We publish Tom Cooper’s account of the Israeli genocide of Palestine.
A WBT reader sent in this article with the qualification that Cooper “is an analyst of contemporary warfare who frankly condemns both the Russo-Ukrainian War and the state-of-Israel agression in the Gaza area and elsewhere, while politically recognising Labour and similar parties as offering a way for peace.”
I do not know which Labour party Tom Cooper is talking about … both Australian and UK Labour parties support the genocide voting (along with 59 countries in the UN) against a Ceasefire. Most of those countries for genocide came from Europe and Pacific island states as well as the settler states of US and Australia – Ian Curr, Ed., 3 Nov 2023.
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| Israel/Palestine, 1 November 2023 |
Somewhere, it’s nothing but funny to monitor Netanyahu’s winding through his TV-appearances. They go like this: in the evening (when most are watching), he appears to say all of Israel is united. During the night (when next to nobody is watching) he appears to blame chiefs of intelligence agencies have screwed up (i.e. there’s no unity, and he’s right, while the IDF and intel are all wrong). In the morning (when few are watching) he appears to apologise… and in between he’s quoting biblical genocidaire Joshua bin Nun, about ‘Amalek’ and how these should be ‘utterly destroyed’, ‘both man and woman, infant and suckling’ slayed etc…
The Western media is ignoring latter segments, and instead publishing only short sequences about ground offensive, long war, second phase and similar… Indeed, a ‘classic’ in this regards is the latest ZDF (state-owned German TV) report from Ukraine. Anchor’s first question to the reporter trying to talk about Avdiivka was, ‘and what do Ukrainians say about the developments in Israel’? To which the reporter was very happy to say, ‘Ukrainians understand that Israel has priority’…
Ah yes, and another ‘major development’ is that, yesterday, the Ansar Allah Movement (Houthis in control over northern Yemen) has declared war to Israel – and promptly launched another volley of Shahed-like UAVs and ballistic missiles. Most of these were shot down over the Gulf of Aqaba. One of missiles fell inside southern Jordan. Some of UAVs and/or missiles were shot down by Israeli warships underway in the Gulf of Aqaba, like this Sa’ar-class corvette:
Of course, Netanyahu can’t care less about all the requests to resign (primarily from the ranks of hostage-relatives, but from within the IDF, too): ‘after the war’…. whenever that might be. Right now, I’m not sure where have I heard that before. I’m only sure it was quite recently…
On 29 October, Hezbollah/IRGC and PIJ launched a number of rockets at Rosh Pina and few other settlements in northern Isrfael: IDF claimed all of these as intercepted. During the same day, also the appearance of US-operated MQ-9A Reaper attack and surveillance UAVs could be monitored over the southern Gaza Strip, prompting many to guess if the USA is involved in air strikes, too?
On 30 October, the IASF has hit the Bayt Lahya with a huge air strike, completely demolishing about 20 homes. Number of victims remains unknown because rescue teams cannot approach the area.
Israelis are estimating that about 300,000 civilians remain in the ‘northern Gaza Strip’ (north of the Wadi Gaza). Also, the IDF increased the number of identified hostages held by Hamas, PIJ, and ‘other’ Palestinian group to 240. So far, 5 were released or freed (4 by Hamas, 1 by Shin Bet).
Yesterday afternoon, the flying supermen of the best air force of the World – IASF, of course – flew a big air strike on the Jabaliya Refugee Camp in the northern Gaza Strip (the largest of eight refugee camps in the Strip, with a pre-October 2023 population of around 50,000). While purportedly ‘targeting a Hamas commander’ (for whom they can’t even clearly say was there), they massacred over 300 Palestinian civilians.
Immediately after, Israelis began weaselling themselves in the usual series of scams and fake news, like every time they massacre hundreds of civilians… and then they cut off all the telecommunication links to the Gaza Strip.
Overall, the IASF bombardment remains so ‘highly effective’, and the Iron Dome SAM-system so ‘successful’, that the Hamas and PIJ managed to shower Tel Aviv (and north of it) with one volley of rockets yesterday around the noon, and then again the last night…
On the ground:
– Most of around 4,000 Palestinians from Gaza that used to work in Israel, have been kidnapped: ‘arrested’ by Israeli authorities, and subjected to detention and torture.
– IDF launched yet another (5th or 6th) raid into Jenin, in the West Bank, the last night, killing at least five and hijacking additional Palestinians. The Israeli social media is full of videos showing Palestinian hostages being beaten and humiliated, and this is widely cheered (usually along the tunes of ‘Manny Mamtara’)…
– IDF continued advancing along the beach into the Atatra area.
– IDF launched a new, big push into the area around the Indonesian Hospital, west of Bayt Hanoun and east of Bayt Lahiya – in direction of the Jabalia area.
– IDF has reached the al-Karama suburb of the Gaza City, and is reporting ‘intense clashes’ there. This is within 1,000m of the ash-Shati camp, which the IDF claims is ‘one of the most fortified Qassam neighbourhoods’.
– IDF continues advancing from southern central Gaza and the Salah ad-Din Road towards the Sea.
– Turns out the Hamas claim about causing ‘heavy casualties’ to the IDF was truth: this morning, the ID confirmed 9 KIA (all conscripts). The place was not mentioned.
…sic transit gloria mundi…
Tom Cooper
1 Nov 2023
We can only agree with you, except for the last bit, with every respect… So, for further clarification (since the editor has seen fit to take us down this rabbit hole):
1) For the record, the song is clearly in support of the argument for an immediate ceasefire (and repudiating countries like Australia for blocking it). And, clearly, that Israel is in the wrong here – it is clearly operating against international law. (Look at the footage!). It is clearly anti-Zionist (in fact anti- all ideology).
2) It definitely is a religious war, nevertheless. If you don’t think religion and politics have been intertwined for millennia, you are taking a very narrow view of both. They have been virtually inextricably linked as forms of aggression since Constantine, at least, and this is part and parcel of the modern mythology which Christianity brought in.
3) There is no argument against having faith. On the contrary, the song urges us to have faith in a different understanding of ‘religion’ and ‘God’ (predicated on the Nature-History nexus and civic humanism). Without faith, there is no hope.
If you can only understand history as a mere sequence of events, however, it will be impossible to understand.
This is the key problem with orthodox Marxism, causing the deterioration of ‘the left’. It is an unfortunate legacy of certain aspects Marx’s Hegelianism which, despite all the good things he wrote, haunts and paralyses current generations (unfortunately often on well meaning blogs like these). Preventing them from seeing the bigger picture.
A myopia that will do us all in, in the end…
Signing off,
The Easter Islanders
We might just add… We are not ‘confused’. We are just practical utopian idealists. The commonly accepted orthodox Marxist line that ‘this has nothing to do with religion’ is plainly wrong. And in the end, it’s counterproductive to say this (because it appears to be neutral, but is in fact partisan – it can’t resolve the deeply held assumptions underlying false claims to ‘sovereignty’). The reality is, there’s no way out of this conflict unless all sides accept their fundamental idea of ‘sovereignty’ – underwritten by their different versions of a ‘one God’ – is false; as false as every other modern State’s. Even Hobbes didn’t believe a State’s sovereignty rested in ‘God’ (the State exists for the sake of citizens, not vice versa). The theory of ‘divine right’ only began in England with the publication in 1680 of Sir Robert Filmer’s ‘Partriarchia’, which claimed that the King’s authority derived by patriarchal descent from the royal authority of Adam, and should thus be free of restraint by Parliament. This idea, though repudiated by John Locke, however ended up in the construction of the modern State (which every nation in the United Nations, irrespective of religion, is founded on). What is today still causing huge division in the US, is this same false belief – founded in modern religion – enshrined in their constitution.
But the only real ‘sovereign’ is Nature. A two-state solution in Palestine – as unlikely as it is to emerge – is still only a temporary solution, and it will only really work once the hubris denying this ‘divine right’ to possessing lands is put in check globally. Call us ‘impractical’, but we think this is possible.
Nations must be founded (and re-constituted) on ‘a new deal’ with Nature, if we are to survive this century. Not one governed by global corporatism and state-sponsored extraction economy imperialism, such as Australia shamelessly supports self-interestedly, which simply fuels more conflicts. (As some have noted, what Putin is doing in Ukraine is really no different to what Clinton did in Kosovo. And so on… on and on and on…).
We stand by the sentiments in our song, and wish neoliberals in the so-called ‘left’ would wake up and realise that there is something more essential wrong here in our geopolitics – and that they are really being no more progressive and no less partisan than their neoconservative counterparts.
The Easter Islanders
For the entirety of my life, that is 73 years, Israeli occupation of Palestine has resulted in ethnic cleansing and genocide. This project began before the state of Israel was born under UN charter. In order to find peace Israeli occupation must end. To achieve that requires an understanding of the Zionist project and its European origins. Please see why it is not a religious war … Not a religious war
This singer in this clip Stop fighting, There is no God is very confused. But then who isn’t about the genocide in Gaza.
The genocide of the Palestinians has nothing to do with religion, it is about Israel and its government determination to ethnically cleanse Palestine of its original people and to put in place a Jewish settler state.
This is only a song, not an essay. But since it is prone to upset a few people on all sides, let us explain its self-evident intention…
Despite there being some good in all modern religions, there has also been some evil. The advent of traditions promoting a monotheistic God led humanity to think (with the help of ‘Enlightenment Science’) that we are separate from and above Nature. Also, that ‘the self’ (or the soul) – the whole idea of Spirit – was dependent on some ‘Holy’ all-knowing entity that we should fear. But the origin of the meaning of holy is Whole. And even Buddhism teaches abandonment of the self, when in fact the individual self is in critical relation with the collective Self in any functioning society. So, this combination has proven to be a disaster. In ancient times ‘religion’ was ‘civic humanism’, and the meaning of ‘God’ was really Nature, but this was upturned by Christianity. You will find the ideas of Jesus, the Tora, or the Prophet Mohammed, in Plato and Aristotle. And many of their important understandings about these relationships much earlier in the pre-Socratics. Yet these ideas have been manipulated throughout history, sometimes built upon and improved, but more often degraded and perverted by religious and political ideology; and ultimately lost in modern materialism. In essence, the ancient and indeed indigenous “religious” belief that Spirit means a ‘oneness’ with Nature – importantly, reflected in civic unity – is at the source of their primarily non-materialist, non-ideological, non-possessive attitude toward life, providing our ultimate purpose and place in the cosmos. Like scientism, all modern (‘revealed’) religions – and all their spin-offs – are ideological. Science is only now coming to grips with the true meaning of ‘Spirit’.
We take the name Easter Islanders to remember that our entire survival depends on achieving harmony both with Nature and each other. We are all in the same boat, but it’s sinking fast. This is only a song, not an essay, and these words are meant to encapsulate all of this:
‘There’s only one religion, one Holy trinity. Pin it to your History, man – that’s Nature, You and Me’.
So, let’s stop the senseless killing and work out why we are here by figuring out how to live together without fouling our only real Home. Forget chewing up more unrenewable resources to go and live another meaningless life on Mars. The meaningful answer lies here. It always did.
Peace, Love, and genuine Freedom (from all tyrannies).
The Easter Islanders “