Rulers Fear Potential of Mass Protests Against Gaza Genocide

The Empire Strikes Back here ♦ From Resistance to Communist Revolution here ♦

New York, 2017—Fordham University students protest banning of Students for Justice in Palestine.

Mass Anti-Genocide Protests Scare US Rulers: The Empire Strikes Back!

LOS ANGELES (USA), December 20— “US Congress grilled three university presidents about ‘antisemitism’ on their campuses,” a comrade explained to a young protester on Human Rights Day. “They want them to label as ‘antisemitic’ and ban groups like Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voices for Peace for calling for a “Free Palestine.”

“Wow,” said the protester. “This is like McCarthyism!”

“It’s like Nazi Germany. In the early stages of fascism, Jewish and other anti-fascist teachers were expelled from teaching,” answered the comrade, giving her Red Flag. They exchanged contact information.

The US imperialists face the loss of their empire to their rising Chinese and Russian rivals. They are panicking at the sight of multi-racial youth massively demonstrating against the US-backed Israeli government’s genocide in Gaza. The word “revolution” is common.

These rulers need a loyal, patriotic work force and military to fight their coming wars, including World War III against their rivals. So, they are striking back.

US universities were founded as capitalist institutions. Billionaires make sure they stay that way. Billionaire investment banker Bill Ackman has attacked Harvard’s first Black Woman President, Claudine Gay, as a “Diversity hire.” This is a racist dog whistle meaning that she got the job because she’s black, not because she’s qualified. The real reason is that he doesn’t think she has come down hard enough on students demonstrating against genocide.

She was forced to resign, despite faculty support, over made-up charges of plagiarism over two decades ago. Before and since the hearing, she has faced disgusting racist slurs. This racism is in the service of US imperialism: to support the genocide in Gaza and to intimidate other educators who oppose it.

For months, rich donors to the University of Pennsylvania campaigned against the President and Chair of the Board. Amid pro-Palestinian demonstrations, donors threatened to withhold tens of millions of dollars. Ross Stevens threatened to take back his $100 million contribution. Penn’s Wharton Business School Advisory Board demanded a change in leadership.

All because Penn’s President refused to sanction, expel, or fire students or faculty who condemned the genocide in Gaza.

Just as the Nazis did, the capitalist billionaires need to tighten their control over their universities. They conspire to guarantee ideological control of the working class and middle class, who they complain have become too “anti-racist” and “pro-socialist.”

They want to fire teachers who criticize Israel’s Zionist government and the world’s imperialists’ complicity in racist genocide. They want to outlaw student groups like Students for Justice in Palestine for “antisemitism.” This group welcomes all students, including Jews, who oppose Israeli government racism against Palestinians.

US rulers and their lackeys want to make it a crime to say that Zionism is fascist, that the Israeli government is fascist and is committing genocide. That the US government is complicit in genocide. The US House of Representatives recently passed a resolution asserting the lie that anti-Zionism is antisemitic.

Teachers can/will be fired for opposing this. “Democracy” is actually the dictatorship of capital over all of us. The universities belong to the capitalists. They dictate what is taught and researched according to capitalism’s needs. Universities MUST toe the capitalists’ line.

Well-intentioned demands for the university to divest from imperialism won’t work. We can’t reform universities to meet the masses’ needs. They exist to serve capitalism-imperialism!

We cannot allow calls for genocide of Jewish or Palestinian or any other group of workers. However, genocide can only be stopped permanently by a workers’ communist revolution! ICWP mobilizes the masses of workers, soldiers, students, and youth to end capitalism-imperialism and build a society where education and work collectively meet the masses’ needs.

In the place of capitalist universities, we’ll have life-long learning that combines work and study for everyone. We will tear down the capitalist division between “mental” and “manual” labor. Communist education will encourage everyone to develop to their full potential to meet the masses’ needs. No more hierarchy of degrees, titles, and certificates that now divides us.

Collectivity will replace competition. We will share our knowledge. No one will live better or worse than another. All will receive what they need and contribute to the collective what they can based on commitment and ability. That is Communism. Join us!

From Resistance to Communist Revolution

The word “revolution” is common among the masses demonstrating against genocide in Gaza. Many are thinking about what that means—and even if revolution is possible.

Questions about revolts in the US armed forces during the Vietnam War (1955-1975) come up repeatedly. Educator friends have asked comrades for more information. Demonstrators have spent a long time with comrades trying to figure out how this history relates to the current catastrophe. Long debates have taken place in coffee shops where staff and customers read Red Flag.

The US imperialists have done their best to hide this history. Their media censors the revolts of US soldiers when comparing today’s resistance to the Gaza genocide to events during the Vietnam war.

Almost every section of the US Army, Air Force, and Navy witnessed major revolts during the Vietnam era. Several comrades now in ICWP helped organize these revolts.

In 1971, the Armed Forces commissioned a report on the loyalty of the troops. It concluded that 47% of the soldiers were either resisting orders or in outright revolt. Over 700 officers were killed by fragmentation grenades thrown by rank-and-file soldiers. The army had to set up special sites to test whether officers were killed by Vietnamese National Liberation Front bullets or by US soldiers.

General Westmoreland oversaw the invading US troops. He ended up pleading with then-President Nixon to withdraw the troops. He was afraid masses of them would turn the guns around.

Lessons from the Vietnam War Era Open Doors to Communist Revolution

This history provides a useful weapon against nationalism and pacifism. It has helped change the direction of our discussions with demonstrators, Red Flag readers, and friends from anti-war resistance to the need and potential for outright communist insurrection.

This is the first time that some friends have considered the strategy of organizing within the armed forces.

“I thought joining the army was against everything I stood for,” said a college student. Now she is rethinking it from a communist perspective.

At the recent ICWP conference in El Salvador, two comrades who are more recent US Army veterans told how they introduced communism to fellow soldiers. They also called for comrades and friends to join the military work.

The US armed forces are not the only military with a history of insurrection. Nearly every capitalist army has seen revolts, often with active communist participation. Working-class soldiers were key to major revolutions. International fraternization among the troops paved the way to those victories.

The more we expose this weakness of the imperialists, the easier it is for masses to see that a new communist world is indeed possible.

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