(Your Voice in a World where Zionism, Steel, and Fire have turned Justice Mute)
People of the Arab countries, as an American who hates imperialism and supports friendship among peoples, I extend my fraternal greetings to you. I would like to speak to you about the situation of the American anti-war movement and tactics related to it.
While I think it is important for you to know that you are not entirely without friends in my country, and that not all of us hate you and call for imperialist war against you, it is also important that I provide a truthful assessment of the state of the American anti-war movement and how we should respond tactically to its current state. It is by facing the truth, however unpleasant it may be, that we can come to a realistic tactical assessment, whereas by fooling others and ourselves we can accomplish nothing useful.
In all honesty, our anti-war movement is currently very small, very timid, very vacillating, and riddled with enemy agents who seek to water down our resistance as much as possible. The dominant voices in our peace movement are not those who make a principled stand against Zionism and imperialism and for militant struggle against imperialism, but rather those who call for restraint in the struggle by those resisting imperialism, who condemn the human bombs, who favor the right of the so-called "Israel" to exist, though perhaps in the pre-1967 borders, who defame President Hussein as a "bloody tyrant", and who "condemn violence on both sides".
Many do not condemn war with Iraq outright but only if done without the approval of the United Nations! Even if President Bush does see fit to wage a more overt war against Iraq without United Nations backing, our peace movement is in no position to stop it or even significantly hinder it.
The picture looks bleak, but there is hope. There is a way we can grow a substantial and effective American peace movement. It partly depends upon the diligence and struggle of the handful of real opponents to the war in the USA, but it depends far more on the resistance that you, the Arab and other peoples in the "Middle East", offer against imperialism and Zionism.
I have encountered some Arabs on the internet who have said that there is a need to moderate tactics of resistance to Zionism and imperialism, to refrain from such attacks as occurred on 11 September 2001, to end the human bombs, to ensure that armed struggle affects only those who are soldiers in uniform (despite "Israel" having universal conscription and it being a settler-invader society built on the ruins of another), and even to do away with armed struggle altogether and struggle against the Zionists with the tactics of Gandhi and Martin Luther King. I don't know how widespread this idea is in the Arab world. I know that in the Arab world only a small minority of the population has access to the Internet, so it may not be widespread. Still, this is a false and dangerous idea, and it needs to be addressed.
I am reminded of another long and bloody imperialist war in which a large and powerful anti-war movement developed in the USA, a movement which significantly helped the struggle to bring the war to a conclusion that was a victory for the oppressed people. That was the war in Vietnam. It was an extremely costly victory for the people of Vietnam. More than two million were killed, and almost every family in Vietnam suffered terribly. Nonetheless it showed that victory is possible in the struggle against imperialism. This victory was obtained by inflicting substantial casualties among Americans, even though far lower in number than their own casualties. The 58,000 dead Americans in that war is a figure that pales in comparison with the number of Vietnamese dead. Yet those 58,000 were enough to mobilize the peace movement here.
It's very sad, but it's true. It was only when American soldiers came home in body bags by the tens of thousands that the American people began to offer serious resistance to the war.
When the National Liberation Front and the Hanoi government exercised restraint, it did nothing to build the American peace movement. When they fought hard, it succeeded in building a peace movement here.
Your casualties are already mounting. Nearly two million Iraqis are dead from the criminal United Nations sanctions. Millions of Palestinians have been displaced and untold tens of thousands have been killed. Most of these died or were displaced before the human bombs tactic started and when the armed resistance in Palestine was at a minimum and when hardly anyone at all in the USA paid attention to your plight. It was only when serious resistance was being offered, that anyone here started to care, even if the initial response was denouncing violence on both sides.
As politically incorrect as this may sound, that is why I rejoiced when I heard about the actions on the morning of 11 September 2001. It was not just that I despised the Jewish financial center of New York City and the pro-Zionist imperialist government in Washington, but it was also because I knew that those long oppressed had at last achieved a victory, however slight. They had shown the world that imperialists were not invulnerable, that there could be revenge for the terrible suffering they have caused. Surely most of the anti-war movement here condemned these actions, but at least they took notice of what American support of Zionism and imperialist aggression was bringing to our shores.
As an American, I hate to say this about my people, but Zionist and imperialist brainwashing has brought us to this state. Self-interest is the only thing that will bring the American people to our senses.
Our soldiers and our civilians need to have the fear of Allah put into us before we start in large numbers to resist Zionism and imperialism. Don't depend upon our humanitarianism. What little we have left is puppet to the Zionist media. Resist us anyway you can, it matters little if the target is military or civilian, in your countries or in ours, especially where the American war machine is targeting civilians and American foreign policies precipitate genocide.
The fight to imperialism is to the death. By failing to fight to the best of your ability, you will only get your own people killed needlessly. Kill as many of us as you can, and perhaps the survivors will come to our senses and make peace. I know this may sound extreme, but really, is there any other way where the arrogance of power has blinded Americans to the suffering their government is visiting upon you and the rest of the world?!
Don't worry about a handful of people like me. Zionism is transforming American society into something more and more hideous every year. If it can't be ended soon, more people here and abroad will be killed in military adventures that further Zionist and imperialist aims worldwide.
I'll do my part, poor though it may be. You must do yours. Let's break the New York-Tel Aviv axis from both ends!
Fraternally,
Kevin Walsh
In his open letter, Kevin Walsh highlighted the weaknesses in the anti-war movement in the United States. Many of those weaknesses can be traced to the influence of Zionism upon the left, the traditional center of anti-imperialist, anti-war sentiment in western countries. There are outright Zionists in the peace movement who claim to be opposed to a US war on Iraq, but who, nevertheless, endorse the sort of sweeping regime changes, American-style "democratization", and redrawing of the map of the region that the Bush administration itself is pushing for. Under slogans such as "Win without war" they peddle a line that is just as destructive as that of the White House and Pentagon, but is much subtler, and in that sense quite possibly even more dangerous.
The damage that is done by these Zionists goes far beyond their own group's numerical presence in the movement. Anti-war activists, like everyone else in western countries, are subject to the daily bombardment by the monopoly media with their long-established views. But in addition, there is pressure to avoid confronting the key problem of Zionism and its role in US aggressive plans, out of fear that this would "split the peace movement" or spark accusations of "anti-semitism".
Kevin Walsh is by no means alone in targeting this serious deficiency in the anti-war movement. The left-liberal American publication Counterpunch recently published the comment below concerning the dangers posed to the peace movement by this blind-spot that refuses to look at the role of Jews and Zionism in US policy in the Arab Region. The authors of this piece, Bill and Kathleen Christison, not long ago contributed an article to that same American publication on the rise of Jewish Zionist influence within the US governmental establishment. As former employees of the CIA (retired in 1979) the Christisons have followed this process from within the American governmental structure, as Kevin Walsh has observed it from the outside.
The fact that Washington insiders and a virulent opponent of the US establishment all call attention to the same severe handicap that belabors the anti-war movement in the US, is a sure sign of how serious is the threat that Zionism poses to peace activism in an America on the brink of war.
-- Muhammad Abu Nasr/FAV
by BILL and KATHLEEN CHRISTISON
Amy Goodman said it (speech in Albuquerque, Saturday, January 18). Robert Fisk wrote it (The Independent, same day). Much of the U.S. Peace Movement talked about it (in demonstrations around the country, same day). On that day of all days, when the peace movement went into high gear around the United States, just about everybody seemed to emphasize, as Amy put it, "a three-letter word, O-I-L" as the real reason the Bush administration wants war in Iraq. Some peace advocates also mentioned the U.S. drive for global domination as a related reason. Few (we heard none) discussed Israeli policy and the increasingly close partnership between the Bush and Sharon governments as a factor at least as important as oil in pushing the U.S. toward war.
Some people who oppose war in Iraq undoubtedly have a strong and sincere belief that no connection exists between the Israel-Palestine issue and U.S. policy on Iraq. More people, however, perhaps the vast majority of those who oppose the war, believe it is wise tactically to soft-pedal any Israeli connection to the war. The peace movement, after all, needs whatever support it can get, and many supporters of Israel also oppose war on Iraq even if the present Israeli government does not. Supporters of Israel tend to bristle at any effort to link Israel to the U.S war effort. So the thinking most likely goes like this: Why bring up the issue? We need the biggest coalition we can cobble together. Let's bury other differences where we can. (No one would ever charge either Amy Goodman or Robert Fisk with coddling Israeli or Jewish-American sensibilities, but they may indeed believe that stopping the war is the number-one priority and that oil is the best and most unifying issue we have.)
But this approach is shortsighted and mistaken. Why?
First, the evidence that Ariel Sharon has since the 1980s fervently desired the ouster of Iraq's present government and other troublesome Arab regimes as part of "transforming" the entire Middle East to Israel's benefit is crystal clear. The evidence is equally clear that strong supporters of a Likud-led government in Israel exist among the neo-cons at very high levels of the Bush administration in Washington. Over the years, these people have not talked or written much for the record about oil and the Middle East, but they have written a lot about strengthening Israel's position through transforming the Middle East. No one can deny that Bush and Vice President Cheney have deep and lasting interests in oil, but the close political relationship that seems to have developed between Sharon and Bush makes it likely that Bush has by now accepted the transformation argument as being just as important as oil. It is also logical that Bush would see his acceptance of this argument as increasing his chances of obtaining more Jewish-American votes in 2004 than he received in 2000. If Bush (and Karl Rove) are in fact thinking along these lines, those of us who oppose war on Iraq should be facing this issue of Middle East transformation head-on, not ignoring it for tactical reasons or out of fear of charges of anti-Semitism.
Second, and more important, by not talking about the link between Israel and Iraq, the peace movement is making it easier for Israel to continue its almost 36-year occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. Every day or week that passes with little discussion in the media of the occupation is a plus for Sharon and his Likud government, because the absence of discussion makes it easier for Israel to slip its new proposal for large-scale aid from the U.S. through Congress while continuing its harsh and unjust actions in the West Bank and Gaza. Furthermore, talk is continuing to mount in Israel of "transfer," that is, expelling the Palestinians in the West Bank to Jordan, leaving the West Bank open to total takeover by the Israelis. This transfer is an integral part of the Middle East transformation that the peace movement seems not to want to talk about. If the war comes, the peace movement's present silence on the subject will also make it easier for Israel actually to carry out the process of "transfer."
In short, the peace movement should not, because of a preoccupation with Iraq, allow the Palestinians once more to be sold down the river because nobody cares.
Kathleen Christison worked for 16 years as a political analyst with the CIA, dealing first with Vietnam and then with the Middle East for her last seven years with the Agency before resigning in 1979. Since leaving the CIA, she has been a free-lance writer, dealing primarily with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Her book, "Perceptions of Palestine: Their Influence on U.S. Middle East Policy," was published by the University of California Press and reissued in paperback with an update in October 2001. A second book, "The Wound of Dispossession: Telling the Palestinian Story," was published in March 2002.
Bill Christison joined the CIA in 1950, and served on the analysis side of the Agency for 28 years. From the early 1970s he served as National Intelligence Officer (principal adviser to the Director of Central Intelligence on certain areas) for, at various times, Southeast Asia, South Asia and Africa. Before he retired in 1979 he was Director of the CIA's Office of Regional and Political Analysis, a 250-person unit. They can be reached at: christison@counterpunch.org