You have the gift of scratching the surface of facts in unexpected places, and in doing so you reveal new visions of the (often terrifying) depths of the human soul. That's why I subscribed. Thank you!
The USSR a dysfunctional "spoiler state"? The Soviets lifted their citizenry out of semi-feudalism, industrialized far more quickly than any previous society, fought off and ultimately destroyed fascism in Europe, put the first man into space -- and a whole lot more. Yes, Stalin's successors ultimately failed to adapt the system to changing circumstances and it collapsed -- but external factors played a role as well; the US did everything it could to undermine the Soviets, see Carter's backing of the Mujahideen in Afghanistan in the 1970s and Reagan's arms race in 1980s. The Soviet system wasn't intrinsically evil, didn't "embrace the dark side of human nature"; it was imperfect, like all human endeavors. The Chinese exhaustively studied the objective factors that led to the collapse of the USSR and have been able to avoid a similar fate. That aside, the points about Israel are of course spot-on.
"History doesn't repeat, but it often rhymes."--Mark Twain
The Crusader State, dependent on European support that eventually dried up, lasted a century. Israel is dependent upon American support, but started the process of losing it by committing this genocide. It is a process they, and the Biden Regime, are unable to stop.
"There are two things that, I believe, we need to note about this crippling nature of the Zionist project and its criminal state: First, it will not last."
Dissident commentators keep saying this (Chris Hedges too) but I think they may be very misguided on what the equivalent of Israel is. It's a settler colony. The equivalent of Israel is the United States, Australia, Canada, South Africa (also a settler colony). In Canada they keep finding hundreds of Indigenous children buried under schools. In Australia they stole Indigenous children from their families and raised them to be farm slaves or house slaves. In the United States they forced indigenous people onto concentration camps that they call barrios and reservations.
Even after the brutal white colonisers took control of all the land and conduct massacres and more, they still keep finding more ways to brutalize the remaining indigenous population. They put them at the very bottom tier of the settler colonial society, and turn them into nobodies, and try to get rid of the people who are left.
As far as I can see, the United States, Australia and Canada are still well and truly around. They are still imperialist forces acting with total impunity. They all go on crusades together invading other countries, Canada applauds a Nazi in its parliament, etc.
There's so much shock about how this could happen after all the genocide of Jews in Europe, and how it is such a gross violation of international law, and the belief that as if the United Nations and ICJ etc. were effective ways to stop all of this. The answer is that this is what the West has always been to the world. International law didn't stop the Western imperialist invasions and occupations of Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria and more. International law didn't stop the degrading torture at Abu Ghraib or Guantanamo. International law didn't stop documented Australian war crimes in Afghanistan and American war crimes in Iraq. Because we let all these atrocities happen and we did nothing about it, we let this atrocity against the Palestinians continue too.
We have to fight back against the West. We can't depend on the institutions under their control to help us. The global majority must throw off the parasites, the "golden billion" as NATO and EU like to refer to themselves.
The US, Canada, and Australia were able to eradicate the indigenous populations to such a degree that they were able to establish full control over their respective territories. The Zionist settler-colony has not been able to achieve that (witness Gaza), nor at this point is it likely to. That's the difference.
Russia has the resources to fight back against the West, but Palestine does not. If there was ever a time that an international coalition should be organised under their leadership to defend a people, it is now.
The assumption about Nazi Germany not lasting just because it is criminal, for example, also doesn't take into account the fact that it was the Soviet Union that really defeated Nazi Germany. The Soviet Union lost 27 million of its citizens in WWII. It liberated Holocaust survivors from concentration camps – as Professor Norman Finkelstein regularly attests to from his parents who were survivors from concentration camps ("growing up, you couldn't say a bad word about the Soviet Union or Stalin in my house", he often says with a smile, e.g. in his first interview on Glenn Greenwald's show.)
We do not have any equivalent of the Soviet Union today to liberate Palestinians from the 25 mile-by-5 mile concentration camp that Israel has made of Gaza. I think there could not be a better time to organise one.
I will read your book on Lviv. I don't recall who it was unfortunately but a Ukrainian historian said on a podcast a few months ago that his grandmother resided in the same town in Western Ukraine for her entire life and saw her town's nation-state affiliation change 4 times.
I'm not so sure about the comparison to "evil Nazis". The stories of the 2nd world war, and all the atrocities thereof, I've come to see as massively inflated wartime propaganda - in essence, we're fed the "victors history", including the sacrosanct "holocaust" (scratch the surface of that and it all falls apart).
Other than that, I find your analysis and insight to be of great value. Thank you!
Excellent article. As you mentioned that Israel has never really contributed anything to the region, and because of its engrained racism, has only sought to subdue and cripple countries and nationalities within and without. Your comments regarding the future viability of the Israeli State align with recent statements by fellow Historian Ilan Pappe claiming that we are witnessing the beginning of the end of the zionist project and as these types of societies start to crumble they become even more violent and brutal.
I hope you are correct in your prognosis.
What an extraordinarily insightful article. Many thanks.
You have the gift of scratching the surface of facts in unexpected places, and in doing so you reveal new visions of the (often terrifying) depths of the human soul. That's why I subscribed. Thank you!
Could not agree more, these things take time lets hope the Palestinian people live to see that day
Substack Morning lesson :
One of the original Semitic peoples are the Palestinians. Look it up sweet cheeks, I dare ya
Yes they are Semitic people. Only a racist can attempt to deny.
So how can I be antisemitic for saying I fully support the Palestinians against the genociding Jews ?
Use this fact liberally to destroy the Genocide loving Jews and others in an argument stop the GENOCIDE and support your Semitic people!!
I sincerely hope that the Zionist Project ceases to exist sooner rather later.
The USSR a dysfunctional "spoiler state"? The Soviets lifted their citizenry out of semi-feudalism, industrialized far more quickly than any previous society, fought off and ultimately destroyed fascism in Europe, put the first man into space -- and a whole lot more. Yes, Stalin's successors ultimately failed to adapt the system to changing circumstances and it collapsed -- but external factors played a role as well; the US did everything it could to undermine the Soviets, see Carter's backing of the Mujahideen in Afghanistan in the 1970s and Reagan's arms race in 1980s. The Soviet system wasn't intrinsically evil, didn't "embrace the dark side of human nature"; it was imperfect, like all human endeavors. The Chinese exhaustively studied the objective factors that led to the collapse of the USSR and have been able to avoid a similar fate. That aside, the points about Israel are of course spot-on.
"History doesn't repeat, but it often rhymes."--Mark Twain
The Crusader State, dependent on European support that eventually dried up, lasted a century. Israel is dependent upon American support, but started the process of losing it by committing this genocide. It is a process they, and the Biden Regime, are unable to stop.
"There are two things that, I believe, we need to note about this crippling nature of the Zionist project and its criminal state: First, it will not last."
Dissident commentators keep saying this (Chris Hedges too) but I think they may be very misguided on what the equivalent of Israel is. It's a settler colony. The equivalent of Israel is the United States, Australia, Canada, South Africa (also a settler colony). In Canada they keep finding hundreds of Indigenous children buried under schools. In Australia they stole Indigenous children from their families and raised them to be farm slaves or house slaves. In the United States they forced indigenous people onto concentration camps that they call barrios and reservations.
Even after the brutal white colonisers took control of all the land and conduct massacres and more, they still keep finding more ways to brutalize the remaining indigenous population. They put them at the very bottom tier of the settler colonial society, and turn them into nobodies, and try to get rid of the people who are left.
As far as I can see, the United States, Australia and Canada are still well and truly around. They are still imperialist forces acting with total impunity. They all go on crusades together invading other countries, Canada applauds a Nazi in its parliament, etc.
There's so much shock about how this could happen after all the genocide of Jews in Europe, and how it is such a gross violation of international law, and the belief that as if the United Nations and ICJ etc. were effective ways to stop all of this. The answer is that this is what the West has always been to the world. International law didn't stop the Western imperialist invasions and occupations of Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria and more. International law didn't stop the degrading torture at Abu Ghraib or Guantanamo. International law didn't stop documented Australian war crimes in Afghanistan and American war crimes in Iraq. Because we let all these atrocities happen and we did nothing about it, we let this atrocity against the Palestinians continue too.
We have to fight back against the West. We can't depend on the institutions under their control to help us. The global majority must throw off the parasites, the "golden billion" as NATO and EU like to refer to themselves.
The US, Canada, and Australia were able to eradicate the indigenous populations to such a degree that they were able to establish full control over their respective territories. The Zionist settler-colony has not been able to achieve that (witness Gaza), nor at this point is it likely to. That's the difference.
Russia has the resources to fight back against the West, but Palestine does not. If there was ever a time that an international coalition should be organised under their leadership to defend a people, it is now.
The assumption about Nazi Germany not lasting just because it is criminal, for example, also doesn't take into account the fact that it was the Soviet Union that really defeated Nazi Germany. The Soviet Union lost 27 million of its citizens in WWII. It liberated Holocaust survivors from concentration camps – as Professor Norman Finkelstein regularly attests to from his parents who were survivors from concentration camps ("growing up, you couldn't say a bad word about the Soviet Union or Stalin in my house", he often says with a smile, e.g. in his first interview on Glenn Greenwald's show.)
We do not have any equivalent of the Soviet Union today to liberate Palestinians from the 25 mile-by-5 mile concentration camp that Israel has made of Gaza. I think there could not be a better time to organise one.
I will read your book on Lviv. I don't recall who it was unfortunately but a Ukrainian historian said on a podcast a few months ago that his grandmother resided in the same town in Western Ukraine for her entire life and saw her town's nation-state affiliation change 4 times.
I'm not so sure about the comparison to "evil Nazis". The stories of the 2nd world war, and all the atrocities thereof, I've come to see as massively inflated wartime propaganda - in essence, we're fed the "victors history", including the sacrosanct "holocaust" (scratch the surface of that and it all falls apart).
Other than that, I find your analysis and insight to be of great value. Thank you!
Excellent article. As you mentioned that Israel has never really contributed anything to the region, and because of its engrained racism, has only sought to subdue and cripple countries and nationalities within and without. Your comments regarding the future viability of the Israeli State align with recent statements by fellow Historian Ilan Pappe claiming that we are witnessing the beginning of the end of the zionist project and as these types of societies start to crumble they become even more violent and brutal.
https://youtu.be/L-YLROxeHA0?si=DwkDEvrtyLVY-sFh