On the Situation in Lebanon and Palestine

On the Situation in Lebanon and Palestine
On July 12, right after the kidnapping of Israeli soldiers by the Hezbollah, Israeli president Ehud Olmert promised Lebanon a “very painful and far-reaching response”. During the early hours of July 13, the State of Israel started an invasion and pushed its working class into another nationalist and imperialist war. The Israeli State started this invasion for its own interests and without caring about the blood that would be shed. In fifteen days, about four hundred Lebanese civilians lost their lives. Not even the current ceasefire guarantees that the massacres won’t start again as the Israeli State showed that it would destroy anything threatening its own interests not only with the last conflict but with the outgoing torture of the Palestinians.
Yet, it should not be forgotten that Israel is not the only responsible side in this conflict. Both Hezbollah, which is attracting the attention of the world nowadays with the fight they gave to the Israelis with a violence that could match their own, and the PLO and Hamas who have been carrying out a nationalist war in Palestine for years can’t be considered ‘clean’. Hezbollah, which was the excuse Israel showed the world before the beginning of the conflict, killed Israeli civilians with rockets provided by Syria and Iran throughout the war. Hezbollah is a anti-Semitic and religious fundamentalist organization. Most importantly, contrary to what some think, Hezbollah did not fight to protect the Lebanese, instead Hezbollah forced the Lebanese working class to join a nationalist front for its own interests, and it struggled only for the territories they controlled and the authority they had. The PLO which pushed the Palestinian workers from class struggle into the claws of their national bourgeoisie and Hamas which is an organization that is as reactionary, violent, anti-Semitic and religiously fundamentalist as Hezbollah also act only for their own interests.
At this point, it is necessary to briefly describe imperialism. Contrary to what most people think, imperialism is not a policy strong nation states practice in order to take over weak nation states resources, instead it is the policy of a nation state or an organization that functions as a nation state that controls a certain territory, resources on that territory and authority over the population in that territory. To phrase it simply, imperialism is the natural policy any nation state or organization that functions as a nation state practices. As we have seen in the last conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, in some situations nation states or organizations functioning as nation states have clashing interests, and this clash finally reaches the point of an inter-imperialist war.
As the situation is like this, what leftists in Turkey and the World become even more ridiculous and inconsistent. Both in Turkey and the world, a great majority of leftists have gave full support to PLO and Hamas. In the last conflict they become one voice and said “We are all Hezbollah”, by following the logic of saying ‘the enemy of my enemy is my friend’, they fully embraced this violent organization which pushed its working class into a disastrous nationalist war. The support leftists gave to nationalism shows us why leftists don’t have much to say that is different from what parties like MHP (Nationalist Movement Party – Greywolves) not only on Hezbollah, PLO and Hamas, but on many other subjects. Especially in Turkey, leftists don’t have an idea on what they are talking about.
Both the war between Hezbollah and Israel and the war in Palestine are inter-imperialist wars and all sides use nationalism to draw workers in their territories to their sides. The more workers get sucked up in to nationalism, the more they will lose the ability to act as a class. This is why neither Israel, nor Hezbollah, PLO or Hamas should not be supported under any circumstances. What should be supported during this conflict is the workers struggle to survive, not nationalist organizations or states who are getting them killed. Yet more importantly, what should be done in Turkey is to work for class consciousness and class struggle that will develop here. Imperialism and capitalism binds all countries together, this is why national independence is impossible. Only workers struggle for their own needs can provide an answer.
For Internationalism and Workers Struggle!
Enternasyonalist Komünist Sol