Direct action against Israeli attacks

If I am in the same position as them, they are in the same position as me.

My point is that wanting something eg communism, is meaningless without a means and action, and further more the my reason for wanting communism is so we are free to create ourselves, interact withou the dead weight of capital and wage labour over our heads, therefore communism is a means to an end. Likewise my workmate be sitting wshing she had wings, but without a means to this it is consequential.

So if I'm sitting on my chair, carrying out the same things as my fellow workers, with no engagement in struggles, my "revolutionary" desire is as profound as a desire to have wings.

If she started making "wings" out of office supplies, and assumed that everyone else was doing the same, but that she was the vanguard, because the office supplies she was usinhg were particularly light, you would think that she was slightly different to you.

Shrug!

Don't joke about that, there are some right weirdo's in my work.

But yeah, her actions are what make clear her desires and her ahem, difference to the rest of us.

So if I was in the process of forming a grass roots group or fighting over a particular issue, then my difference, my desires, come to mean something.

That first paragraph is beautiful, I even forgive your half hearted defence of the primmo's now.

Please give me a reason to hate you some time soon.

so in essense it's not enough to simply declare yourself a class struggle anarchist?

and it won't stop you getting involved in workplace struggles or community organising so everyone's a winner.

Jack that is a pathetic response that could apply to any struggle ever.

Seriously Jack, I have issues with the strategy and tactics of "anti war" actions but this is just absurd.

Let's try it with a refusenik,

yep, I think they are all in place, and further in place if we take the example of the Scottish Train Drivers who refused to move war material for the Iraq invasion, all we have to do is replace "banged up" for sacked. And if there was ever a case of soldiers carrying out a similar refusal we'd be able to reinstate "banged up".

Your level of debate has just sank lower and lower on these boards, it would be a parody of itself except it can't even muster a wry smile under the pathetic weight of numbness.

Jack, As I've said I have massive problems with the way "anti war" activities are carried out, their abstraction from everyday life and their role in perpeuating self referencial activist sub cultures and full time "peace activists".

But this does not mean I rule out the possibilty of any anti militarist action on the impossible criteria that you laid out. The fact you think that what you said was merely a semantic difference and not one of the most ill thought out generalised crock of shit argument i have ever seen ANYONE offer on this board, tells me alot of how little you critically engage with your own thoughts, it's almost like they have become empty signifiers, hollow curse words.

Hi

Yeah Laz. I actually really like you, (for LR stalkers, I’ve met Laz in the flesh, he’s gorgeous and sexy and nice) but your approach to the Middle East is really worrying me. You need to report for re-education Lazy Riser style.

Love

LR

Hi

Of course. But, I wouldn't drink the water if I were you. Now, please stop discrediting yourself further with all this “putting pressure on UK/US/Israel” garbage.

Love

LR

Jack i gave you examples of anti militarist actions that would have fallen foul of your absurd criteria, yet you somehow manage to exclude then on some magical basis.

I will ask you is it possible to carry out a useful anti militarist action without resorting to imperialism or nationalism, short of a revolution? To quote what your sock puppet Jef Costello said in an earlier post.

I have not even ventured as far as suggesting any concrete actions, rather I defended the possibility of them. And infact the smashing of the Raytheon office in Derry is such an action I see as conuter productive. So please can you stop trying conflate my points with some sort of defence of ill thought out "do domething" actions.

I thank the heavens everyday that you read politics instead of Medicine at University.

Another ex-arithisis suffer recovers at Dr Jack's revolutionary clinic.

Hi

I’m sure all those unemployed ex-Eastern Block immigrants to Israel would be delighted to make Israel self sufficient in weapons. If through some bizarre turn of events you succeed, it’ll give Israel excellent leverage to use its nuclear arsenal to defend its borders. I’d appreciate it if you’d confirm that’s what you want, because if you achieve anything then it’ll be that.

But the specifics of whatever “Direct Action” you wish to take is merely the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the reactionary nature of what I suspect you’ve got planned. Please tell us what it is you want to achieve for the region and why it’s in your best interests to see it come about.

Love

LR

P.S. Take your time, coz I'm splitting for a party any sec.

See Ireland thread here:

http://libcom.org/node/8873

These folk reckon this is targetted and probably that if replicated may make a difference. It gets hard not to support anti-war activists once they've gotten themselves arrested for doing something in opposition to a war yer also opposed to but we do still need to have our critical faculties engaged.

Did this have any possibility of stopping or shortening the war? No, I don't think so. Will people say it provided an important symbolic message? Yeah, the question is does this matter. Should we support those arrested or decide they were self-serving activistists who wanted to 'do-something' and 'stick it to the man' and, well, basically take a hell slap in inta them approach to calls for solidarity? See, now I dunno.

I'll support them in their court case, whilst remaining critical of their particular action.

Awaits, Jack telling me this is a reactionary cursty to the activist ghetto.

Obviously Jack turnt down all support when he was in court for GM crop damage. ho hum

I thought I'd take a stab at this, seeing as how I figure the snipe makes me involved. But I can't figure out what your argument is, as he's already talked of refuseniks. The best way for Israelis to organise is to refuse to join the army, or to support it. To educate their children and young people, to stop them joining the army and being brutalised. The actions of the Israeli pilots who refused to carry out so-called targetted assassinations is a first step on this road. There is little that the Lebanese can do, they simply have to try to survive. One of the reasons, alongside the fear of casualties, that the Israeli army dislikes ground operations is that it bring soldiers into contact with what they've done. Unlike the pressurised environment of a checkpoit in Gaza say, entering a Lebanese village that has been bombed will have an effect.
I am pretty pessimistic about the ability of the average LEbanese person to get out of this situation, short of organising and supporting each other there is bugger all they can do. They cannot fight and defeat Israel in any real way. so they must appeal to/ wait for the Israeli working class to awaken. I am pessimistic about the possibilty of this happening.

They tend to, the main reason Israel would be unable to do this is that it needs external funds and materials. China and Russia would both be perfectly capable of running weapons industries without exports. I believe IRan is fairly self sufficient isn't it, and most of the exports are freebies aren't they?

except coffemachine made that comment in relation to my post defending the possibility of anti militarist actions and not to any particular "direct action".

well i would argue that the workers who refused to move arms on the way to Iraq, were realistically not going to do fuck all, and rather the action was an act of concrete symbolism that illuminated the possibilities whilst at the same time being a principled stance in the best tradtition of working class anti militarism.
And in the case of the workers there is no direct benefit for them. Likewise they were putting themselves at the risk of dismissal and general harrasment from management etc.

So your ridiculous criteria would rule out one of the most inspiring anti militarist acts we saw during the Iraq war.

So I will accept that you didn't not mean to dismiss all anti militarist actions but i still won't accept the ridiculously reductionist criteria you set out for judging such actions.

As for jef's post, well a) he clearly shows that there are possibilities that avoid falling into the trap of nationalism, yet he reduces the Lebanese to the category of "non people", who must just eek out an existance to survive and wait for the Israeli's to "awaken". One can only wonder what you would have made of the civil rights movement in the states, suppouse those blacks best option would have been to wait for "whitey" to overcome racism?

What if the lebanese and palestinians aren't happy to just wait in purgatory, what if some of them decide to join Hezbullah and Hamas, what if they decide that their "survival" depends on sending katyusha's into Israeli cities, suicide bombers into disco's and cafe's? What sort of effect do you think this will have on the Israeli working class breaking from Zionism?

Infact one wonders what the Israeli working class can do considering they apparently live under a "fascist" state.

next time you feel like aping jacks positions, atleast have wit to understand their consequences.

it's embarrassing enough hearing your thoughts on Genetics and Critical theory, without having you inflict your half baked politcal analysis on my eyes.

I never suggested anything of the kind. I simply pointed out that they are at the mercy of a military machine, any attempt to fight will be defeated. I have suggested that maintaining their own solidarity and attempting to connect with Israelis is their best method. And with regards to America, it was quite possible for Whites and blacks to meet on a daily basis. I doubt be bombed by F16s for a few days and then having tanks and APCs show up is the same thing.

They'd be wrong then. I'd understand why they'd do it but they'd be wrong. I am entirely unsure why you've raised this. They are in a position where they have no power, apart from my suggestions what can they do? Short of march across the border as one, throwing their pain into the faces of Israelis on a personal basis?

Do you have any ideas on what can be done by the Lebanese, short of your cop out "supporting the possibility" if it's possible then you can surely think of something? Or do you just want to get one over and win on the bulletin board? If we say you're the cleverest boy who's read the most big books will you stop being naughty?

I don't think that I said that they did, I believe I asked why they didn't. You failed to prove that they didn't, I remember that much.

I understand what I'm posting, you're the one who seems to have trouble.

This is relevant how?

My "possibilities" are no more fucking vague than your pathetic calls' that they maintain their "solidarity". They are maintaining they're solidarity, they are jumping in behind hezbullah by the thousands!

And the ludricous notion the Lebanese should "shame" the IDF, by being a relfection of their actions is the most disgustingly liberal shite I have ever heard in my fucking life, and this from the poster having a pop at Lone Wolf for apparently celebrating the cult of "victimhood".

Your suggestion that they seek to make links with Israeli's fighting against the occupation is a step in the right direction, and if this can happen, it would have some potential to atleast cut into the cycle of violence in the region. But i fail to see how this differs from when I offered this as one potentiality, which you dismissed with this little gem,

Now you might claim this wasn't a rhetorical question, but you'd be a liar, and if it wasn't a rhetorical question why would you ask it as I had already suggested the supporting of refuseniks and making links with those in israel opposed to the occupation.

I also think we shouldn't be conflating south lebanon with the west bank and gaza. The lebanese still have an economy and the working class has some semblence of independence, in trade unions which the palestinians don't.

The point of looking for "possibilities" is that i don't have fucking easy answers but I do know that I'm not happy to accept that nothing can be done to "stop IDF bombing, without resorting to imperialism or nationalism, short of a revolution."

I am not sure if I actually did that.

Where did I suggest this? As far as the sentence actually makes sense, I am fairly sure that I did not. I said it was pretty much all they could do, short of staying alive. What should they do then Revol? Organise strikes, I'm sure the Israelis would have been terribly upset by that, or would the aim of strikes be to put pressure on the lebanese government to intervene?

Go back and check the context. IT was coming after a series of several posts on strikes.

It wasn't a rhetorical question, I'm not engaged in a batle of wits, I am trying to discuss something. Which is clearly not what you want to do.

I didn't conflate, I used them as examples of different approches by the Israeli military.

That's fine, as I have pointed out I was asking a genuine question.

Maybe but you haven't addressed this...

also

You have in no way offered any specific example or even defition to "supporting each other" or your other phrase "survival". As I have pointed out already most Lebanese are understanding sticking together and surviving to mean joining and supporting Hezbullah. The one pro active example that you did offer was of making links with Israeli refuseniks and dissidents, was something i already mentioned, yet you seemed to have overlooked.

The idea that the Lebanese working class can do nothing except "sticking together" and "surviving" (still undefined beyond the exclusion of joining Hezbullah) until such times as the Israeli working class awaken is cretinous. Not only in it's proscriptions for the Lebanese but in how it overlooks the invasions and occupations as a means of further cementing the Israeli working class to militarism.

I understand that i am getting quite animated by this, but i don't like the smug "revolutionary" pronouncements proclaiming the impossibility of the situation, and is happy to leave it's analysis there, saying they offer or can see no potentials for the rupturing of the barbarism that is engulfing the region, from within the regions working class itself. It wouldn't be so dishonest if they then gave up their criticisms of Hezbullah and Hamas, but I'm not content with letting hamas and hezbullah off the hook in this manner, and alas i'm forced to look for some potential path out of the quagmire.

It's late, I've gone through the thread and not found the post with this suggestion. Can you tell me where it is?
Incidentally I am also less motivated to answer questions preceded by someone calling me a "fucking liar" these are supposed to be no flaming forums, try respecting that.

Following on from my question about what can be done I was trying to explain my reasons for asking it. Short of helping each other get the fuck out of harm's way I could think of nothing more that the lebanese could do.

This is irreleveant.

I'm sure the invasion is designed to cement militarism. The conflicts aim to do that on both sides. I fail to see what the Lebanese can do to resist the Israelis, short of reinforcing this conditioning by joining hezbollah. They cannot strike and affect them, they cannot blockade. I have asked several times what they can do because I would like to know.

As the fact that I keep asking questions might signal, I am actually looking for answers, if you mean others then that's fine.

I don't understand what you mean by this.

If I could sleep I'd be in bed. I'm done with this, for tonight at least.