Statement of the ISL (Israel) on the Terrorist Event In Jerusalem*

Who was
Khussam Dwayat? According to YNet, the website of Israeli daily Yediot
Ahronot, was a 31 year old father of two from the Sur Baher neighbourhood in
East Jerusalem. He was not a member of any political organization and does
not seem to have had strong political views. His attack seems to have been
quite spontaneous, not pre-planned like other terrorist attacks in the past.

The Zionist racists can easily explain this: it is the evil "Arab nature,"
the uncivilized and brutal nature of Islam, maybe "extremism," etc. The
arguments change as one goes from left to right across the political
spectrum. But all the arguments have the same purpose: to avoid an
explanation of terrorism, something that the Zionists fear like the devil.

As Marxists we must explain scientifically what would drive a relatively
young man to give up his life in order to kill innocent people. But we
already know the context of the attack. After Hamas' victory in the election
and the Israeli disengagement from Gaza, many people had false hopes that
perhaps, if Palestine could not be taken back in its entirety, than Hamas
could at least ensure the Palestinians a better life in the parts of the
land in which they live now. But Hamas' and Hizb Allah's new deals with
imperialism have crushed these dreams, as the ISL has warned all along.
Superexploited and seeing before them not workers and capitalists, but only
a racist society of colonialists, the Palestinian masses can feel no
sympathy for the Israeli workers.

The ruling class of the Zionist state has been facing a difficult situation
for a while now. It has been defeated in Lebanon, it has failed to break the
will power of the Palestinian people, and it has suffered from the growing
world economic crisis. The American imperialists refuse to make a commitment
to support Israel in case it decides to attack Iran. The French President,
whose show of support for Israel was meant to give French imperialism a new
foothold in the Middle East, is deeply unpopular in his own country, and
obviously France cannot substitute for the military strength of the US. They
are so down on their luck that they are even afraid of losing the support of
Israeli workers, evidenced by their quick capitulation in the face of strike
threats by the Histadrut, even though they know very well that Histadrut
Chairman Ofer Eini is "their man" in the union.

Things were to become worse. A deal has been finalized with Hizb Allah for
an exchange of prisoners. Hamas seems to have finally made its long
sought-after settlement with the imperialists. This is deadly for the
Zionists. Israel, a country whose only function in the world imperialist
system is the military suppression of the masses in the Middle East, lives
on strife. If the fundamentalists and the nationalist bourgeoisie can subdue
'their' masses, then support of the Zionist state becomes unnecessary PR
trouble for imperialism. This explains the regrowth of Zionist hysteria
regarding Iran.

The terrorist attack in Jerusalem must be viewed in this context. Who was
Khussam Dwayat? According to YNet, the website of Israeli daily Yediot
Ahronot, was a 31 year old father of two from the Sur Baher neighbourhood in
East Jerusalem. He was not a member of any political organization and does
not seem to have had strong political views. His attack seems to have been
quite spontaneous, not pre-planned like other terrorist attacks in the past.

The Zionist racists can easily explain this: it is the evil "Arab nature,"
the uncivilized and brutal nature of Islam, maybe "extremism," etc. The
arguments change as one goes from left to right across the political
spectrum. But all the arguments have the same purpose: to avoid an
explanation of terrorism, something that the Zionists fear like the devil.

As Marxists we must explain scientifically what would drive a relatively
young man to give up his life in order to kill innocent people. But we
already know the context of the attack. After Hamas' victory in the election
and the Israeli disengagement from Gaza, many people had false hopes that
perhaps, if Palestine could not be taken back in its entirety, than Hamas
could at least ensure the Palestinians a better life in the parts of the
land in which they live now. But Hamas' and Hizb Allah's new deals with
imperialism have crushed these dreams, as the ISL has warned all along.
Superexploited and seeing before them not workers and capitalists, but only
a racist society of colonialists, the Palestinian masses can feel no
sympathy for the Israeli workers.

The ISL truly symapthizes with the suffering of the Israeli masses, unlike
the Zionists who despise them and use them as cannon fodder. For this
reason, we are honest with them. We say to them: so long as you continue to
identify yourself with the state; so long as you continue to support its
murderous oppression of the Palestinians; so long as you continue so
sacrifice yourself and your children for its wars in service of imperialism,
the Palestinian people will not and cannot sympathize with you, or tell the
difference between you and your oppressors. The only way for Jews to live in
peace in this land is to support the proletarian revolution in the Middle
East.

Obviously, we sympathize with the expropriated and oppressed Palestinians as
well. And for the same reason, we are honest with them too. Terrorism cannot
advance the struggle for national liberation, much less for socialism. Even
if the attacks would target only military targets or officials, they could
not shake the foundations of the colonialist state. The only way for the
Palestinians to ever be free is to overthrow imperialism and its client
regimes - the only way to do this is by building revolutionary workers'
parties, which will be led by the most class conscious elements of the
working class of this region.

The terrorist attacks will be used once more by the Zionists in order to
justify their racist policies. Already there is talk of reversing an order
disallowing the destruction of homes of the families of terrorists. The
hypocrisy here is astounding. Has Baruch Goldstein's home been wrecked? What
about the home of Eden Nathan-Zada, the fascist who murdered 4 Palestinians
in a bus in the city of Shfaram? Knowing the Zionists, they define as
terrorists all those who dare rise up against Israeli oppression (former
Minister of Finance, Benyamin Nethanyahu, even called striking workers
terrorists once).

The ISL stands firmly against this current. In the face of the silence and
embarrassment of the 'radical', i.e. centrist and reformist left, we clearly
spell out our positions. We do not hide our slogans, which remain unchanged:

*For a Palestinian Workers' State, from the Jordan to the Sea!*

*Against Zionist pogromism!*