John Clarke, former major organizer of the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP), recently posted on Facebook the following:
I see voices raised to the effect that massive rallies aren’t enough to force Western leaders to stay the hand of the Israeli killing machine. In my view, this is a consideration that must be taken seriously but it’s necessary to think through how to advance it.Certainly support for Israel is a strategic priority and the systems that are devoted to this must be challenged and disrupted if we are to prevail. However, I’d make two points. Firstly, let’s properly and fully acknowledge the huge importance of having so many people ready to come onto the streets in solidarity with the Palestinians. This is an enormous gain and a precious resource we can build upon.Secondly, more disruptive approaches are needed but they will fall far short if they are simply the defiant gestures of a disconnected handful. We are seeing train stations occupied in the UK. In Australia and the US, Israeli shipping lines are being targeted. Significant sized office occupations have taken place in Canada.The point is to take the growing sense of anger and build confidence. A fighting mass movement is needed and the prospects for building it are enormously promising at the present time.
I have a couple of comments to make on the above, one negative and the other positive. To claim, as Clarke does, that
Firstly, let’s properly and fully acknowledge the huge importance of having so many people ready to come onto the streets in solidarity with the Palestinians. This is an enormous gain and a precious resource we can build upon.
is, I believe, an exaggeration. There were many people protesting against the murder of George Floyd, and yet the movement towards the abolition of the police and defunding the police petered out. Protests in themselves should not be seen as “an enormous gain” unless they can be sustained or unless their results can form the basis for further, cumulative results.
However, on the positive side, such mass protests do have the potential to form ” precious resource we can build upon.” The refusal of some workers and unions to ship material to Israel, for example, if it can be linked to such protests and be linked across countries, can indeed form a threat to both Israel’s efforts and to the oppressive actions of the United States and Canadian governments (and other capitalist governments).
When political issues such as the current genocide in Gaza and the West Bank are linked to the daily life of producing and maintaining our lives that there arises a greater potential for permanent advances towards the abolition of the class power of employers and oppressive policies of governments that express their interests.
The Abolitionary 