At 4:19 PM -0500 1/4/02, David Griffin wrote:

>Hello? That is the point!  -- Assigning a religious character to secular
>bourgeois-democratic states is not only "faulty logic", but is opportunistic
>and plain incorrect. Israel does not kick the shit out of Palestinian
>villagers because it is "Jewish" anymore than the European colonists kicked
>the shit out of Native Americans because they were "Christian." The DOMINANT
>powers in the world today are acting on ECONOMIC principles, not the dictates
>of a religious order. We're not living in the 15th century anymore. As George
>Bush Sr. said most eloquently, "It's the Global Economy, Stupid!"

While we may not be living in the 15th century *objectively*, many many societies are still quite backward. I'm not trying to be opportunistic in saying that, I can't even imagine what I would have to gain. It is simply that it appears to me that this is the case.

The dominant capitalist form of oppression is, as you say, economic. But clearly the oppression of the Palestinians of the occupied territories is not solely economic, they are also being politically and physically oppressed in a discriminatory manner. Although for all intents and purposes they are residents of Israel (there being no Palestinian state and Israel being vehemently opposed to a Palestinian state and the ruling government of the occupied territories) they have no citizenship rights whatsoever. And they can't aspire to citizenships rights, simply because they are not Jewish.

As a result, they have no political rights in Israel whatsoever. The only legal avenue to obtain citizenship rights would appear to be to convert to Judaism, since that is the only avenue to citizenship.

It seems to me that this is not the model of a modern capitalist democracy. In fact it is closer to the model of a primitive pre-feudal society.

You appear to want to blame the ills of the middle east on the capitalist economic system. As a socialist, I have no reason to defend capitalism, but it is clear to me that you are mistaken. As you rightly point out, capitalism is a system where the ruling class rules primarily by economic coercion, there is no need to discriminate on any other basis than an economic one. The oppression of the non-Jewish population of greater Israel, including the occupied territories, is not primarily economic, it is military.

Perhaps I'm mistaken, but at the root of this seems to be a form of religious bigotry, an irrational insistence of maintaining the state of Israel as a state of and for Jews. With non-Jews being non-citizens, or at best second-class citizens. This type of chauvinism is a hangover from a bygone age and is regarded as repugnant in most modern capitalist societies.

Bill Bartlett
Bracknell Tas