It is completely right to see the role of Israeli Zionism and expansionism as the fundament of the whole conflict in Palestine. Israeli Zionism was created in order to hold this region in permanent tension. Its system is such that it must constantly look for further conquests in order to keep alive the fundament of this quasi-racist state. And now this Israeli Zionism, already having claimed the larger part of Palestine, has created a tight network of settlements also in the Westbank which finally cannot but end up with claiming the whole Westbank for Israel and more or less to evict the rest of the Palestinian population also there. This is the program in which the whole patchwork of settlements spread over the whole Westbank results.

See also: The Fate of the Palestinians and the Year 1982 How to deal with the question of Islam - A contribution to a Seminar in London, November 03, 2001 By Hartmut Dicke Topic: Racism-Zionism-Nazism

The question is: how could the Palestinian movement come to this point? And it is correct to point to what happened 20 years ago when the PLO leadership, already then, virtually waived the independent struggle and had the US, which it itself had always said to be the background power of Israel, evacuate itself and its fighters, and a deep split within the PLO occurred. By the Oslo agreement the appearances of a peace agreement were reached which in fact could not do away with the fundamental questions and problems. And the first corner point of the Palestinian question on the Palestinian side is first of all the rise of Islamic fundamentalism as a reactionary current which can well be compared to Israeli Zionism. Organizations like Hamas are in principle exactly as reactionary as the Israeli Zionists. There are even public suggestions that Israel has also financially contributed to supporting Hamas. And political channels between Islamic fundamentalists and Israeli Zionists have already a long time ago been proven.
Why is there such a collaboration, if these are fanatic organizations directed against Israel? Because the Israeli leadership and the insiders know that in this way the Palestinian struggle for a democratic Palestine in which all people live with the same rights is undermined, and their chances are improving.

A further corner point of the Palestinian question, however, is the role of the Saudi-Arabian money and the money of the rest of the oil states in the Gulf.

In order to keep up life in Palestine a lot of money from the part of the rich Arabic oil states is flowing into the Palestinian regions, money which serves to ensure elementary supplies, but also to create militias, to run secret services or create infrastructures. This money is, of course, not given without services in return. In this way the Palestinians and a part of their structures are tied exactly to the same reactionary forces which are closely connected also to the US, although one has an adversary, Israel, which is equally connected to the US. Thus it is the own reaction which also plays a big role why the Palestinian struggle has not been able to unfold, or for years has been unfolding only on such a level which could not create a serious danger to Israel.

One sees by this instance that the structures among the Palestinian are tied up with those of the other Arabic states and nations. In 1990 almost all of the Arabic states let themselves be enrolled and fit together in a fight against Iraq on the part of the US, because of the sheikdom Kuwait which was claimed by Iraq and temporarily annexed by force. By this act, almost all of the Arabic states had even additionally recognised the US as the force of order in the region and allowed it the right to bomb an important Arabic nation like Iraq with their support. In this way further opportunities of resistance against Israel were given up, as it is hard to imagine how a state would seriously oppose the US which has put itself on such a rail.

In general the look at this region involuntarily turns to this predominant majority of Arabic states. How at all can a power like Israel, leaning upon 5-6 million inhabitants, dominate a region with the same language, with a historical coherence and a population of much more than 150 million people? This poses the question as for the role of the Arabic states and their regimes. These are themselves penetrated by the big powers, they are enemies to their peoples themselves, are in antagonistic contradiction to their own respective peoples. And mostly they are in their inner structures additionally engaged in a struggle with Islamic fundamentalism, a fact which brings us to the last component within the Arabic world which one has to integrate in the calculation. Islamic fundamentalism is dead reactionary in its essence. It is also noticeable that it coincides with Saudi-Arabia as one of its promoters.
Saudi-Arabia, a foundation by the US and Great Britain, has itself been stamped by Islamic fundamentalism right from the start. Islamic fundamentalism fights any modern development among the Palestinians and comes along in particular under the cloak of Anti-Americanism and Anti-Zionism, although it is sponsored by the big superpower through many channels, not only via Saudi-Arabia but well also directly. In all states the Muslim brethren, the Islamic fundamentalists, have been playing an arch-reactionary role which does some groundwork for the US, while at the same time they are verbally fuming against US imperialism or Zionism. They are so reactionary that they do not at all form an alternative to the Israeli Zionists, and they have their various hands and influences also within the Palestinian world, thus making a further reactionary component emerge within the Palestinian world. And it is this amalgamation, this meshing with the own reactionary components in the Arabic world which greatly weakens the Palestinian struggle. And it cannot be explained only by despair or by the negative experiences from the organization of Arafat because that has been more or less following a capitulationist course. That Islamic fundamentalism is spreading among them, has to do with the reactionary financial sources within the Palestinians themselves.

To attack and fundamentally fight this is also a task of any kind of Palestinian movement abroad, because demonstrations can take place a lot, they can be imposing and mighty and certainly they can be of some avail for the Palestinian cause, but Sharon and similar people will not be defeated by demonstrations alone. It is also essential that a conception is achieved within the countries. And how shall the knot of the bogged-down situation in the Middle East be solved? At first no way at all is to be seen. Perhaps it will in fact come so far that the Israeli Zionists drive the Palestinian people more or less completely out from Palestine in order to take possession of the country. This cannot be excluded, as this is the program and the point of Zionism, and even then it would not have finished. It would then go on and claim Syrian, Egyptian and other Arabic regions.

The Palestinians are too few and to weak in order to give rise to a decided struggle against the own inner reaction which is internationally supported, although there are many progressive Palestinians who stand with despair in front of the present situation. The structures among the Palestinians are themselves much too much wedged especially by Islamic fundamentalism to make that seem possible. The question will direct itself to how the people's movement in the large Arabic states like Egypt, Iraq or Syria will develop. The outrageous actions by Israeli will give rise to the resistance, and this resistance in the Arabic countries must be furthered. The program calling for a democratic Palestine can be credibly defended only if it is simultaneously a program for the revolutionary democratization of the Arabic world itself.

Editorial staff of Neue Einheit

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