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From Socialist Worker, No. 103, 4 January 1969, p. 1.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’ Callaghan for the Encyclopaedia of Trotskyism On-Line (ETOL).
ISRAEL, WESTERN IMPERIALISM’S PUPPET state in the Middle East, is once again waging war on the Arab people. The ferocious attack on Beirut airport last weekend may herald new moves by the Zionists to extend still further their illegal boundaries and render thousands more homeless and destitute.
The raid on the Lebanon was in retaliation for the attack on an Israeli airliner at Athens and for ‘countless other terrorist attacks’ according to the Zionists.
But it is the Zionist ruling class of Israel who are responsible for terror in the Middle East.
The state of Israel was created in 1948 by the sustained terror of Zionist gangs led by men like Moshe Dyan, who ruthlessly wiped out Arab villages and, herded the people into concentration camps.
Supported by the Western imperialists, who saw Israel as a useful buffer state to the Arab countries fighting for national independence and control of the oil fields, Israel has made no bones about her desire to expand her borders.
In 1956 and 1967 the Zionists went to war and ruthlessly uprooted more Arab peasants and workers in their quest for land. As a result of this terrorism, countless thousands barely survive as ‘stateless persons’ in refugee camps.
In response to this, liberation movements like Al Fatah have been formed to fight to overthrow the Zionists and to restore Palestine to the Arab people.
British socialists should give their full support to the guerrilla organisations, which are not fighting the Jews but Zionism and its imperialist backer.
The tragedy of the Jews in the twentieth century should not be allowed to obscure the issues in the Middle East.
Zionism is a reactionary creed that sees the solution to anti-semitism in a religious state where the indigenous Arab people are treated like third-class citizens.
Jews who support Zionism and ‘separate development’ turn their back on the need for a united struggle against capitalism which breeds not just anti-semitism but all forms of racialism, nationalism and religious intolerance.
The Middle East in particular is an area crying out for social change, for the overthrow of the feudal and nationalist demagogues and the smashing of imperialism’s grip over the oil fields.
In contrast to wild anti-semitic statements from feudal relics like Hussein, the leaders of the guerrilla movements have made it clear that their struggle for a free Palestine is directed only against the Zionists, not the ordinary Jewish people.
The Arab liberation movement calls for a free secular Palestine in which all Semitic people, Arab and Jew, can live in peace together.
Socialists in Britain have a duty to cut through the myths and distortions of the millionaire press and the flabby Labour Left who chatter about ‘poor little Israel.’ Israel is bent on the destruction of the Arab liberation movement, aided and abetted by the imperialists and the giant oil companies.
A free Palestine will be a blow not just to Zionism but to imperialism as well and can open the way to the construction of a united socialist republic in the Middle East with full rights for all minorities.
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Last updated: 30 October 2020