the Disillusioned kid

Happy Xmas (War is Over) 2015

Bagram Air Base, Afghanistan

Maaloula, Syria

Al-Quds University, East Jerusalem, Palestine

Previous years: 2006, 2007,2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

Labels: Afghanistan, Anti-war, Christmas, Imperialism, Israel-Palestine, Syria, US, War on Terror, Weirdness, Winterval

Season Message: Revenge of the Message

I started writing seasonal posts on the blog way in 2006. Almost
a decade ago. It is now the only sign of life in an otherwise moribund blog.

Usually I post a rambling festive message as well as a compilation of images juxtaposing Christmas imagery (trees, Santa etc) with symbols of conflict (soldiers, tanks, protests etc).

The latter I dub Happy Xmas (War is Over) as an ironic nod to the John Lennon and Yoko Ono Christmas song. A not terribly subtle reference to the fact that when I began this project with the occupation of Iraq at its height and ongoing strife in occupied Palestine, war was far from over.

Over the last few years these posts have
become harder to put together. The world really did seem to be becoming more peaceful.

It doesn't feel like that this year. With the brutal Syrian civil war grinding on, the rise of ISIS, continuing conflict in Israel-Palestine and simmering tensions in Ukraine things look to be going downhill.

Perhaps this is just a question of perception. I do think there is something to Steven Pinker's argument that the world is generally, on average, becoming less violent. But that will be small consolation to those suffering this Christmas.

Closer to home, the government continues it's assault on the working class under the banner of austerity. This is unlikely to change next year even in the (unlikely) event of a Labour victory at the General Election.

The left, meanwhile, is nowhere to be seen. For whatever reasons it is in abeyance and in no position to exert any real influence on national politics. (The betrayal of the local government pay strike earlier this year hasn't helped.)

It is tempting to hope for some spontaneous uprising. Nobody could have predicted in Russia in December 1916 what would happen the next year. This is true, but it misses a fundamental point.

Apparently spontaneous activity is rarely genuinely spontaneous. It is usually the product of long-standing political activity. Just because history doesn't record the day-to-day organisation of political movements doesn't reduce it's importance.

The simple reality is that this sort of activity has largely ceased in the UK. Much of the infrastructure on which it previously relied has now gone. It will take a lot of effort to rebuild it.

So there's a lot to be getting on with in 2015...

Happy Christmas, Chrismukkah, Dies Natalis Solis Invicti, Duckmass, Festivus, Hannukah, Hogmany, Holiday, HumanLight, Koruchun, Kwanza, Marxmas, New Year, Saturnalia, Winter Solstice, Winterval, Xmas, Yalda and/or Yule! (Other holidays are available. Probably.)

Previous years: 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005, 2004

Labels: Anti-war, Christmas, Iraq, Israel-Palestine, Syria, the cuts, Unions, Weirdness

Previous years: 2006, 2007,2008

Labels: Afghanistan, Anti-war, Christmas, Israel-Palestine

Happy Xmas (War is Over) 2007

Um Salomona, West Bank

Baghdad, Iraq

Kabul, Afghanistan

Labels: Afghanistan, Christmas, Imperialism, Iraq, Israel-Palestine, War on Terror

"I am the law!"

This is pretty shocking, even for a bitter, old anarchist like me. What was it N.W.A. used to say?

Labels: Bloody Students, Israel-Palestine, Notts, Police, Repression

What happens next?

It's almost the end of the year, so what better time to stick my neck out and make largely baseless/self-evident assertions about what's going to happen in the coming year?

Firstly, the situation in Iraq is going to continue to deteriorate, but the US and UK will not withdraw. It's possible that the occupying forces may increasingly be able to retreat to their barracks, as control is handed to Iraqi prixies, but this is far from guaranteed. Even if this does take place, the widespread criminal violence (kidnappings etc.) and burdgeoning civil war will go on, possibly extending to Iraqi Kurdistan which has hitherto remained relatively peaceful.

Afghanistan will in all likelihood suffer a similar threat. Having re-emerged as a major threat over the past year, the "neo-Taliban" are unlikely to disappear anytime soon. Again it's hard to imagine a US/UK withdrawal, although a steadily rising death toll amongst British and American forces may weaken support for the war.

In Palestine there's little sign that the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, caused by extended Israeli closures and international sanctions, is going to be resolved anytime soon. While the "international community" have suggested that sanctions will be lifted once the Hamas government are removed from power, Mahmoud Abbas' calls for new elections may backfire. If Hamas decide to boycott them, then they'll have little legitimacy in the eyes of the Palestinian population and if Hamas do decide to run, it's entirely possible they'll win again, perhaps even more convincingly. Either way, I fear we're a long way from stability in the Occupied Territories, let alone a serious Israeli-Palestinian settlement.

The conflict in Darfur will continue, inspite of the peace deal between some rebel groups and the government in Khartoum. While we may see a UN presence in the region, I don't think the kind of large scale western intervention which some liberals support is anymore likely next year than it has been over the last few. Perhaps the most worrying trend visible in the Darfur situation, is its transformation into a regional conflagration incorporating local conflicts in neighbouring Chad and the Central African Republic. If this continues, as seems likely, it will serve to make any peace deal all the more complicated to acheive.

On a slightly more positive note, I continue to believe a major assault on Iran is unlikely. The US and UK might well like to attack the country, but bit off more than they could chew in Iraq and will find themselves under increasing pressure in Afghanistan. Similarly, the Hezbollah-Israel conflict of last August will surely have discouraged the more hawkish Israelis. No doubt western powers will try to use the recently established UN sanctions regime to put pressure on Ahmadinejad. They may even supplement this approach with covert action, perhaps through the Islamist-Marxist People's Mujahedin, who have previously received US support, despite being designated a "Foreign Terrorist Organisation," by the US State Department. If we keep looking for the big attack or even an invasion, we may miss these smaller and less obvious interventions.

Back in Blighty I think it's safe to say we're going to see the attack on our civil liberties continue. The introduction of ID cards will begin in earnest with 69 interrogation centres being opened sometime in 2007. After calls from senior police officers for bans on flag burning, and the power to proscribe chants as well slogans on placards, banners and headbands, I'd be less than surprised if at least some of these suggestions found their way into legislation over the coming year. Even children won't escape this, with the expansion of fingerprinting in schools and the establishment of the Children's Index.

As pessimistic as the foregoing sounds, it isn't all going to be bad. I promise. It's just that bad things are easier to predict with any degree of certainty. We do know that by this time next year, Blair will be gone, even if we're not entirely sure when he's planning on going (place your bets here), so at least there's that to look forward to. I also believe that none of the foregoing is inevitable. History shows that if people get themselves organised in sufficient numbers, governments have to sit up and pay attention. (On which note I predict the Save the NHS campaign is going to be one of the big movements of next year.) The future really is in our hands. I just wish we didn't seem so butter fingered.

Labels: Afghanistan, Darfur, Iran, Iraq, Israel-Palestine

NVDA Consistent With International Law After All Admits HRW

Human Rights Watch (HRW) seem to have realised how stupid their press release about Palestinian non-violent resistance (which I laid into last Thursday) was and have released the following mea culpa (via):

We regret that our press release below (“OPT: Civilians Must Not Be Used to Shield Homes Against Military Attacks”) gave many readers the impression that we were criticizing civilians for engaging in nonviolent resistance. This was not our intention. It is not the policy of the organization to criticize non-violent resistance or any other form of peaceful protest, including civilians defending their homes. Rather, our focus is on the behavior of public officials and military commanders because they have responsibilities under international law to protect civilians.

It has also become clear to us that we erred in assessing the main incident described in the press release. We said that the planned IDF attack on the house of a military commander in the Popular Resistance Committee, Muhammadwail Barud, fell within the purview of the law regulating the conduct of hostilities during armed conflict. We criticized Barud for reportedly urging civilians to assemble near the house in order to prevent the attack, in apparent violation of that law. Our focus was not on the civilians who assembled, their state of mind, or their behavior (such as whether they willingly assembled or not), but on Barud for risking the lives of civilians.

We have since concluded that we were wrong, on the basis of the available evidence, to characterize the IDF’s planned destruction of the house as an act of war. If the planned attack against the house – a three-story building housing three families - was, in fact, an administrative action by the Israeli government aimed at punishing a militant for his alleged activities, the law regulating the conduct of hostilities during armed conflict would not apply and could not be violated...

While this admission is to be commended, I don't think it takes anything away from my fundamental point. Note that they would have stood by their argument had the IDF's action been an "act of war," even if all other facts were unchanged. Later in the same article they state explicitly that whether the actions of "human shields" is voluntary or not is irrelevant, provided the question arises in a situation where the "laws of war" apply. This is problematic: where does it leave the likes of the International Solidarity Movement (ISM) who seek to intervene non-violently in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to protect Palestinians?

It is also interesting to note, that HRW apparently see no disjuncture in juxtaposing an example where civilian women voluntarily went to aid Hamas militants cornered in a mosque after two days of fighting, with an instance when "the IDF blindfolded six civilians, including two minors, and forced them to stand in front of soldiers who took over civilian homes during a raid in northern Gaza." HRW's phrasing implies that these are in some sense comparable, which is frankly laughable. HRW seem to believe that people are not entitled, or perhaps not able, to make choices which put their own lives at risk. Such matters, they suggest implicitly, are the sole responsibility of their leaders. Hence, my original point about the denial of agency seems to be borne out.

Labels: Israel-Palestine

From Kosovo to Gaza

In From Kosovo to Kabul, David Chandler argues that human rights discourse conceives of the human subject as passive, an inherently undemocratic idea, as it undermines the conception of active agency on which participation in the political process is predicated. In the place of popular action as the driving force for political change, this view inserts elite, top-down reform and even, in the most extreme cases, humanitarian intervention.

In many respects, this is a controversial view. Human rights in many respects has become the prevailing ideology of our age and one which goes largely unquestioned. A recent article by Jonathan Cook provides an insightful example of this aspect of the discourse playing out. Back in November, a number of Palestinians organised themselves to protect homes about to be the target of Israeli air strikes. At the time, I argued this was a positive step, a conclusion Cook seems to concur with. However, as Cook points out, Human Rights Watch (HRW) aren't so keen.

HRW argue that "it is a war crime to seek to use the presence of civilians to render certain points or areas immune from military operations," even "where the object of attack is not a legitimate military target." Cook suggests that their interpretation of international law may be wrong, noting that popular resistance to oppression has always been a dangerous venture in which civilians risk serious injury and even death. "Responsibility for those deaths must fall on those doing the oppressing, not those resisting, particularly when they are employing non-violent means. On HRW’s interpretation, Mahatma Gandhi and Nelson Mandela would be war criminals."

HRW's Middle East director Sarah Leah Whitson opines, "There is no excuse for calling civilians to the scene of a planned attack... knowingly asking civilians to stand in harm’s way is unlawful." Note that there is no suggestion of compulsion here. Civilians have been "called" or "asked," but certainly not forced. However, having implicitly accepted the conception of a passive human subject, Whitson seems unable to accept that people may have actually chosen to participate in these actions of their own volition, with full knowledge of the dangers. Once individuals have been stripped of agency it becomes impossible to understand their actions without reference to their leaders.

Clearly, one doesn't want to throw the baby out with the bath water. Many of the abuses which human rights organisations oppose are worthy of condemnation and the struggles to end them deserve widespread support. By denying the agency of their victims, such organisations can only call for top-down reform. For what it's worth, I agree with Chandler suggestion that what is needed is for the active subject to be re-emphasised, collective politics to be rejuvenated and for the maximisation of "people's capacity for autonomy and collective rational decision-making, a capacity denied by the proponents of ethical regulation from above."

Labels: Israel-Palestine