It's a very intelligent and well informed essay, worth reading and re-reading perhaps despite it's clear Revisionist POV (socialist idealist). The author suggests some harmony with Marxism-Leninism but perhaps only a re-imagined M-L.
The title suggests the essay (written in 1977) was written by Moishe Postone under a pseudonym and published in Germany. I'm not sure if this is correct, it is not listed in Wikipedia as one of Postone's works. However Postone does look like an interesing "post M-L" theorist I think I'd like to check out some more, possibly in the same nature as the essay above: it's so full of facts and ideas despite my feeling that the author is still fundamentally wrong somehow.
Here's where I think the error is: I think it's ludicrous to believe we can analyze effects, except perhaps in a millenial perspective. Even 2000 years later, it's all about ideals, perceptions, and preconceptions. Were the Jews losers for having lost their (and others') homeland under Roman (and earlier) empires and facing frequent pograms? Or were they winners from having settled and grown into nearly every country in the world, often occupying the upper levels of respect and remuneration in many if not most places as well? (I say winners, and that Jews were critical to the success of USA and Europe. Since 1948, and due to Zionist myopia, the Jewish mind power that used to drive Western innovation has faded, as has the West itself--and this is not entirely coincidence.)
I would not myself want to be involved in the hijackings that Palestinian groups carried out in the 1970's, understandable though they might be. Retrospectively it's hard to say they made any difference at all. Israel was going to do what they did, and nobody was going to stop them.
Were the Hamas attacks of October 7 of the same overtly terrorist nature? Absolutely not. They hardly seem aimed toward civilian terror outside Israel, or atrocities and massacres at all (and such allegations have not been well established in my view). By all sources at least 300 IDF forces were killed. My sources further say the attack was aimed at several bases around the Gaza perimeter, and the key goal of Hamas was to capture hostages to be used in prisoner exchange (while this is a war crime, it is not genocide, and it does merely reflect the greater detentions of Israel). Israel has a well known policy not to allow hostages to be taken, even at some cost in civilian casualties. And indeed it seems like much if not most of the civilian deaths were from friendly fire, though I am also discontent at how poorly this has been established (though claimed as fact by many people on my twitter). But the reverse has not been established either, despite the much greater ability of Israel to do so. It looks likely to be a cover up, suggesting my sources have the story basically correct. Here's one recent thread.
So of course I do not denounce the Hamas attacks. And I don't know where this will all lead, but it remains my belief that the Zionist Entity is a temporary phenomenon. In the millennial perpsective then, 1000 years from now, all Palestinian attacks and even terror may appear not only justified but successful. So I don't judge them either.
My likely more passive strategies hardly matter. Palestinians would best be making their own choices, not necessarily the Hamas leadership and auxilliaries, but how can this be imagined when they are not even permitted to make their own choices if those choices are opposed to the existence of Israel, as all sane minded people should be? "Democracy" is not only trivially necessary it is trivially impossible. Hence there is little democracy in the oldest democratic republics of the world. What the West and Israel clearly want is a captured client-democratic process such as the one that originally existed in the Palestinian Authority. Not actual sovereignty for the Palestinians.
It does seem to me that Palestinians do have a strong will to fight Zionism and reclaim their state. It has reached the point where it seems many would rather die than be displaced further, resulting in some of the civilian casualties. That is understandable. Others may simply be unable to move as 'requested' by Israel.
What Jews would Palestinians "allow" to remain in the reclaimed Palestine? The essay author says some say '20 and others say '48. But any plausible settlement would allow all Jews currently in Israel/Palestine to remain in a restored pre-48 Palestine, and I believe the 2017 Hamas Charter says as much. The goal is a state without any discrimination. And as is often claimed, many Jews may leave under the threat of losing their discriminatory advantages of a state that persecutes, steals from, and murders other ethnicities, but perhaps not as many as Zionists would imagine. People often change their stripes when material circumstances dictate, which is why material circumstances should be organized without discrimination in the first place.
Another difficulty arrises from the return of Palestinian properties. Generally in cases of theft, material changes or "improvements" don't count, it all has to be given to the rightful owners. It is hard to imagine all this happening, but it's far from impossible.
Update: The essay now does appear to be written by Postone. He was educated in none other than Frankfurt, where the essay was published. Though he seems to find more (but still limited) value in Marxism-Leninism than other Frankfurt School Marxists, so he's a kind of post-Frankfurt along with post-M-L. He taught at University of Chicago, which refused him tenure in Sociology but finally accepted him in History. Ironic that first 4 letters in his surname are post.
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