Operation 'Scorching Summer'

In reaction to the growing scope of revolutionary uprisings in the Middle East, the State of Israel has, over the recent weeks, systematically prepared the ground for a new military offensive in Gaza, aimed to nip in the bud the Palestinian youth's intensifying struggle for national unity and democratic change; a struggle apt to inspire protests within the crisis-shaken Zionist state itself, for a closer analysis will reveal that the problems and the power structures of the Zionist regime are non too far away from those of Mubarak's (and Tantawi's) Egypt.

All leading Israeli politicians are recruited from the ranks of the military and the intelligence. Corruption is rampant. So is unemployment. Military and intelligence are the state's most powerful institutions.

The general economic situation is troubled. Poverty and discontent are on the rise.

Without the ever-present image of the "Arab enemy", on whom all evils can be blamed, against whose threatening presence the nation can be mobilised and united, the Israeli regime would be in the same disarray as the Mubarak regime on January 25.

The Arab dictatorships used Israel (with whom all of them, secretly, had established close ties) as a justification of their repression and corrupt autocracy, and the Israeli rulers are using the Arab regimes as a justification of theirs.

Gaza is indeed the amalgam that glues Israeli society together, and the Gaza wars are Israel's strategy of survival.

Operation 'Scorching Summer' is also a direct warning to Egypt (as Egyptian civilian targets were hit alongside Gaza) with regard to possible shifts in its pro-Israeli policies, as well as it is a direct response to the Arab Revolution with its re-awakening pan-Arabic solidarity and political awareness.

It is, further, Israel's reassertion of its status within the imperialist world, and its reassurance regarding its position and ties with the USA, NATO and the UN.

In this respect what is happening in Gaza today is of great consequence, and the world's reaction to it is crucial. It is this which will determine the politics of the Middle East in the coming decade.

What is our position on this?

We are aware, first of all, that silent toleration would be the worst scenario. This applies to the Arab and Middle Eastern as well as to the international community. No one should be deceived that such an attitude would deescalate conflicts. It would rather fuel them, and it would make them assume the ugliest and most calamitous form possible. 

We cannot, and must not, close our eyes to the fact that Israel's actions are pushing the Middle East into a new war. Neither can we ignore the fact that, under the vicious, continuous attacks of the Zionist rulers on the lives of civilians in Gaza, Palestinian resistance does not only have the right but the duty to fight back with all means at their disposal. Nor can we avoid to point out the fact that Egypt, targeted by the Zionist aggression, is dutibound to take action in defence of its national integrity and in protection of the lives of its citizens.

If the Zionist rulers were interested in a peaceful solution, why do persist in creating realities that make a peaceful solution impossible? And why do they reject the ceasefire offered? Why do they continue to hit everything that moves in violation of a ceasefire unilaterally declared? 

The answer is that the Zionist regime does not want, and has never wanted, a peaceful solution. It cannot afford a peaceful solution, for war is what keeps it alive.

The importance of the declaration of a Palestinian state is assuming an ever greater urgency. The declaration of this state, preceded by intensified diplomatic efforts to assure that it will meet with prompt recognition by a sufficient number of countries of sufficient political influence, has become an immediate necessity.

In this context, the question has arisen whether this ought to be a Palestinian state alongside Israel or whether a one-state-solution is to be envisaged.

Our position on this question is clear: a comprehensive solution and a stable future can be achieved only in a united Palestine, one with itself, and so our political vision is, and has always been, a one-state-solution.

Given the facts on the ground, a united Palestine will necessarily be a multi-ethnic and multi-cultural state, which, most probably, will be an entity of federal structure. This entails a systematic process of "growing together". Though such a state could, by a united Arab camp, be achieved by military means, its inner stability requires the existence of an Israeli movement for unification, representative of large parts of the Jewish population. Else, its structures would be dysfunctional, haunted by an uncontrollable potential of ethnic tensions, and by the ever-present risk of terrorist attacks by Zionist militias duplicating the situation of the 1930's and 1940's.

Our path, therefore, leads through an interim-solution, through the compromise of recognising two states.

The first step forward would be the dissolution of the PLO and its re-constitution as a new legal body, which would then no longer be bound by the Oslo agreements, followed by the unilateral declaration of a Palestinian state comprising Gaza, the Westbank and Arab Jerusalem, abandoning the existing administrative zones that fracture its territory and laying claims on Haifa, which according to the original partition plan, is to be an integral part of its territory.

The Palestinian state proclaimed must then be enforced and safeguarded by all means necessary, including military means.

The long-term aim, the unification of Palestine, ought to be envisaged from day one and be pursued through an intensified cooperation with anti-Zionist Jewish forces and with the help of concerted campaigns propagating the idea, the political vision and the practical modalities of a unified Palestine among the Israeli population.

Our aim must be the radicalisation of Israel's political opposition and the creation of a united Jewish-Palestinian camp against Zionism (or the Zionist regime in its present form) and for the unification of Palestine based on the natural unity of the working classes, on the Golden Age as a common cultural and historical denominator, and on a political rather than an ethnic concept of citizenship.

Muhammad A. Al Mahdi

APIC (APICONG), March 07/08, 2011