Thu 17 May 2018, 03:55 AM | Posted by editor
LETTER from Tom Smith
My dad was a bricklayer. He was a catholic brought up in a Protestant village. It could have been a Protestant in catholic village for all he cared. He saw the destructive power of sectarianism and workers’ unity and a socialist Britain were his slogans that guided him at the time. And so, in 1934, he was debating with workers who supported the Tories, Liberals, various nationalists and a whole host of other outlooks.
We have to understand he was very young and was not a rounded-out Marxist but, after the Second World War he pondered deeply over experiences and told me later of how he often took a very controversial view of politics that often landed him in an isolated position. One of those was Zionism.
At that time the Jews were under constant attack, not just in Germany but in Poland, Hungary and for that matter Britain. The capitalist press, the Daily Mail, the Express poured out filth like there was no tomorrow. Let’s not forget it was a Tory minister who permitted the blackshirts to march into the East End of London. The Royal family supported Mussolini and later put on the throne a facist king. Obviously not all this was clear in 1934. Dad, however, was always cautious about how to argue against Zionism, given the persecution of Jewish people. So this is what he did.
First, if a Jew wanted to put a Zionist position at a meeting my dad let him. He defended the right ruthlessly of any worker to express a view. However, he argued that Zionism may succeed for as long as the labour movement failed to produce a socialist alternative. After all there were those who would vote Tory if the labour movement failed to consolidate a socialist country.
Only socialism, he argued, could unite all workers. What would be the point of fruitless debate about Zionism when it was vital to promote a socialist programme on any platform you could get?
Capitalism was the enemy, not a person who was looking to other solutions for survival.
Dad even took the view that a failure to achieve socialism would mean that Zionism would be inevitable. Imagine taking that position in 1934. Do not forget that Hitler was hated, amongst workers anyway, as he had atomised the labour movement in that country. Dad had no illusions, as he pointed out to Jews that if Hitler is not overthrown and fascists gained power in the UK, we were all dead.
He produced for me a book which showed what the Nazis would do to Britain which boiled down to jail the trade unionists, murder the Jews, and reach a working accommodation with the rich. He got that in 1946.
Today I say this. If people want to put forward a Zionist view, let them. My dad said that Israel was a permanently armed camp since its foundation in 1948. It is a capitalist country. We must argue for the socialist alternative.
The only way for those suffering in Gaza is workers’ unity and a socialist programme. I would not vote for Hamas, I would vote for a socialist. I would not vote for the variety of opinions on the West Bank, I would vote for a socialist. I would not vote for Hezbollah, I would vote for a socialist. I would not vote for Western oppositional parties, I would vote socialist. I would not vote for the government in Israel, I would vote for a socialist. Only workers with a set of common interests can bring about peace. I have long ago ditched the idea of a so-called two-state programme as utterly meaningless
One last point, these are only notes and not a rounded-out analysis: if we had a socialist Palestine I would, as now, recognise the right of the state of Israel to exist. Imagine a socialist Europe. There would still be borders, French, German and British. Borders will only be given up when the workers of those countries demand they are given up. Israel should be given the same rights as anyone else.
