#Gaza #Palestine #Syria #Yarmouk Selective #Internationalism: An Activist Disorder This vigorous internationalist grassroots response to Israel’s murderous campaign is exactly what revolutionary Syrians called for from activists abroad since 2011 in response to the Syrian regime’s adoption of Israeli tactics like collective punishment and bombing, shelling, and demolishing entire civilian neighborhoods — but to no avail. The regime of Bashar al-Assad has killed over 2,000 Palestinians and displaced far more Palestinians than Israel has... For ‘pro-Palestine’ activists that have abandoned Palestinians to their fate at the hands of the Syrian regime or betrayed them by siding with the regime, the ironies abound. Out of one side of their mouths, they attack liberals and soft Zionists for blaming ‘both sides’ for the Gaza crisis; out of the other side of their mouths, they blame ‘both sides’ in Syria for the regime’s starvation of Yarmouk refugee camp located near Damascus. Out of one side of their mouths, they reject Israel’s claim that Hamas has left them ‘no choice’ but to take military action against the most destitute and oppressed people in the region; out of the other side of their mouths, they repeat the Syrian regime’s claim it has ‘no choice’ but to act in ‘self-defense’ against armed militants espousing Islamist ideology. State-centered borders-based pseudosolidarity is not only at the core of selective internationalism but also the false notion that the Syrian regime is somehow pro-Palestinian due to its participation in the “axis of resistance,” an anti-Israel alliance of Syria, Iran, and Hezbollah. Any force that is against Israel is ipso facto part of this ‘resistance,’ regardless of that force’s aims or political characteristics. This is how Iran’s Press TV ended up hosting anti-Israel white supremacist David Duke; the Klan is evidently part of ‘the resistance.’ The Assad regime paints itself as an ally of Palestinian freedom on the same anti-Israel basis, as if attacking the Palestinian Liberation Organization and Palestinian camps in Lebanon in the 1980s and torturing and killing Palestinian activists helps anyone but Israel. To activists afflicted with selective internationalism, such questions are incomprehensible since their stand is based not on a meticulous, all-sided evaluation of the stakes involved in a struggle from the standpoint of the oppressed but solely on opposition to this or that reactionary power’s orientation. In the name of opposing their enemies they continually betray their friends. notgeorgesabra.wordpress/2014/07/22/selective-internationalism-an-activist-disorder/
Posted on: Tue, 22 Jul 2014 16:33:54 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015