The Marxists and the Lobby

By Israel Shamir

When an author and an editor of a left-wing magazine repeats word-perfect
the last speech of Ashcroft at ADL New York, it can't but cause some eyebrow
twitching. That is the case with recent condemnation of 'antisemitism' by
Nat Weinstein[1] http://www.socialistviewpoint.org/sum_03/sum_03_08.html on
pages of The Socialist Viewpoint, a high-quality magazine consistently
supporting democracy in Palestine and end to the Jewish apartheid state.

What is worse, Weinstein's style and rhetoric are those of Ashcroft and of
Abe Foxman, as well. Weinstein writes: "Buchanan's insinuations of a Jewish
conspiracy in the service of Israel echo a similar claim that lay at the
heart of Adolph Hitler's brand of fascism." However, an open Jewish
'conspiracy' of supporting Israel is a hard fact, and it is expressed by
almost every Jewish newspaper by slogan 'Jews stand steadfast behind Israel'
. This slogan is not an empty word: recent survey shows 86% of the US Jews
support Israel. In a recent discussion on the Web, Jeff Blankfort, a
consistent antizionist, made a sober conclusion: "the distinction that we
are always careful to make between being Jewish and being Zionist is
essentially deceptive and that while all Jews are not Zionists, the
organized Jewish communities throughout the world, despite whatever
differences they may have, are totally behind the Zionist project. To
pretend that these organizations do not speak for the overall Jewish
community, one, that without any doubt, supports Israel as a Jewish state,
is illusory."

Weinstein creates 'guilt by association' as he calls explicit words of
Buchanan 'insinuations echoing Adolf Hitler'. However, 'guilt by association
' is a double-edged weapon, as he himself echoes Abe Foxman, Ashcroft and
Bush.  That is why let us deal with the question properly

Weinstein writes: "claim that the "Jewish Lobby"-a small group of
pro-Zionist Jews-could dictate foreign or domestic policy to the hard-nosed,
quintessentially-pragmatic American capitalist class, is absurd. In fact,
those that make such a charge are either simple-minded fools or unmitigated
anti-Semitic scoundrels."

It is an arrogant statement, for this opinion is universally shared by
billions of people outside of the US, and by many Americans as well, with
one correction: the Jewish Lobby is not a 'small group of pro-Zionist Jews'
but an extremely powerful group of billionaires, media lords, and their
supporters in the left and the right, from the New York Times to the Nation,
from Wolfowitz of Pentagon to Rabbi Lerner of Tikkun. (This subject is
covered in Fiesta of St Fermin, by Israel Shamir). 'Hard-nosed American
capitalists' are indeed "quintessentially-pragmatic", and they understand
what is good for them personally. That is why even the dedicated antisemite
Henry Ford preferred to scrap his book when he had met with the irresistible
force of Jewish boycott. That is why the American parliamentarians are
united in their support of Israel, as it was recently confirmed by the
Senate vote 89 to 4 against Syria. The Iraqi war was a disaster from the
point of view of American capitalism: as it was predicted, it brought them
no oil, no weaponry orders, no new friends; but the capitalists are not
idealists Weinstein presupposes: they know that their stand against Israel
would ruin them personally, and they disregard 'the general interest of
capitalist class'.

Indeed, Buchanan and La Rouche (censured by Weinstein) represent the true
interests of the American capitalists (or 'the middle class' in usual terms)
when they fight the Jewish Lobby. They aren't natural allies for the Left,
but not less unlikely than Foxman and Ashcroft. Weinstein tries to adhere
the label of racist, Nazi and fascist to La Rouche; but the label does not
stick. Instead of expressing his approval, Weinstein is visibly upset that
La Rouche is not a racist: "Rather than demonizing African Americans, La
Rouche lays claim to the heritage of Martin Luther King and . established a
relationship with the Black nationalist Nation of Islam."

Weinstein is hard to please: La Rouche 'uses anti-capitalist and
anti-imperialist' slogans, so he's got to be a fascist (!). La Rouche 'does
not attack Jews, communists and striking workers', so he is a
crypto-fascist. La Rouche 'learned from Trotsky', so he is a perverted
fascist.

It reminded me a short piece by Hanoch Levine, our best playwright:



"The Military Governor's Standing Orders for soldiers in Occupied
territories:

A nervous pedestrian is a suspected Arab terrorist.

A calm pedestrian is a suspected cold-blooded Arab terrorist.

A looking upwards pedestrian is a suspected religious Arab terrorist.

A looking downwards pedestrian is a suspected shy Arab terrorist.

A pedestrian whose eyes are shut is a suspected sleeping Arab terrorist.

A stay-at-home person is a suspected sick Arab terrorist.

The above-mentioned suspects should be arrested, and after a warning shot,
taken to the morgue"



Indeed, Weinstein does not produce a single proof of La Rouche's 'fascism',
or his similarity to Hitler and Mussolini. His true objection to La Rouche
and Buchanan is based on one thing, namely on their anti-Jewish rhetoric. He
comes clear in following lines:

'The fascists will say that it was the Jews who were the masterminds behind
American imperialism's 55-year-long role of creating, financing and arming
the Zionist state of Israel. That's why those who profess opposition to
Zionism are either foolish or anti-Semitic when they charge the so-called
"Jewish lobby" with dictating American foreign policy.'

But we, the friends of Palestine, Jeff Blankfort, Michael Neumann, Elias
Davidsson, Stan Heller, Norm Finkelstein, David Hirst, Mazin Qumsiyeh and
many, many others (surely not racist antisemites) are not more foolish than
Weinstein. We are just honest folk and we say what we think is true. For us,
it is more important to stop today the Israeli-American aggression in the
Middle East than to worry for 'the Jews' and their position tomorrow, for
truth and sincerity is the best defence against forthcoming 'fascists'.


2

Indeed, should the Marxists, including The Socialist Viewpoint, support and
protect 'the Jews' from the left? The Marxist view of the Jews was formed by
Karl Marx, Kautsky, Lenin, Trotsky and Abram Leon. It is founded on
rejection of the concept of 'the Jewish nation'. Lenin said[2]: 'this
Zionist idea is absolutely false and essentially reactionary'. He quoted
approvingly: "The modern Jew is a product of the unnatural selection to
which his forebears were subjected for nearly eighteen centuries." Abram
Leon completed this view with his vision of 'people-class'. For him, the
Jews were the original capitalists of pre-capitalist society; people who
preferred to fulfil antisocial function of money-lenders and tax-collectors.
Naturally, such a 'people-class' does not deserve our support.

But even if Weinstein considers 'the Jews' being a separate nation, it is
still no reason to protect them. Lenin called for 'revolutionary war against
contra-revolutionary nations'[3], and wrote in 1919: "If we fight [the US
President] Wilson, and Wilson turns a small nation into his tool, we should
explicitly fight this tool"[4]. Equally, Leon Trotsky denied any connection
to the Jews and rejected appeals of the Jews.

Marxists are against RACIST antisemitism, but thankfully this plague is
eradicated. Racist antisemitism should not be confused - not only with
anti-Zionism, as Weinstein correctly notes, but with non-racist rejection of
'the Jews' elsewhere, as well. The Jewish Question of Marx and of Leon
provides an example of such non-racist rejection.

Every Marxist knows of Marx's negative view of the Jews. 'Their God is money
', he wrote. Naturally, he was not a racist and believed that a person of
Jewish origin (like he was) can break with the Jews. Usually such a break
was formalised by baptism; Spinoza's break was formalised by nidui, the
curse of the Jews, after the philosopher rejected Jewish world-view.

Would Weinstein defend Jews against Marx and Spinoza? But anti-Jewish idiom
of Buchanan and La Rouche is equally non-racist. Both have numerous persons
of Jewish origin on their staff and among their friends. But these people
(like Trotsky, Marx or Spinoza) do not belong to Jewry. Moreover, they speak
up against 'the Jews', thus encouraging other people of Jewish origin to
break with this remnant of medieval past.

In similar way, Prince of Orleans took a name of Phillip Egalite and
rejected his ties with aristocracy. If Weinstein thinks that Foxman,
Friedman and Sulzberger made an anti-Jewish approach popular in the US, he
should call upon the American Marxists to embrace these policies and lead
them in ideological non-racist direction. For otherwise his attempts to
protect them will backfire. The Americans will say that Jews from Foxman to
Weinstein speak in one voice and then, the dangerous racist antisemitism can
come back - on the ruins of the Marxist Left.

Moreover, Weinstein's fight against antisemitism objectively works against
the declared goals of the Left. The US Jews made their covenant with the
American ruling class. They are an integral part of the American elite, the
Brahmins to the WASP Kshatriya warrior caste. The Left, and in particular
the Marxist Left, strives to overthrow the ruling classes and create the
society of equality.  There is no way to achieve it without a concerted
anti-Jewish effort. If the Brahmins will be separated from the Kshatriya,
Jews from the WASPs, the dawn of equality will draw closer. 'Sow discord
among your enemies', - this is the first rule in the Chinese manual, The Art
of War. Instead of proclaiming unity of the Jews with the rest of the ruling
classes, the Left should promote strife among them. The sad developments in
Palestine, the quagmire of the Iraqi War provide an opportunity for the
Left.  From this point of view, Lyndon La Rouche the Democrat and Buchanan
the Republican should be supported in their fight against the Jewish Lobby.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] July/August 2003 . Vol 3, No. 7 . Zionism, Anti-Semitism and Fascism By
Nat Weinstein

[2] in his polemics with the Bund

[3] Collapse of the II International (1915)

[4] Speech at 8th congress of the Russian Communist Party.


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