Interest > Values Part 2: WHY America’s Foreign Policy Continues to Fail its People and its Victims

See Part 1 here

The following was written on April 18, 2013. Some of the details discussed below may be incorrect as news is still unfolding.

On April 15, 2013 there was a wave of bombings in Iraq—20 carbombs and a handful of roadside explosives—that claimed that lives of 31 people and injured more than 200. On the other side of the world that same day two small IEDs (improvised explosive devices) exploded at the finish line of the Boston Marathon; three people were killed and over 100 were injured.

Innately, the survivors of these tragedies are more concerned with their own victims than they are of the other’s. This is the inevitable shortcoming of a state’s foreign policy: the often insular and arbitrary nature of tribalism that exists in human societies today is the primary obstacle to what we might hope to call a just foreign policy. Most often this tribalism realized by competing forms of nationalism, but other such tribes are recognized as sectarian, ethnic, and economic groups.

How does a tribe formulate a policy of interaction with another based on mutual respect and interest? Why would any tribe be interested in the just treatment and wellbeing of another? The ethical consistently yields to the advantageous. A tribe of any kind is an inherently exclusive outfit prone to the binary classification of humanity into “us” and “them.” In modernity tribes are empowered to abhorrent extremes with bomber aircrafts, tank squadrons, and weapons of mass destruction. It is long past time that these tribal affiliations be recalculated if not entirely obliterated.

Most models of societal organization require some sort of arbitrary underpinning of identity and often entail the mediation and marshalling of intra-societal relations, often for the purpose of resource management. This is directly contrasted with the monopoly on the inter-societal relations that the political elite tend to wield. In some societies this power may be diffused over a group; in others it may boil down to a single individual. However—especially in state structures—foreign relations are typically not the concern of the people, that is, until it is a matter of security.

State structures, in fact, have a vested interest in keeping their constituents focused inward, unable to see over the walls of localism. This empowers the political elite with the ability to easily manipulate the public into war, more often than not packaged within a framework of threats to security. In order to determine the truth value of claims of communist influence in Vietnam, weapons of destruction in Iraq, or Israel’s utility as a strategic asset, Americans often do not have a frame of reference beyond immediate events reported by the media and state or corporate propaganda. This vacuum of knowledge—combined with the existential imperative of production imposed by capitalism—assists the state in conducting a foreign policy unimpeded by such notions as “values” championed by naïve masses or radical fringe opposition. It takes only a glance at polls of voter priorities to see that even at the height of the Bush administration’s “War on Terror,” only 40% of the electorate prioritized foreign policy when calculating their choice of representative in 2007; in 2012—a more typical year—this number had shrunk to 9%.

It is a natural phenomenon that people are drawn to concern themselves only with their immediate surroundings, and it is difficult indeed to contemplate the importance of an earthquake a million miles away, particularly when you are told that the victims of said calamity are your enemies. But is ambivalence toward suffering so different from the exploitation thereof? America’s tawdry relationship with Saudi Arabia—perhaps the most odious regime of our time, save North Korea—is evidence enough that we are perfectly comfortable enjoining our so-called national interest to alliances that compromise our most basic values of liberty, justice, and equality.

However, I do not think this is a choice, and if it is, it is certainly not one made consciously. Americans who go to their local gas stations do not think of the geopolitical maneuvering, underhanded politics, and economic exploitation that go into delivering their fuel. Even if they did, in most cases it would be difficult to make an alternative choice. The one million Americans that are employed in the American defense sector cannot be assumed to support every terrible regime that utilizes their products or every military operation the United States executes. So long as the majority of Americans remain disinterested in these events, the power of influence will remain in the hands of those few whose profit margins are built on structures of human despair. It is the political and economic elite that created this system and continue to desperately maintain it. An informed populace legitimizes the failures of American foreign policy by reproducing popular conceptions of American moral superiority and purity of arms that still manage to survive in spite of the catastrophic war in Iraq, the inexcusable support for the crushing of popular, nonviolent resistance in Bahrain, and the steadfast championing of conquest and occupation in Palestine.

The enormity of American power is too vast to be trusted to the elite few, while the many remain concerned with their local world to serve as a democratic check on how that power is used. It is this shortcoming that prevents America from attaining a foreign policy prioritizing the best of American values over the hungry cannibalism of imperial power and economic greed.

An Uncomfortable Stone

On March 7^th, 1965 around 600 people began to march from Selma, Alabama to Montgomery. A few weeks before during a separate nonviolent demonstration about voting rights Jimmy Lee Jackson, a young black man, was shot by a state trooper while defending his mother and subsequently died. At Jackson’s funeral Martin Luther King, Jr. declared him “a martyred hero of a holy crusade for freedom and human dignity.” The march from Selma to Montgomery, in-part organized by King, was as much about remembering Jackson’s sacrifice, his martyrdom, as it was about continuing his crusade.

Called “Bloody Sunday,” the march was blocked at the Edmund Pettus Bridge that leads out of Selma by Alabama’s State Troopers. The procession of marchers, unarmed, was assaulted by state security forces. Their throats filled with tear gas, their bones broken with batons and nightsticks, the marchers were literally beaten back into Selma.

It would be two weeks later before 3,200 protesters began the successful march from Selma, walking approximately twelve miles a day and sleeping in fields before they successfully reached Montgomery. When they arrived on March 25, their numbers had swelled to 25,000.

In Montgomery, Alabama, that same day King spoke:

Yes, we are on the move and no wave of racism can stop us. We are on the move now. The burning of our churches will not deter us. The bombing of our homes will not dissuade us. We are on the move now. The beating and killing of our clergymen and young people will not divert us. We are on the move now… Like an idea whose time has come, not even the marching of mighty armies can halt us. We are moving to the land of freedom.
 

Let us therefore continue our triumphant march to the realization of the American dream. Let us march on segregated housing until every ghetto or social and economic depression dissolves, and Negroes and whites live side by side in decent, safe, and sanitary housing. Let us march on segregated schools until every vestige of segregated and inferior education becomes a thing of the past, and Negroes and whites study side-by-side in the socially-healing context of the classroom.

…I know you are asking today, "How long will it take?" Somebody’s asking, "How long will prejudice blind the visions of men, darken their understanding, and drive bright-eyed wisdom from her sacred throne?"…How long will justice be crucified, and truth bear it?"

I come to say to you this afternoon, however difficult the moment, however frustrating the hour, it will not be long, because "truth crushed to earth will rise again."

How long? Not long, because "no lie can live forever."

How long? Not long, because "you shall reap what you sow."

…How long? Not long, because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”

In August of the same year, President Lyndon Johnson signed into law the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Over twenty years later, on the opposite side of the earth, there was yet another uprising taking place. Called the first intifada, in December1987 the Palestinian people rose up to resist Israel’s military occupation. The resistance of the first intifada, as opposed to the second, was characterized almost exclusively by acts of nonviolence and civil disobedience.

Israel’s Defense Minister at the time was Yitzhak Rabin, he famously told commanders of the military regime in the West Bank to crush the uprising, to “break their bones” in order to “re-instill fear” into the protesters. Rabin denied that he meant the words literally, though one wonders how bones might be broken figuratively. Israel’s Attorney General, Yosef Harish, ordered Rabin to instruct troops to use more restraint in the wake of “numerous complaints of cruel treatment to the inhabitants” of the occupied territories. By March of 1988, four months after the intifada began and twenty three years after the march from Selma to Montgomery was concluded, 111 Palestinians were dead.

By 1993, the intifada had been called off by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), now in negotiations with Israel about the creation of what they believed would be a proto-Palestinian state. Rabin, the bone-breaker, was now Israel’s Prime Minister and thus a primary character in the negotiating drama. The Oslo Accords, as the results of negotiations were called, ostensibly represented an interim period of Palestinian autonomy. For the Palestinians, this implicitly meant that statehood and self-determination, so long out of reach, was finally at hand.

For Rabin, this meant something else entirely. For Rabin, the Oslo accords and the creation of Palestinian autonomy structures represented the further consolidation—not the retreat—of Israeli power. “The Palestinians will be better at [“enforcing order”] than we were,” explained Rabin,

because they will allow no appeals to the Supreme Court and will prevent the [Israeli] Association for Civil Rights from criticizing conditions there by denying it access to the area. They will rule by their own methods, freeing, and this is most important, the Israeli army from having to do what they will do.[1]

Beyond the duties of the indigenous police service, was the structure of the Oslo itself. Rabin championed the concept of the separation of Israeli and Palestinian peoples. First, the West Bank was trifurcated into three different areas. Area A was under full Palestinian control (3% of the West Bank’s surface area); Area B was to under Palestinian administrative authority and Israel controlling security (25%); Area C was under the strict purview of Israel (72%). For Palestinians the divisions were concrete, though Israeli forces would stage numerous incursions in to Area A. Israel instituted a rigorous permit regime over these divisions; Israeli citizens with Israeli permits were (and still are) given numerous privileges (access to roads, to subsidized housing in illegal settlements, immunity from prosecution in Palestinian courts), while permits for Palestinians served to arbitrarily grant and deprive them of access to employment, education, healthcare and freedom of movement.

Palestinians and Israelis are expected to at all times be readily distinguishable. Israeli fuel tanks were meant to be one color, Palestinian fuel tanks another. Roads were constructed specially for Israelis while Palestinians were forced to use roads that wound around Israel’s illegal settlements; journeys of just a few miles could take hours navigating through checkpoints and around roadblocks and closures—if of course a Palestinian had the appropriate permission. Meanwhile, new Israeli settlements were constructed and old settlements were expanded at a previously unheard of pace. Rabin’s plan for peace through all of this was boiled down to an easily packaged slogan: “Them over there; us over here.” Those familiar with South Africa’s history will readily recognize the similarity with the system of apartheid; those familiar with the history of America’s south will immediately recognize similarities as well.

On March 21 2013—forty-eight years to the day after King’s historic march from Selma to Montgomery—President Barack Obama laid from a stone from King’s memorial on Rabin’s grave.

One can only guess at what Obama may have meant by such a gesture. What could it possibly mean to bring the memory of a man who struggled against the forces of segregation and racism, who was imprisoned by and bled under the scourge of state power, to Israel and rest it on the final resting place of Yitzhak Rabin, a champion of “separation” that fought with truncheon and tear gas to crush a nonviolent uprising, that oversaw the defense of military occupation, killing hundreds and imprisoning thousands? There is no rational answer to be gleamed. The only thing the two men had in common was that they were both gunned down by assassins before their visions could be realized.

Whatever analogy that Obama hoped to make between the two men must logically end there. The visions that they strived for were intrinsically, irreconcilably different.

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[1] Massad, Joseph. The Persistence of the Palestinian Question. 2006. Pg. 98.

Interest > Values, Part 1: HOW America’s Foreign Policy Continues to Fail its People and its Victims

The New America Foundation recently hosted a debate between Douglas Ollivant and Joel Raybun entitled “Can we call Iraq a Success?” However, it quickly became clear that the definition of success had only one criterion: did the adventure serve America’s “national interest?”

At one point Peter Bergen, the moderator, asked the participants to give their perspective on how safe the country was—likely the most way an Iraqi might define such “success.” Ollivant declared that three rules ought to be followed for anyone that wants to stay safe in Iraq:

1. Don’t go to a Shia Mosque on Fridays or join in Shia religious processions (Bad news for a majority of the population)  
2. Don’t be a “moderate Sunni” (So… be an extremist?) 
3. Don’t stand near any member of Iraq’s security services (Ideally, the people paid to keep Iraqis safe.)

These rules would ordinarily indicate a sever failure, however Ollivant was the debater arguing that Iraq was indeed a success. The failure of the Iraqi state to create a decent, safe environment for its people isn't as critical to Iraq’s overall success  as defined by its return to the global market and its ability to frustrate Iran’s schemes. His opponent, Rayburn, was more explicit about how American interests are in danger in Iraq, rousing the specter of Iraq nationalizing its oil. One would think that as a matter of respecting a nation’s sovereignty and right to self-determination, this type of rhetoric would be a little more muted given the United States fractious history with opposition and resistance to nationalization efforts.

The issue of Iran loomed in the background of this debate, but it deserves to be brought to the fore here. In 1953 the CIA, collaborating with British intelligence and the Iranian Shah, annihilated the constitutional part of Iran’s constitutional monarchy. Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadeq was ousted after he nationalized Iran’s oil. Once the Shah was restored as an absolute monarch he began ruling as an absolute thug without the frustrations of popular leadership to frustrate him. Meanwhile British corporations were free to resume exploiting Iran’s natural resources, sharing the profits with the Shah and the Americans while cutting the Iranian people out of the deal as much as possible. After over two decades of authoritarian rule, the Iranian people overthrew the Shah in 1979 after which a fanatical regime came to power that was far more dangerous than the democratically elected, populist Mossadeq.

Assuming that in the short term depriving the Iranian people of democracy served America’s short-term national interest (dubious, at best), I don’t know of anyone serious who would say that this is true in the long-term.

The events that proceeded from the coup and the subsequent revolution tell of the shortcomings of American power beyond “blowback.”  Saddam Hussein immediately recognized that his old Persian rivals were weakened and saw the opportunity to not just oppress more Shiites, but also—of course—acquire Iran’s oil. Hussein was certainly power hungry, but the Iranians weren't wholly innocent either. Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, fresh off of a successful revolution, began encouraging Shiites to rise up elsewhere in the region. Obviously this would make Hussein’s regime nervous, as a Sunni minority ruling over a Shiite majority, but it also made most of the other odious regimes in the region nervous. As it turns out it wasn't just Shiites in Iraq and Iran who were cursed with the rotten luck of having oil under their feet. Shiites in the Eastern part of the Arabian Peninsula were in the same boat; Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Yemen, and Iraq were countries with oil based economies, ruled by authoritarian Sunni regimes—and all were to some extent allied with the United States. To this day, the Gulf States typically oppress every member of their citizenry, but special, brutal attention is paid to their Shiite populations.

When Hussein invaded Iran in September 1980, these Gulf States—while weary of Hussein’s ambitions—were wholly supportive of quelling these Shiite upstarts. The United States was as well.

Not only was the US still dealing with the hostage crisis, but Iran’s open support of an international Shiite uprising was making America’s oil-powered friends nervous. Throughout the Iran-Iraq war the United States materially supported both Iraq and Iran. The US considered Iran an obvious enemy and it was fully aware of Hussein’s broader, regional ambitions. Seeing the two states go to war was a foreign policy gift as the they would both likely end up distracted in the short term and weaker in the long run. US supported Iraq with detailed intelligence about Iranian troop positions, and had its allies in the region supply Iraq with American made weapons. The support to Iran was covert at the time, but the details are well known at this point, dramatized in the scandalous Iran-Contra affair where the profits from arms sales to Iran were used to fund the notorious contras in Nicaragua

The export of American made arms is directly related to the defense industry in America. When politicians talk about defense spending, they’re really talking about a specific type of jobs program or stimulus package. There’s no question that these transfers of arms serve to bolster America’s economy, particularly manufacturing jobs that in most every sector besides defense have been shipped overseas for the past few decades.

It’s not difficult to find out where these arms eventually end up.

Periods of conflict are lucrative boom seasons for war profiteers. The Iran-Iraq war was one such boom; the most terrible war the Middle East has ever seen, it lasted eight years and claimed over a million lives. Even when it became known that Iraq was using chemical weapons on civilian populations, the arms kept flowing. US politicians may have reeled at this revelation, but stopping the conflict wasn't explicitly in line with American interests.

But these boom seasons come and go. The regular recipients of America’s military hardware don’t use them on their neighbors; they typically use them on unruly populations under their sovereignty. This is especially true of the aforementioned Gulf States; barring North Korea, these regimes represent the most repressive regimes on the planet. The biggest recipient of US aid in the Middle East for the past few decades has been Israel, which has maintained a strict military occupation over millions of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, not to mention recurring wars and occupations in Lebanon. Even with the advent of the Palestinian Authority (PA), Israel’s military aid has only gone up. Additionally the creation of the PA was essentially the creation of a new customer, receiving aid monies in the millions per annum. Stepping into the small spaces that Israel retreated from, the PA has picked up the same mantle of population control.

All of these ‘interests’—be they access to natural resources, arms sales, corporate interests, the interests of America’s allies—run absolutely counter to America’s mythology that it serves as a ‘force for good’ in the world. The notion that American power is a moral force that stands for democracy and peace directly contradicts the reality that the ‘national interest’ mentality has at times created.

American power is a force that deserves to be treated with respect and responsibility. The use, misuse, or disuse of that power can determine whether people live or whether they die, whether they live free or in bondage, in peace or in fear, in poverty or in prosperity. Americans cannot delude themselves by thinking that their own self-interest directly coincides with what might be good for the millions of people whose lives are at stake when American power manifests around the world. At best the concept of America’s national interest represents a naiveté of the purest form, one demonstrated by the most recent adventure into Iraq. At worst the concept represents a myopic worldview characterized by xenophobia, selfishness and neotribalism. In either case, the “national interest” ought to be critically reexamined, if not dismantled altogether.

A Tale of Two Cities in Palestine

On 11 January, a group of around fifty Palestinian activists created a village. Named Bab al-Shams (Gate of the Sun), it was comprised of about 25 tents including a clinic and an administrative center. Organized by the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee in the West Bank, the activists planted the posts of their tents in the area that the Israeli government calls E-1.

Recently designated for construction, the construction of the E-1 settlement block would connect Israel’s settlements around East Jerusalem with Ma’ale Adumim, yet another settlement block that is constructed deep in the center of the West Bank. More than simply being illegal, as all Israeli settlements beyond the ‘Green Line’ are, the completion of the project would likely mean the annihilation of a viable Palestinian state and therefore a two-state solution. Its announcement has resulted in an irregular amount of outcry even from Israel’s closest European allies.

Under the Oslo Framework, the West Bank was divided into three different areas. In Area A—comprising the larger population centers and around 3% of the West Bank’s land—Palestinians have full administrative authority and are responsible for security. Palestinians are allowed to build in Area A within certain Israeli-imposed restrictions. Area B (25%) tends to make up the outlands of the populous cities of area A and includes smaller towns and villages and serves as a buffer between Areas  A and C. While it is under Palestinian administrative control, security responsibilities are shared with Israeli in these areas. Construction here is permitted only with express Israeli permission. Area C comprises the rest of the occupied West Bank—approximately 72% of the land. Under full Israeli authority, Palestinian construction here is completely forbidden, though illegal Israeli construction goes on with impunity.

Bab al-Shams was built in Area C.

The Israeli government’s first response to the village was to declare it a closed military zone and hand out eviction notices to the activists. This is a familiar method that Israel employs to dispossess Palestinian living in areas that Israel wishes to incorporate as part of its borders in a final status arrangement. The organizer’s of Bab al-Shams were prepared for this and were able to get an injunction from an Israeli court delaying the eviction order. The Benjamin Netanyahu’s administration was able to overturn the injunction by claiming to Israel’s High Court that there was a “pressing security need” to evacuate the nascent village. Approximately 48 hours after it was created, Bab al-Shams was vacant save for the few Israeli soldiers left behind to prevent Palestinians from returning.

The city of Rawabi tells a different story.

Rawabi is a billed as the first planned Palestinian city. While not directly involved the project falls well within the realm of Fayyad’s initiative of forging a Palestinian state with or without Israel’s permission. Funded by predominantly Qatari investors (like numerous construction projects in Hamas-controlled Gaza), Rawabi is estimated to cost near $1 billion upon its completion. Ground was broken in Rawabi in 2010, but the first residents of the city are projected to arrive sometime this year.

While Rawabi lies within Area A, it has not been immune from Israeli obstruction of different sorts. In order for construction to proceed smoothly, the Palestinians began with Israel as far back as 2010 about an access road part of which would run through Area C. As of today, the lack of such a road is still a problem, however the investment company and the workers have continued to build despite this hardship.

The residents of the nearby Israeli settlement, Atarot, are not thrilled about their new neighbors either. The access road desired by Palestinian builders runs, Israeli settlers say, too close to the road used by Atarot’s colonists. Aliza Herbst, spokeswoman for the Yesha Coucil expressed satisfaction at this turn of events, “I’m really glad the road is there to prevent them from building that city… and yay for us that we have established those communities so that the problem exists.”

More worrying than the predictable obstruction from certain parts of the Israeli government and the Yesha Council, are the criticisms coming from Palestinians activists. The harshest critics from this community come from quite notable sources like Electronic Intifada, the Boycott-Divestment-Sanctions movement, and numerous local Palestinian groups that assert that the Rawabi project serves to normalize the occupation.

One op-ed referred to the Palestinian businessman in charge of Rawabi’s development, Bashar Masri, as a wakil, which the author chose to translate as ‘subcontractor’ but is more often used in reference to collaborators. There’s no doubt that a project of this size requires a large degree of, at the very least, cooperation with Israel, however the use of the term “collaborator” as often used in revolutionary vernacular is hyperbolic if not grotesque. It is estimated (quite conservatively I imagine) that Rawabi will add $85 million to the Israeli economy when all is said in done. Though there is a prohibition on buying products made in Israeli settlements, logistically, said one engineer, raw materials like cement powder and sand had to come from Israeli companies.

Yet another criticism ties into the neoliberal, “free market” aspects of Fayyad’s state building strategy, including the introduction of “Fannie Mae-style” mortgage institutions in order to allow more Palestinians to buy homes on credit and experience the joys of debt.

These two cities represent two very different modes of nonviolent resistance. The Palestinian elite in the West Bank are firmly committed to forging a society under the banner of Fayyadism within and in spite of the constraints placed upon it by the Israeli military occupation. The activists of the popular committees aim to defy those constraints.

Numerous authors, as well as the project’s developers, have admitted the tenuous nature of Rawabi. Though the project has been in planning since 2009, four years later basic questions of about the cities survival linger. Where will its water supply come from? How will a town with a capacity of 45,000 residents function without the abovementioned access road? What becomes of Rawabi in the event of more political turbulence: an Israeli re-occupation, Palestinian factional infighting?  None of these questions have clear answers. It is very much possible that Rawabi—an ambitious albeit controversial and thorny project—might be blown away and destroyed as easily as Bab al-Shams.

Then again, Bab al-Shams has hardly blown away. As the Israeli army was bulldozing the empty tents left by the grassroots activists, the Palestinian Authority created a village council for Bab al-Shams, cementing the Palestinian claim to the land. Moreover, the activists of the Popular Committee have continued to create new villages creating new points of contact with the Israeli occupation and exposing it more and more every Friday. From Bab al-Shams to Bab al-Karama to al-Manatir and most recently Canaan, activists continued to employ this tactic of confrontation.

The Rawabi model, while working within the constraints of the occupation and even in cooperation with its overseers, offers a high risk, high reward potential for Palestinians. The Bab al-Shams model, while it has yet to produce any tangible results for Palestinian society, represents a beacon of hope and defiance. Both, however, with all of their flaws and controversies are national endeavors expressing a deep yearning for self-determination.

In closing, one final point about these two models: the Rawabi model is inherently limited, both by the very real constraints imposed upon a Palestinian society whose every aspect is controlled by an occupying power and by the imaginary lines drawn up in the Oslo Accords. Area A’s meager allotment will inevitably run dry and Palestinian construction will cease or spill over into Area B or C. The Rawabi model, while perhaps ambitious, will inevitably intersect or be subsumed by the model presented at Bab al-Shams.

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Complicating the “Israel Lobby” and America’s Support for Israel

The Senate confirmation hearing for Chuck Hagel has temporarily revived the discussion (I won’t call it a debate) about the so-called Israel lobby. Stephen M. Walt and John Mearsheimer’s 2007 The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy has become a rallying point for critics of America’s relationship with Israel and its apparently unshakeable pillar of support, the American Israel Political Action Committee (AIPAC). It was no doubt a controversial work, and was accused of anti-semitism in more than one instance. However, I think such an accusation is unfounded. A more reasonable review of Walt and Mearsheimer’s work and the facts that surround American support for Israel lead one to conclude that rather than anti-semitism, this view is founded on laziness.

We should not discount that AIPAC has quite a bit of sway; after all they spent roughly $2.7 million during election year 2012. That’s substantial sum of money, but it pales in comparison to other more lucrative motivations for Washington’s support for Israel. For fiscal year 2012, “despite tough fiscal times” the US pledged $3 billion in foreign military financing (FMF) to Israel. FMF effectively functions as a gift card acceptable at any of America’s domestic defense contractors.

Here is where the heavy hitters of political lobbyists really enter into play.

The Apache helicopter, named after a near-eradicated indigenous population, is used without any sense of irony by the Israeli military and is produced by Boeing who in 2012 contributed over $15 million to the American democratic process. The Apache is normally outfitted with Hellfire missiles that Israel employs in its policy of “targeted killings;” these Hellfire missiles are manufactured by Lockheed-Martin, who spent another $15 million on political lobbying in 2012. These two pillars of the “defense industry” are by no means alone, but if isolate just these two they collectively outspend AIPAC ten times over.

Military spending is certainly a key factor in the decisions of policy-makers. Reuters reports that representatives of the industry in question are saying that as many as 100 million jobs could be lost as a result of cuts in defense spending. Moreover, military spending is regarded as a form of stimulus for the manufacturing sector of the US economy.

In short, if we’re focusing on lobbying power as measured by money spent (the most sensible measurement considering the current state of campaign finance), surely we can admit the corporate ideology of the arms industry factors in far more than the political ideology of the “Israel lobby.” The arms manufacturers and their lobbyists, purely as a function of maximizing profits, do not influence politicians toward a pro-Israeli or anti-Palestinian stance. They influence politicians simply toward militarism and support for militarism under the familiar buzzwords of “security” and “stability.”

I am a staunch opponent of Israeli policy, but it’s simply dishonest to suggest that America’s relationship with Israel exists because, in Hagel’s words, “the Jewish lobby intimidates a lot of people.”  No one talks about the strength of the Egyptian lobby or the Saudi lobby or any of the other contemptible allies that America supports with military assistance and sales; this is because the influence of the arms industry is endemic beyond the reach of relatively minor political action committees like AIPAC.

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Where now for Palestine? Part 1: nonviolent vs armed resistance

Find the series introduction here.

Responding to Gelderloos’ criticisms of nonviolence

Nonviolence is a complicated, if not controversial topic among activists. On the one hand, I find myself hearing activists readily embracing and staunchly standing behind nonviolent strategies and rejecting all notions of violent or armed resistance. On the other, there seems to be a pervasive intellectual current among activists arguing that nonviolence is, among other adjectives, ineffective, statist, racist, patriarchal, and deluded.[1]

Nonviolence is ineffective: Peter Gelderloos published How Nonviolence Protects the State in 2007. The passage of time, particularly with respect to the developments of the 2011 Arab Spring, has done much to address his criticism that nonviolence is ineffective. That revolutions in Egypt and Tunisia began and remained nonviolent in the face of state oppression was remarkable; that they succeeded in toppling long standing dictators only emphasizes the achievement; that these revolutions toppled dictators in a less than a month strains the limits of belief and defies all of the previous conceptions about the resilience of Arab dictatorships.

It is true that the revolutions in Egypt and Tunisia are by no means complete. In Egypt, the power was reorganized following Hosni Mubarak’s ouster but remained tightly controlled by the military. The free elections that took place there however have done much to erode the military’s power. Muhammad Morsi’s recent power grab in addition to what seems to be a deal being brokered between the Muslim Brotherhood and the military are certainly worrying for those hoping for a free Egypt. However, the Egyptian people have proved that they are not going to tolerate a return to dictatorship. The Egyptian populace seems to be more than willing to continue the revolution for as long as it takes however, a sign that should give us much hope.

The revolution in Libya which turned violent quite quickly—due to the Qaddafi regime’s bloody tactics—lasted much longer and cost more lives. In Syria, the results of the terrible civil war raging there now are yet to be determined and there have over 40,000 casualties thus far—again due to the disgusting onslaught of the regime. The lessons of Libya and Syria should be clear: nonviolent protest is not always the answer. I do not imagine that such a movement could have been successful in these cases, and I do not think that nonviolence should be something advocated absolutely without seriously questioning whether or not the regime in question is actually vulnerable such a movement. Palestine, though, I believe is one such case where nonviolence is the likely the only mode of resistance that can lead to the recognition of Palestinian rights and the resolution of the Palestine question.

Nonviolence is statist: Gelderloos argues that nonviolent activism “ensures a state monopoly on violence,” arguing that it does not challenge the state from a Weberian point of view. Here I disagree entirely. Max Weber argued that a state is defined (in one sense) by holding a monopoly on the legitimate use of force. Naturally, using force illegitimately besmirches the state and tends to erode its power. Looking again to the Arab Spring, we can see that many of these uprisings started out quite small. But case after case, Egypt, Yemen, Libya, Tunisia, Syria, Bahrain, when the state began brutalizing protesters, the opposition was galvanized and burgeoned beyond what it was before the state delegitimized itself. This was the case in Deraa, in Tahrir Square, in Manama Square, on and on. The oppressive states’ power continued to break down the more they attempted to intimidate and kill their opponents.

Nonviolence is racist/patriarchal: Gelderloos arguments in these chapters tend to get somewhat farfetched in my opinion, but I understand where he is coming from. “Nonviolence,” Gelderloss writes, “is an inherently privileged position in the modern context… Pacifism assumes that white people who grew up in the suburbs with all their basic needs met can counsel oppressed people, many of whom are people of color, to suffer patiently under an inconceivably greater violence, until such time as the Great white father is swayed by the movements demands…” His arguments are similar with regard to patriarchy. The more vitriolic (perhaps absurd) rhetoric aside, I do agree to a point that someone like me (a white, middle class, American male) is privileged, and that calling on Palestinians in Gaza to go on a hunger strike or to join hands around a bonfire while bombs are raining down on their heads is patently immoral. It seems to me, however, that when Hamas and other militant groups responded to Israel’s attacks with indiscriminate rocket fire it only served to reinforce the racist notions about Palestinians in the West. Moreover it did not save Palestinian lives and failed to deter the Israeli onslaught. During such a crisis, the immediate goal must be a ceasefire which is very difficult to initiate in the middle of a conflict.

The argument for violence in this case, which I do think can be justified as a form of Palestinian resistance given the violence perpetrated upon them by Israel, would have to show that militant groups in the Gaza Strip could in anyway defeat the Israeli military. It is not a racist nor patriarchal nor privileged mindset that leads me to conclude that such a victory is not possible. Furthermore, the only way to induce a change in policy from the Israeli government is to induce a change in the Israeli populace; it defies logic to think that this can be accomplished by firing rockets at civilian population centers.

Additionally, I would never advocate that anyone “suffer patiently.” Israel’s policies toward the Palestinians demand resistance, and I find it hard to tolerate an opposing view in this regard. This is one reason why I think the Palestinians should refrain from negotiating with Israel. There is nothing to be negotiated. There should be demands substantiated by actions. Nonviolence, when practiced properly, should not in any way advocate passivity.

To be fair, Gelderloss argues for a diversity of tactics and for a more sober assessment of nonviolence than is typically represented by absolutist ideological advocates of nonviolence. Gelderloos’ work is important for this rather myopic strain of activism that I think permeates movements today. However, these criticisms, while important to be mindful of, do not discredit nonviolence altogether. Indeed, this is not Gelderloos’ goal. In some cases though, nonviolence is the most effective, practical path to social change. I believe this is the case for Palestine.

Nonviolence and Palestine

Nonviolence has been employed in numerous settings for a myriad of different goals, from independence movements to workers rights to overthrowing dictators. Palestine, however, represents a special case.

Palestine is, first and foremost, confronted by Zionism, an ideological colonial movement. Nonviolence has been employed in numerous colonial settings, the most well-known being the case of India. While the historical circumstances of the British Empire’s departure are far more complex than simply Mohandas Gandhi’s movement, there can be no doubt the strategy of noncooperation was a key factor. Faced with the aftermath of World War II, the British Empire was exhausted and largely on the decline. Maintaining rule over a defiant populace in a country far away was simply not feasible. But a violent uprising would have had several detrimental effects on a post-colonial India. Obviously, there would have been a significantly higher number of casualties, but also the political transition would have been dictated by military leaders, the results of which are always highly uncertain. Recently a 2005 Freedom House report demonstrated this point, concluding that in transitions where nonviolence is the primary mode of resistance, there is a much higher likelihood that the transition will result in a freer society rather than merely another authoritarian regime.

However, Palestine is not simply a colonial asset attempting to transition to independence, nor is it just an autocracy attempting a transition to democracy. The West Bank and Gaza Strip have been under Israeli military occupation since 1967. There are precedents for nonviolent applications here as well: in 2005 Syria pulled its troops out of Lebanon, ending a military occupation that began in 1976. This occupation ended when confronted by a popular uprising following the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. The popular uprising lasted for approximately two months, before Syrian withdrawal in spite of counter protests put together by Hezbollah, a key regional ally for Syria. There had been several attacks on protest leaders, including more assassinations, but nevertheless the Syrian occupation ended. Regionally and domestically, the prospect of massacring Lebanese protesters, through proxies or otherwise—was not a viable option for Syria. The Syrian withdrawal had more to do with being able to retain nominal control over Lebanon through its clandestine operatives as well as through its partners in Hezbollah. In other words Syrian influence over Lebanon was transformed, though nonetheless diminished.

Historically, for Palestinians nonviolence has been the primary mode of successful resistance. The first intifada was a wildly successful uprising. The Palestine Question was thrust into the public spotlight, not in the usual, problematic depiction of militants attacking Israeli targets from Lebanon or Jordan, but rather in the form of young men throwing stones at tanks. Images of Israeli soldiers following Yitzhak Rabin’s orders to “break their bones” were covered by the media and it is this crisis of international legitimacy and public relations that led to negotiations with the PLO, culminating in the Oslo Accords. The problem is that rather than rethink the logic and moral calculus of Israeli policies, Israel found a Palestinian leader willing to act as a surrogate for a reformatted form of occupation and crush the uprising. Yasser Arafat was at his weakest point politically when he agreed to be Israel’s enforcer, and he and the returning exile leadership took to the task with a remarkable zeal.[2] Thus, what very well could have been a nonviolent revolution of Palestinian independence was completely subverted by a weak leader thrust into negotiations. Nevertheless, this form of resistance forced Israel to shift positions.

Armed resistance, however, has been a historic failure often accompanied by monumental tragedies. The cross border raids by the PLO from its inception in 1964 unto the late 80s achieved little, if anything tangible at all. Launched from Lebanon, Syria, and Jordan, the logic of these attacks was to goad Israel into a response, and forcing these states to respond to breaches of sovereignty, presumably leading a large scale war where Arab states would finally liberate Palestine. What happened in reality however, was that Israel responded with a show strength (if not brutality), and, rather than confront a consistently more advanced Israeli military, the host states blamed the Palestinians and sought to control and punish those within their borders.

Hamas’s tactics have consistently ended in failure as well, and has clearly been recognized by Israel to be a useful tool for avoiding and subverting negotiations and subsequent obligations. But what has Hamas actually accomplished through bombings, rocket attacks, and other deplorable acts of violence other than mayhem? During the 1996 Israeli election cycle, a bombing campaign by Hamas brought to the Likud government to power under the leadership of Benjamin Netanyahu. The second intifada resulted in much more death than the first; the attacks on Israeli civilians dominated the media’s focus away from nonviolent efforts and played into Israel’s never-questioned narrative of self-defense.

Hamas’ prideful participation in Israel’s escalation with Gaza’s militants resulted in over 1,400 killed in December-January 2008-2009 and over 150 killed this past November. Bizarrely, the most recent episode has been lauded as a success for Hamas because of Israeli concession achieved through negotiations in Israel. This perception is based on the ludicrous premise that Israel will honor these obligations. If there is any evidence that suggests that Israel intends to lift the siege of Gaza and begin treating the Palestinians there with any sort of decency, I’ve not yet seen it. Furthermore, even if we consider the terms of the ceasefire a victory for the Palestinians, it was not at the point of a gun that Israel agreed to these terms. It was through a process of mediation due to a new Egypt that is no longer willing to be as complicit as the Mubarak regime was.[3]

Israel is particularly vulnerable to nonviolent resistance with respect to the Palestinians. Israeli officials frequently cite Israel as the only democracy in the Middle East, an assertion that goes too often unquestioned. There are emerging democracies all over the region. Perhaps then these Israeli officials mean that Israel is the only liberal democracy in the region? This is a wildly problematic statement when considering Israel’s treatment of the Palestinian minority in its own country. Nevertheless, this assertion is very easily called into question when juxtaposed to images of Israeli soldiers beating and shooting unarmed demonstrators, i.e. the first intifada.

Another critical issue is that Israel relies on Western support, particularly American support. For the same reason that the Mubarak regime, unquestionably an illiberal dictatorship, could not sustain American support while murdering the nonviolent protesters that occupied Tahrir Square, Israel could not maintain American support while brutalizing unarmed, nonviolent protesters. In Bahrain the uprising was crushed with American support through its proxies in the Bahraini and Saudi Arabian governments. However, while Bahrain’s uprising went largely ignored by the western media and its coverage began to dwindle as it went on, Egypt’s uprising dominated the headlines and the evening news as the media still found the revolution to be sensational and fresh enough to cover day in and day out.  

The American populace is largely uneducated about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, if they are aware of it at all. Most Americans, in my experience, support Israel for either for ideological reasons stemming from certain eschatological Christian views as well as from ignorant notions of Palestinians terrorists. In the first case, while Americans may support a Jewish state for the sake of ushering in the end times, there is little to do about confronting such a mindset. However, supporting the existence of a Jewish state does not necessitate the murder of Palestinians and many Christians, I believe, would hesitate to support murderous campaigns against peaceful demonstrators. For those Americans that support Israel because of a bastardized interpretation of the global ‘War on Terror,’ this support cannot sustain itself when confronted with images of nonviolent Palestinian resistance.

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[1] For these accounts, which will be addressed albeit briefly below, see Gelderloos, Peter. How Nonviolence Protects the State. Cambridge, MA: South End, 2007. Churchill, Ward, and Mike Ryan. Pacifism as Pathology: Reflections on the Role of Armed Struggle in North America. Winnipeg: Arbeiter Ring, 1998.

[2] The PLO’s base in Lebanon had been decimated by civil war, Syrian intervention, and an Israeli campaign that targeted the group directly. The PLO now sat off in distant Tunis, far from the borderlands of historic Palestine. Arafat blundered yet again when Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, perilously backing the Iraqi dictator. Following Hussein’s defeat, Kuwait expelled the Palestinian laborers there as punishment while other Gulf States cut funding to the PLO. Diplomatically and geographically isolated, financially bankrupt, and now confronted with an uprising that began without any PLO input whatsoever, Arafat and the leadership in exile were fast becoming politically irrelevant.

[3] However, we cannot let the Morsi government off the hook so long as they are complicit in Israel’s blockade of Gaza.

Where now for Palestine? Series introduction

On 29 November 2012, the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) recognized Palestine as a non-member observer state; with 138 for, 9 against, and 41 abstentions, the motion was overwhelmingly supported by the planet Earth. Palestine was explicitly recognized as the Gaza Strip and West Bank, including East Jerusalem. Israel (the current occupier of Palestine) and the United States (the primary financier of the occupation) were the most notable nations among the opposition.

One would hope, in the face of such a massive consensus, that the losers might consider some form of introspection. This has thus far not been the case. Israel has announced that it will proceed with the long-planned construction of the settlement bloc known as E-1. If fully implemented the construction would result in a large scale project on the land between Jerusalem and the illegal settlement Ma’ale Adumim. First, this would result in the de facto annexation of occupied East Jerusalem. Moreover, E-1 would effectively bifurcate the West Bank by restricting access between the north and south to a narrow corridor avoiding new settlements and the already existing military areas which Israel insists are a part of its plan for “defensible borders” as well as a “demilitarized Palestinian state.” The US for its part continued to prove that disdain for Palestinian self-determination is the only thing that can bring Democrats and Republicans together.

The near global recognition of Palestine, regardless of the rather pitiful head-in-the-sand detractors, is a monumental achievement. However, as has anyone will observe, the reality of occupation and continued Israeli sovereignty over Palestine has not changed and is not likely to do so anytime soon.

I had a brief twitter exchange with a Palestinian yesterday who remarked:

Lena Ibrahim: How do we move forward? …and I personally don’t believe the answer to the current 1 apartheid state is a “2 state solution.”
E/A: Middle East: The trick, as far as I can tell, is breaking through to the people of Israel. The people running the [government] are lost causes.
Lena Ibrahim: I agree but I think that’s really tough. It will take generations even after peace to change racist perception by Israelis… only because that’s really all they are taught about the Palestinians, very negative and racist stigmas.”
E/A: Middle East: I agree. That’s why I advocate radical nonviolent activism and dialogue—NOT NEGOTIATIONS. Only way to break those views

 Of course, this exchange requires quite a bit of unpacking, and I hope to dig a bit deeper in the remainder of this series. But I’d like to set out some initial thoughts before going much deeper. 

1) An outsider, like myself, prescribing and advocating nonviolence for people who routinely suffer terror and oppression at the hands of power is always problematic. This is a critique I am all too conscious of. However, accepting the premise that dialogue and interaction with the Israeli populace—as opposed to the ineffectual and/or harmful negotiations pursued by the current Palestinian leadership—is the key to a fundamental change of dynamic between Israel and Palestine, nonviolence is simply the most practical way forward. Setting aside all conceptions of flowery rhetoric on the “goodness” of nonviolence, I would ask the skeptics and critics of nonviolence to accept the fact that Israel is a democracy; it’s intractable, far-right politicians are elected and preserved by popular opinion. Rockets and bombs are no more likely to evoke empathy among Israelis than blockades and massacres are likely to evoke submission among Palestinians. One caveat I would like to add is that there are too Palestinian perceptions that would have to change. Palestinians, just like their Israeli counterparts, are “taught… very negative and racist stigmas.” The difference, I think is that these stigmas would rapidly wither away without the daily reinforcement of Israeli occupation and aggression. 

 2) The reason I oppose negotiations is because there is very little, at the moment, to negotiate about. On the issue of Palestinian refugees’ right of return: even if one rejects mainstream academia’s conclusion that Israel expelled approximately 750,000 Palestinians in 1948 and accepts Israel’s narrative that they simply left of their own volition for fear of war, these refugees still have the right to return to their homeland according to international law. On the issue of territory: Israel imposed its sovereignty over the Gaza Strip and West Bank (including East Jerusalem) after it conquered the territory during the 1967 war; gaining territory through conquest is prohibited by international law; settlements and other forms of unilateral Israeli expansion have rightly been denounced as illegal since 1967 and remain as such today. On the issue of “demilitarization”: A neutered Palestinian state that relies on Israel for its security, is forbidden to make independent treaties, and does not have control over its borders, airspace and coastal waters, is neither sovereign nor independent and has thus never been nor will be an acceptable substitute for an actual Palestinian state. The goal for Palestinians, as far as I can tell, is getting the Israeli populace—and eventually the Israeli leadership—to understand this. However, it only takes an informed glance at the history of the so-called “peace process” to determine that negotiations are merely a forum for Palestinian capitulation, rather than real political settlement.  

3) A successful campaign of nonviolence would require a massive amount of mobilization and consensus among Palestinian society—this includes the Palestinian leadership, heretofore complicit in the Israeli occupation. The premise of nonviolence, at its heart, is refusal to acknowledge and obey the avatars of power, however this is requires an active, provocative process. The Palestinian Authority (PA) that currently operates as a subcontractor of Palestinian oppression will have to be reformed and reconstructed; Hamas will have to be confronted about its use of armed resistance; indeed these should be the first targets of change for activists in Palestine. Hamas, strange as it may sound, is much more likely to consider the measure than is the PA. Hamas has shown interest in a long term ceasefire, and appear willing to reconsider armed resistance. The PA, however, while tacitly supporting certain nonviolent gestures, relies politically, financially, and materially on playing their part in the Oslo model of Palestinian oppression. The recent recognition by the UNGA, however, provides numerous opportunities for the PA to shed such shackles. 

The objective of this series will be to add specificity the arguments listed above. The blue print for the series is first to address specific criticisms and shortcomings of nonviolence, and how this relates to a possible Palestinian movement. In Part 2, I wanted to briefly (and somewhat inadequately) address the history—successes and failures—of nonviolent activism, armed resistance, and negotiations in the in the last two decades of so. Finally, followed by specific prescriptions both for Palestinian and international activists as well as for, hopefully, a modified more activist PA that could embrace and facilitate such a movement in Part 3. 

I would welcome appreciate comments and thoughts regarding: 1) Criticisms/thoughts on nonviolence; 2) the appeal of armed resistance; 3) the benefit of negotiations; and 4) your personal ideas on specific nonviolent strategies. I will give all comments consideration as I work through this series. 

Follow me on Twitter at @Adam_Wes_S and on Facebook at Expert/Activist: Middle East.