

Question: Does the Holocaust Justify the Dispossession of the Palestinian People?

For many the "bottom-line" argument for the state of Israel is this: the Jewish people, worldwide, need a state to which they can go for protection should another nation take up Hitler’s project of extermination of the Jews.

Let us state in no uncertain terms that the Holocaust was clearly one of the great crimes of modern history. But on a very basic moral level: how does a crime against one people (the Jews) committed by the government of another (the Germans)—no matter how horrific that crime—justify the dispossession, exile, constant humiliation and oppression, and denial of self-determination to a third (the Palestinians)? It does not and it cannot. An argument could perhaps be made that, as part of the post-war reconstruction of Europe and as part of reparations for these horrendous crimes, provisions should have been made to enable the Jewish people to choose some form of autonomy or self-determination within Eastern Europe, using German lands and resources to carry this out; but this argument was not only never seriously entertained by the victorious powers at the time, but when someone like the journalist Helen Thomas commits the unpardonable sin of mentioning this notion, as she did a few months ago, she is immediately subjected to public humiliation and career death.¹

To approach this question another way, the slogan "Never Again" can be taken in two ways. One way is that "never again shall it be allowed that crimes against humanity can go on and people will be able to plead ignorance or impotence as an excuse for doing nothing to stop those crimes"; the other way is to say that "never again will my people be fucked over, and anything that is done to justify preventing that is allowable." There is a world of difference between those two moral stands.

Further, let’s look at the historical context of the Holocaust. The Holocaust was part of a "larger project." The Nazi regime conflated Judaism and communism; that is, the Nazis rolled them into one big enemy, the so-called Judeo-Bolshevik conspiracy. The Nazis regarded the communist project of emancipation—which included the abolition of anti-Semitism—as utterly intolerable and evil; the participation of some Jews in this project only added to their hatred. As the Nazi forces invaded the Soviet Union, the counter-revolutionary forces from among the Soviet citizenry which supported them were the same ones who eagerly assisted in the extermination of the Jews and the murder of communists.

This part of World War 2 was, in a real sense, a fight between two different visions of what it meant to be human. Whatever the shortcomings of the socialist Soviet Union at that time, two different worlds based on two different visions confronted each other, captured in the respective watchwords of their movements: "Deutschland Uber Alles" ("Germany Over All") versus the emancipation of all humanity. For this among other reasons, the "Eastern Front" (where the Soviet Red Army defeated the great majority of the German Wehrmacht [war machine]) was a war zone of particular ruthlessness. Very few Americans know that, in addition to the six million Jews pitilessly exterminated by the Nazis, the German army was responsible for the deaths of some 28 million Soviet citizens! (And here, too, when someone mentions that inconvenient truth—as Oliver Stone did a few months back²—they too are be publicly pilloried.)

So long as imperialism exists, the majority of nations and peoples will be oppressed by a relative minority of dominant nations. It is important and valuable and just—in fact, it is absolutely necessary—that people stand up to that oppression, refuse to tolerate it, resist it, and work to abolish it. But if that turns into a fight for national rights at the expense of another people’s rights, then it is not so fine—then it is on the road to very quickly becoming reactionary. The only way to be finally sure that there will be no more genocides, of any kind and against any people, is to abolish imperialism itself—to, yes, emancipate all humanity, and nothing less.

1. In the course of a May 27, 2010 "interview" outside the White House by a pro-Israel rabbi, Helen Thomas said Israel should "get the hell out of Palestine..." Within hours, the 89-year-old Thomas, long known as Dean of the White House press corps, had been forced by media pillorying, pro-Israel organizations, and the Obama administration into retirement. For more, see Revolution #203, June 12, 2010, or revcom.us. [back]

2. In a July 25, 2010 interview with London’s Times, filmmaker Oliver Stone said that Hitler might have done "far more damage" by killing 25-30 million Soviet citizens during World War 2 than by killing six million Jews. When asked why he thought there was so much more emphasis on the Holocaust than on the deaths of tens of millions of Soviet citizens, Stone said it was mainly because of a powerful Jewish lobby within the U.S. Coming under fierce attack by the Simon Wiesenthal Center, the American Jewish Committee and other pro-Zionist organizations, Stone clarified his remarks, saying he did not intend in any way to belittle the atrocity that was the Holocaust. [back]

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THERE IS NO DENYING THE TRUTH

As the media continues their one sided assault against the victims in this whole tragedy, truth does find a way out, even if on a much smaller scale than the fucking liars have at their disposal. Fuck the media, the terrorist governments of israel, canada, the u.s.a., and all other terrorist organizations.



The interests, objectives, and grand designs 
of the imperialists are not our interests—
they are not the interests of the great 
majority of people in the U.S. nor of the 
overwhelming majority of people in the 
world as a whole. And the difficulties the 
imperialists have gotten themselves into in 
pursuit of these interests must be seen, 
and responded to, not from the point of 
view of the imperialists and their interests, 
but from the point of view of the great 
majority of humanity and the basic and 
urgent need of humanity for a different 
and better world, for another way.
Bob Avakian
BAsics 3:8

TERRORISTS

The terrorist state of israel is being aided in their mass murder of the Palestinian people by the largest terrorist organization in the world, the united states government...

Israel's Murderous Assault on the People in Gaza...
And the Need to Oppose These Crimes NOW

by Alan Goodman | November 25, 2012 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

Right-click to download PDF Leaflet of this article.

At this writing, a brutal wave of targeted and indiscriminate killing, destruction, and terror is being rained down on the Palestinian people in Gaza by Israel—an operation the Israelis are calling "Pillar of Defense." Health officials in Gaza say 46 people have been killed and 440 people wounded so far in the attacks. By the time you read this, that number will be larger (there have been three reported deaths on the Israeli side). This terror and brutality—overwhelmingly hitting at non-combatants in Gaza—is fully backed by the United States, with Obama insisting over and over that Israel's murderous bombardment of essentially defenseless people in Gaza is "self defense."

Israel's assaults on Gaza are taking place under cover of darkness—literally. Israeli missiles and bombs have, at this writing, knocked out power in Gaza, leaving people, hospitals, homes, and emergency responders without light. What few reports from Gaza make it into mainstream media coverage portray a reporter standing in pitch dark, describing sonic booms, earth-shaking bombs, and flames erupting high into the sky. The Israeli assault has already killed elderly people, children, and many, many other people who could not possibly be considered "combatants" in any military activity originating in Gaza.

One of those killed by the Israelis was the 11-month-old son of Jihad Misharawi, a BBC journalist who lives in Gaza. An Israeli missile hit Misharawi's home on November 14, early in the assault, killing both his son and sister-in-law. When the Israeli missile hit Misharawi's home, there was no military activity observed in his residential neighborhood. After the Israeli missile hit Misharawi's house, his BBC editor tweeted, "if Israel can kill a man riding on a moving motorbike (as they did last month) how did Jihad's son get killed." This murder of the 11-month-old child and the sister-in-law of a BBC journalist is part of a long record of Israeli (and U.S.) killings and terror against even mainstream reporters to keep the world from seeing what Israel is doing to the Palestinians.

Only a very partial picture is available of the situation in Gaza. But what emerges from postings on social media is alarming. A doctor in Gaza posted this at Facebook two days into the attack:

Dear Friends, Gaza is under extensive Israeli military attack, in less than 2 hours, 14 military attacks against different targets in different parts of Gaza Strip, 6 were killed including 2 young girls age 4 and 7, 11 were injured, the hospitals are already lacking essential emergency medications, and citizens were called for blood donation, we do not have power, iam using UBS, the first stage of this operation has been accomplished, we expect more escalation. your solidarity means a lot at this difficult times, pass the word, this aggression, should stop now.

Again, a clear picture of the terrible human cost of the attack on Gaza is not available at this writing, and all indications are that what is leaking through Israeli blackouts and U.S. media distortion is only the surface of the death and suffering the people there are being subjected to as you read this.

And as this issue of Revolution is posted online and goes to press, Israel is massing troops on its border with Gaza and there is talk of a ground invasion, which would further escalate the death and destruction.

The current assault on the people of Gaza comes four years after Israel's "Operation Cast Lead" which killed 1,400 people in Gaza and destroyed schools, hospitals and housing; and after four years of a blockade that has kept building supplies and other necessities of life from reaching Gaza. On May 31, 2010, Israeli military forces stormed the Mavi Marmara, one of six ships attempting to bring concrete, toys, workbooks, chocolate, pasta, and substantial medical supplies to Gaza, items that Israel banned from Gaza. Israeli commandos killed nine unarmed activists on board.

U.S. Media: Turning Reality Upside Down

It is important to highlight the utterly shameful complicity of the U.S. mainstream media in justifying all this by framing it as "Israel's response to terror," even when their own reports reveal a different picture.

A revealing exchange took place on the Piers Morgan show on CNN. Morgan—who himself is a mouthpiece for the interests of U.S. imperialism, but may have "lost his head" for a moment after watching a report from CNN's reporter in Gaza depicting massive destruction and terror being rained down on people—more or less blurted out: "Gaza is, to many people, one of the key problems in the region because of the terrible oppression, whatever the right phrase is for it, of the Palestinian people there. It's an awful place for people to try and live, isn't it?"

He was immediately "corrected" by his guest, CNN analyst Fareed Zakaria, who said: "First, one has to say, Piers, as you did, the Israelis are justified in doing something when all these rockets are being fired at them. So there's no question that it's justified."

And with that "settled," the terms of acceptable discourse were re-set, and the discussion moved on... to critiquing how successful (or not) Israel had been at advancing the interests of Israel (and by extension, its sponsor, U.S. imperialism). And in the process, utterly upside-down terms were set as the beginning and ending point for any "analysis" that was going to come across the airwaves, and how viewers were being programmed to think.

Three Basic Defining Facts

Israel's assault on Gaza is taking place in the context of a complex and rapidly and radically shifting political situation in the region, and in the world. There is work to do to analyze how all this is playing out right now, but a basic and sweeping analysis of the current world situation, and how to act in the face of it, can be found in Bob Avakian's talk "Why We're in the Situation We're in Today... And What to Do About It: A Thoroughly Rotten System and the Need for Revolution." The audio of this talk is available at revcom.us, and again, this provides an essential foundation for contextualizing the conflicts and upheaval in today's world.

But in order to have any sense of how Israel and the oppression of the Palestinian people fits into the big picture, it is necessary to ground one's understanding in three basic, objective facts that define the nature and role of Israel in the world today:

1. Israel was, and is, built literally on the blood, bones, land, and homes of the Palestinian people, stolen through terrorist ethnic cleansing that constitutes a great legal and moral crime.As such, the state of Israel is illegitimate, and no justice—for anyone—can be found within the paradigm of the Zionist state.
          The terrorist attacks by Zionist settlers were concentrated in the "Nakba" (catastrophe): systematic, planned killing, destruction of Palestinian villages, and rape of Palestinian women in 1948 that marked the birth of the state of Israel. This has been documented, even by defenders of Zionism (even as pro-Zionist historians have sought to justify these acts). Nearly the entire population of Gaza was driven out of, or is descended from, people driven from their homes in what is now Israel.
2. Israel is a product of, and plays a special role in, enforcing the global system of capitalism-imperialism. From its conception and inception, Israel has never been mainly an expression of the aspirations of Jewish people (although there has been and is a Zionist movement among Jewish people). Instead, it is fundamentally a creation of first British imperialism (one of whose representatives said that a Zionist state would be "'a little loyal Jewish Ulster' in a sea of potentially hostile Arabism."*) Soon after its birth, Israel became a key enforcer of the interests of U.S. imperialism in containing Arab nationalism and contending with other imperialist powers (especially the Soviet Union after capitalism was restored there). Israel's service to U.S. imperialism ranged from providing key military assistance to Apartheid South Africa to playing a key role in overseeing the genocidal massacre of 200,000 indigenous Guatemalan peasants in the 1980s. And today, Israel continues to plays an indispensable role for the U.S. empire.
3. The moral foundation on which Israel's crimes are justified—invoking the Holocaust—is utterly immoral. To quote from the special issue of Revolution—"Bastion of Enlightenment... or Enforcer for Imperialism: The Case of ISRAEL." (Revolution #213, October 10, 2010):
          "Let us state in no uncertain terms that the Holocaust was clearly one of the great crimes of modern history. But on a very basic moral level: how does a crime against one people (the Jews) committed by the government of another (the Germans)—no matter how horrific that crime—justify the dispossession, exile, constant humiliation and oppression, and denial of self-determination to a third (the Palestinians)? It does not and it cannot....
          "To approach this question another way, the slogan 'Never Again' can be taken in two ways. One way is that 'never again shall it be allowed that crimes against humanity can go on and people will be able to plead ignorance or impotence as an excuse for doing nothing to stop those crimes'; the other way is to say that 'never again will my people be fucked over, and anything that is done to justify preventing that is allowable.' There is a world of difference between those two moral stands."

And Israel, built on a foundation of ethnic cleansing, enforcing imperialist exploitation and oppression, and justified with profound immorality, is upheld by the "international community," the great powers of the world, especially the U.S., as a "bastion of enlightenment" in the Middle East.

"Two Outmodeds," a Basic Question of Right and Wrong, and a Need to Act

The (elected) government of Gaza—a section of Palestine not directly occupied by Israel—is Hamas, which is an Islamic fundamentalist movement aligned in various (and shifting) ways with other Islamic fundamentalist forces. And Israel's attack on Gaza is taking place in the context of a whole set of global conflicts, including the clash between "the West" and Islamic fundamentalist forces.

Bob Avakian speaks to that conflict this way:

What we see in contention here with Jihad on the one hand and McWorld/McCrusade on the other hand, are historically outmoded strata among colonized and oppressed humanity up against historically outmoded ruling strata of the imperialist system. These two reactionary poles reinforceeach other, even while opposing each other. If you side with either of these "outmodeds," you end up strengthening both.

While this is a very important formulation and is crucial to understanding much of the dynamics driving things in the world in this period, at the same time we do have to be clear about which of these "historically outmodeds" has done the greater damage and poses the greater threat to humanity: It is the historically outmoded ruling strata of the imperialist system, and in particular the U.S. imperialists.

—BAsics 1:28

In the world today there is a great and urgent need for not only mass resistance to both these "outmodeds" and above all the imperialist "outmoded" —but for qualitative advances and breakthroughs for the real and fundamental alternatives to both these outmodeds: revolution led by a genuinely communist vanguard aiming for the final goal of a communist world, free of every kind of outmoded, exploitative and oppressive relation and corresponding ideas. (See "On the Strategy for Revolution" by the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA for a full presentation of what is needed for there to be a revolution, and how the work of revolutionaries, along with developments in the world, can make that possible. The statement on strategy is in BAsics and at revcom.us.)

There is a basic question of right and wrong here: Israel's attack on the people of Gaza is essentially a mass slaughter of civilians in the service of reactionary aims, to enforce and impose an exploitive and oppressive world order. Nobody with a basic sense of justice should be silently complicit in that! And while there have been important protests around the world, and some in the U.S., there is not anywhere near enough visible political outrage in this country.

Going back to the challenge to break out of the parameters of the "two outmodeds," the lack of visible opposition in the U.S. to these attacks would feed the whole deadly paradigm where the two alternatives people think are possible are these "two outmodeds."

But on the positive side, the more people around the world do see a force in the U.S. that is cohering around a whole other way things could be, and is, opposing the crimes of "our" government, and the more that resistance is framed in the context of a movement for revolution, this can be a really important part of a whole ensemble of work to put revolution on the map here, and around the world.

Things you can do now:

• Wherever you are, organize protests against Israel's attack on Gaza, its role in the world, and U.S. backing for Israel. As you do, get out this issue of Revolution, along with relevant quotes from BAsics, including "After the Holocaust, the worst thing that has happened to Jewish people is the state of Israel." (BAsics 5:12), and the BA quote in the centerspread of this issue of Revolution, (BAsics 3:8) Pass them out on palmcards, put them on banners and signs, and find other appropriate ways to challenge everyone with these quotes.
• While the special issue of Revolution on Israel is not widely available in print at this time, get the title of, and link to it out all over:
  Bastion of Enlightenment... or Enforcer for Imperialism:
  The Case of ISRAEL
  Get the real story at revcom.us/israel
• Organize, participate in, and intervene in forums, discussions, and panels on Israel and the Middle East, with strategic confidence in facts and truth, which argue against anyjustification for Zionism.
• Throughout all of this, bring people to Bob Avakian's new synthesis of communism and the movement for revolution—to make that real.

* Ulster is the name the English ruling class assigned to a section of Northern Ireland, where there has historically been a section of people who identify with and have served as enforcers for English domination of Ireland, and Ulster has been a stronghold for the English domination of Ireland. [back]

LAST NIGHT

Despite the mediocre turnout and relatively low energy of the crowd at last night's Logan's show, I had a great time. It has been at least twenty years since I've played with any of Lettuce's bands. The last time must have been in '92 at Zanzibar, a cafe that no longer exists. So it was great to be able to play with 24 Hour Standoff, (who were awesome), and the fucking blazing Bleak Machine, who are one tight fucking band. Thanks to Raf of Bleak Machine for putting it all together, and for his enthusiasm, and just for being a standup and righteous human being. Thanks also to the old diehard motherfuckers who keep coming out, and to the fabulous Scott Henderson for doing sound, and for being a living Victoria legend. Our next show may not be until the Jay Brown Memorial at the end of January. We hope to keep working on the latest recording, and probably writing some new songs in the meantime. Thank you to everyone for all of the support.

SEE YOU TONIGHT.

I look forward to seeing all of you pricks at Logan's tonight. Bleak Machine are an excellent, precise, tight, hardcore/crossover hybrid, and I look forward to seeing them. 24 HR. Standoff have one of the best local names I've heard in a while, and with Lettuce in the band, it'll be straight up no nonsense fuck you punk. See you all there.