Wednesday, June 3, 2015

Bernie Sanders on Israel.

http://mondoweiss.net/2014/09/elizabeth-sanders-bandwagon

I don't agree with Senator Sanders's stand on Israel. He joined in a unanimous Senate resolution that supported Israel's latest savage attacks on Gaza, a resolution that suspended reality and truth, ignoring Israel's six month long campaign to destroy their cease fire with Hamas, the organization that gets the most votes among Palestinians who live in the areas commonly called "occupied territories." (In my opinion all of the place that's called "Israel" is also occupied territories.)

At any rate, people who have supported the Palestinian cause are rightly angry with Sanders and vocal about this too. I'm with their disagreement with Sanders. Where I part company with some of them is their opposition to his run for the Presidency of the United States. In the context of United States "real politics" Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren as well, take positions miles ahead of the pack. I have the odd idea that politics is not to be confused with romantic love. It's called the art of the possible.


Our members of Congress fell all over each other acting like seals in a zoo begging for fish, kissing Benjamin Netanyahu's rump as he pounded the rostrum demanding an American attack on Iran and undermining our president for not putting his nose far enough in. Congress' invitation and disgraceful display of obedience to the Israel Lobby were also a direct slap at the first United States President who is not a white man. The US far right has conducted itself as though Obama is not a legitimate president.
Bernie Sanders led the boycott of the disgraceful display of obedience to Israel and racism, and was joined by Elizabeth Warren and Al Franken, both Jews, as is Sanders by the way.

I wish we had a revolutionary alternative to Sanders participating in the upcoming election and I also wish we had a powerful movement in the streets, the workplaces, schools and barracks. Do we, but I've just not seen it? 

So, I'm supporting Sanders' run, and I support Palestinian right to self determination. No contradiction.

People may be upset with me for giving most of my energy to fighting Uber. To me fighting Uber with all my energy makes sense because the progressive movement apparently don't get that Uber is a throwback to indentured servitude and feudal relationships. Uber resembles a retrograde first world fascism that mobilizes the middle class against the interests of workers worldwide. So, no apologies here.





2 comments:

  1. Too bad you can't take a trip to Gaza and see how they are
    terrorizing their own people. No country would tolerate
    thousands of rockets hitting their country regularly --
    Hamas' first "act" after the so-called election was to kill
    off much of Fatah -- and terrorize the rest into submission.

    Now think of what they did with a taxi driver who dared to
    tell his passengers that Hamas was corrupt -- a murderous
    gang dragged him out of his taxi, beat him to death and
    dragged his body on the back of the through the streets.

    Hitler was elected too.


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  2. Ask your brother about what imprisoned people want to do with snitches and collaborators. Gaza is a big prison where there is not enough of anything. These rockets that hit Israel - pathetic home made, delivering a message - "we want our homes back." Just compare the casualties of each side. In a prison where there is not enough of anything things will often go wrong. Whose fault is that? Gaza can't have a port, nor an airport. To equate Hamas with Netanyahu's demands that the United States attack Iran and launch still another horrible war that happens to meet the needs of intransigent Israel. Thank goodness that Obama found another path.

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