[Marxism] Obama, racism

[abu hartal]

"With all due respect to this position, which we recognize as legitimate, and to those who believe this, we feel it is a pipe dream to expect that Obama will ever change after being elected on a platform of unquestioning support for Israel and its oppression of Palestinians. He will have huge debts of gratitude to the Jewish community, and particularly to his very pro-Israeli political endorsers as well as huge monetary debts to pro-Israeli contributors, that will keep him from ever looking honestly at what Israel is doing to the Palestinians and particularly from ever speaking out forthrightly against this oppression."

So write the CIA analysts. 

First, note that they have dropped Gonzalez's outrageous claim that Obama plans on retaining 60,000 troops on Iraqi soil. They can only insinuate such a much reduced charge now. 

If one reads Obama's comments to Jewish voters in Ohio, it's clear that his strategy is to turn Jewish voters against AIPAC's security strategy of occupying Iraq and attacking Iran while calling for a Palestine which is contiguous (an improvement over the other electable candidates, I believe). It does follow from Obama seeking Jewish community support that he will be committed to Israel's security, but he believes that such policies are in Israel's secuity interests. 

So he is challenging to some very limited extent what is being done in the name of Israel's security. So we should not make the rather dubious assumption that the Jewish community gives its support for Israel's expansionist and colonial policies. It should be possible to enjoy substantial Jewish community support while challenging a whole host of Israeli policies.  Obama has made it clear that his courting the Jewish vote does not mean that he is proclaiming a refusal to criticize what the state of Israel has done wrong. He said exactly that in his most substantial comments to date, but the CIA analysts do not say anything about his Ohio comments. 

The much hated Samantha Power has spoken of human rights violations in Jenin (I don't know whether any camp has made such a statement) while also saying that Israel's tactics in response Hizbollah were counterproductive. One of Obama's advisors (Malley?) also puts some blame on Israel for the limits and failures of the Oslo peace process. 

But Obama however has already put some distance between himself and Brzeznski due to how reviled the latter is by AIPAC. 

So there is really no good grounds for confidence that Obama will challenge Israel on behalf of Palestinian self-determination and with substantial Jewish community support. 

I don't see the point however of casting a protest vote on behalf of Nader and jeopardizing the possible victory of Obama who may prove a bit more sensititive outside political pressure on which the Palestinian fate depends. 

But there is no good reason to believe that Obama will not silence himself in regards to Palestinian rights even if does withdraw from Iraq and end the saber rattling against Iran. 

AH




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