Because it is So Strong

The late Israel Shahak, perhaps Israel's most important civil libertarian during his lifetime, once made a telling remark about the policies of the benighted Israeli Generals. "Israel was defeated in Lebanon," he told me "precisely because it is so strong." That is, that which calls itself the Jewish State--then as now--has overpowering force and the ability to kill thousands of people in a few days or weeks, for weeks and weeks on end. BUT, the delusions of such military might blind this apartheid state to the severe limits of this force to mold political outcomes desirable to its ruling elite.

And so it is in Lebanon again. The fast-becoming war criminals, Olmert and Peretz (wanted soon in a European capital near you), believe that they can impose a new order on southern Lebanon by ravaging the country, its civilians, and its civilian infrastructure. In the short term, they hold off the Israel hard-right from using "security" and "anti-terrorism" as wedge issues against them. But they can not accomplish the dismemberment of Hezbollah (or Hamas, for that matter). Both groups, and the increasing support each of them enjoys, will simply live on to fight another day and this, in this highly uneven military battle, represents a victory for the weaker parties..

I do not hear the charges of "war crimes" coming as regularly as they should from those of us who oppose the invasion of Lebanon. Bolstered by the assertions of respected international human rights organizations, the charge of war crimes needs to be endlessly articulated to every US politician, every day, and relentlessly. We need to constantly ask ourselves what we did TODAY to hold our criminal government responsible for the current conflict and the dozen of others it plays a role in around the world.

My friend and colleague, Professor Fran Shor of Wayne State, recently wrote me and made the infinitely reasonable suggestion that we engage in sit-ins in Senators’ offices, not simply communicate electronically. Let’s fill up their office spaces with protestors, and we might wish to start with the likes of Carl Levin, who recently responded to constituents’ complaints about Israeli human rights abuses by claiming (in his stupid, sub-literate, mass-produced letter on the conflict) that Hezbollah is “full responsibility” for the conflict and the violence that has occurred since July 12th 2006 (the date marking the start of Zionist colonization in Palestine).

Sure, Hezbollah is responsible for the Israeli bombing of Lebanese bridges and airports and buildings full of civilians--Shiite, Sunni, and Christian and Druze. What next? Hezbollah is responsible for Israeli neo-liberal economic reforms that have further impoverished vast segments of its working-classes and working poor? Perhaps Hamas is responsible for Israel wiping out an entire Palestinian family of seven on a Gazan beach in early July, or for Israel’s now infamous trafficking of women sex-workers (talk about slavery).

Levin is a first-rate coward, more interested in pandering to anti-Arab, Jewish fascists in Michigan’s right-wing Zionist community than with upholding and defending International Law. Let him reap the storm from anti-zionist Jews in Michigan and the Arab-American communities who have put far too much faith in him in the past.