| Alpha | | Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2004 1:18 am Post subject: Naomi Klein: The Likud doctrine |
| ----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, September 10, 2004 1:28 PM
Subject: Naomi Klein: The Likud doctrine
"There has indeed been a dramatic rise in religious fundamentalism in
the Muslim world. The problem is that under the Likud doctrine there
is no space to ask why this is happening. We are not allowed to point
out that fundamentalism breeds in failed states, where warfare has
systematically targeted civilian infrastructure, allowing the mosques
to start taking responsibility for everything from education to
garbage collection. It has happened in Gaza, Grozny and Sadr City.
Sharon says terrorism is an epidemic that "has no borders, no
fences", but this is not the case. Terrorism thrives within the
illegitimate borders of occupation and dictatorship; it festers
behind security walls put up by imperial powers; it crosses those
borders and climbs those fences to explode inside the countries
responsible for, or complicit in, occupation and domination."
The Likud doctrine
First Bush, and now Putin, have picked up lessons for their wars on
terror from Israel's campaign against the Palestinians
Friday September 10, 2004
The Guardian
by Naomi Klein
http://www.guardian.co.uk/russia/article/0,2763,1301504,00.html
Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, is so fed-up with being
grilled over his handling of the Beslan catastrophe that he lashed
out at foreign journalists on Monday. "Why don't you meet Osama bin
Laden, invite him to Brussels or the White House and engage in
talks?" he demanded, adding that: "No one has a moral right to tell
us to talk to child-killers."
Fortunately for Putin, there is still one place where he is shielded
from the critics: Israel. On Monday, Ariel Sharon welcomed the
Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, for a meeting about
strengthening ties in the fight against terror. "Terror has no
justification, and it is time for the free, decent, humanistic world
to unite and fight this terrible epidemic," Sharon said.
There is little to argue with there. The essence of terrorism is the
deliberate targeting of innocents to further political goals. Any
claims its perpetrators make to fighting for justice are morally
bankrupt, and lead directly to the barbarity of Beslan: a carefully
laid plan to slaughter hundreds of children.
Yet sympathy alone does not explain the outpourings of solidarity for
Russia coming from Israeli politicians this week. An unnamed Israeli
official was quoted as saying that Russians "understand now that what
they have is not a local terror problem but part of the global
Islamic terror threat". The underlying message is unequivocal: Russia
and Israel are engaged in the very same war, one not against
Palestinians demanding their right to statehood, or against Chechens
demanding their independence, but against "the global Islamic terror
threat". Israel, as the elder statesman, is claiming the right to set
the rules of war.
Unsurprisingly, the rules are the same ones Sharon uses against the
Intifada in the occupied territories. His starting point is that
Palestinians, though they may make political demands, are actually
only interested in the annihilation of Israel. This goes beyond the
state's standard refusal to negotiate with terrorists - it is a
conviction rooted in an insistent pathologising, not just of
extremists but of the entire "Arab mind".
From this basic belief several others follow. First, all Israeli
violence against Palestinians is an act of self-defence, necessary to
the country's survival. Second, anyone who questions Israel's
absolute right to erase the enemy is themselves an enemy. This
applies to the UN, other world leaders, journalists and peaceniks.
Putin has clearly been taking notes, but it's not the first time
Israel has played this mentoring role. Three years ago, on September
12 2001, Binyamin Netanyahu, Israeli finance minister, was asked how
the previous day's terror attacks would affect relations between
Israel and the US. "It's very good," he said. "Well, not very good,
but it will generate immediate sympathy." The attack, Netanyahu
explained, would "strengthen the bond between our two peoples,
because we've experienced terror over so many decades".
Common wisdom has it that after 9/11, a new era of geo-politics was
ushered in, defined by what is usually called the Bush doctrine: pre-
emptive wars, attacks on terrorist infrastructure (read: entire
countries), an insistence that all the enemy understands is force. In
fact, it would be more accurate to call this rigid worldview the
Likud doctrine. What happened on September 11 2001 is that the Likud
doctrine, previously targeted against Palestinians, was picked up by
the most powerful nation on earth and applied on a global scale. Call
it the Likudisation of the world: the real legacy of 9/11.
Let me be absolutely clear: by Likudisation I do not mean that key
members of the Bush administration are working for the interests of
Israel at the expense of US interests. What I mean is that on
September 11, George Bush went looking for a political philosophy to
guide him in his role as "war president". He found that philosophy in
the Likud doctrine, handed to him ready-made by the ardent Likudniks
ensconced in the White House. In the three years since, the Bush
White House has applied this logic with chilling consistency to its
global war on terror - complete with the pathologising of the "Muslim
mind". It was the guiding philosophy in Afghanistan and Iraq, and may
well extend to Iran and Syria. It's not simply that Bush sees
America's role as protecting Israel from a hostile Arab world. It's
that he has cast the US in the same role in which Israel casts
itself, facing the same threat. In this narrative, the US is fighting
a never-ending battle for its survival against irrational forces that
seek its total extermination.
And now the Likudisation narrative has spread to Russia. In that same
meeting with journalists, Putin made it clear he sees the drive for
Chechen independence as the spearhead of a strategy by Chechen
Islamists, helped by foreign fundamentalists, to undermine Russia by
stirring up its Muslim population. "There are Muslims along the
Volga, in Tatarstan and Bashkortostan ... This is all about Russia's
territorial integrity," he said. It used to be just Israel that was
worried about being pushed into the sea.
There has indeed been a dramatic rise in religious fundamentalism in
the Muslim world. The problem is that under the Likud doctrine there
is no space to ask why this is happening. We are not allowed to point
out that fundamentalism breeds in failed states, where warfare has
systematically targeted civilian infrastructure, allowing the mosques
to start taking responsibility for everything from education to
garbage collection. It has happened in Gaza, Grozny and Sadr City.
Sharon says terrorism is an epidemic that "has no borders, no
fences", but this is not the case. Terrorism thrives within the
illegitimate borders of occupation and dictatorship; it festers
behind security walls put up by imperial powers; it crosses those
borders and climbs those fences to explode inside the countries
responsible for, or complicit in, occupation and domination.
Sharon is not the commander-in-chief of the war on terror; that
dubious honour stays with George Bush. But on the anniversary of
9/11, he deserves to be recognised as this disastrous campaign's
guru, a trigger-happy Yoda for all wannabe Luke Skywalkers out there,
training for their epic battles of good vs evil.
If we want to see where the Likud doctrine leads, we need only follow
the guru home, to Israel, a country paralysed by fear, embracing
policies of extrajudicial assassination and illegal settlement, and
in denial about the brutality it commits daily. It is a nation
surrounded by enemies and desperate for friends - a category it
narrowly defines as those who ask no questions, while offering the
same moral amnesty in return. That glimpse of our collective future
is the only lesson the world needs to learn from Sharon.
www.nologo.org
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