SENZA CENSURA n.8
Italy, june 2002

Editorial

The Zionist entity is been trying to stop the Intifadah Al-Aqsa using all kind of violence against the Palestinians every day. That isn't but the continuation of the genocide war against this people that Israel, the watchdog of Western capitalism and especially of US capitalism in the Middle East, started about 60 years ago. However, in spite of the public statements of the speakers and representatives of the imperialist governments, a temporary solution, pacific or not, of the conflict in Palestine is now a crucial and unavoidable condition to deepen again, by the adequate political and military means, the intervention of the imperialist powers in the area.
The new centrality of the Palestinian question in the Middle East "fault" puts also an end to the dreams of pacification of this area, based on the Euro-American joint management (poorly collapsed in the recent summit which took place in Madrid) and points out two "historical" causes of its recent outburst.
The first one is an objective cause: through the world war against terrorism Israel aims at regaining and justifying its role of watchdog of Western imperialism also trying to carve out a niche of independent political management for itself. The Zionist entity has been doing it for some years (see for instance the bilateral agreements about security with Turkey) although this effort also highlights the "historical crisis" of its role, compelling it to expose itself both on the domestic and international level
directly or indirectly using the Israel communities living in the Western countries.
The second cause is of the subjective type: the radical and strong
resistance of the Palestinian people and its most representative political organisations. Here, in spite of the effort of the Western powers (US and EU) to create in Palestine a compatible opposition and leadership, it's evident that a new leadership able to guide the Palestinian revolution can't but come out of the new Intifadah and of the struggle (with all necessary means) of all the organisations of the Palestinian resistance.
That's why the events within the main organisation of the Palestinian left-wing, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, are typical.
In spite of the limitations and pressures of the Palestinian National Authority, leftist organisations are again deep-rooted in the Palestinian society as they were able to express a military and political potential adequate to the present conflict, increasing their authority among the masses.
These events (and also the recent inclusion of the Palestinian left-wing organisations among the "terrorist" organisations defined by the EU) point out the strategy and the true goals of the so-called "Oslo process", that today it's better called "the world war against terrorism". It's also evident that all this process is strongly connected with the process of the centralisation of powers in the imperialist States and the definition of new hierarchies within the imperialist system. The US, for instance, after the
Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (1996) has recently passed the USA Patriot Act, a law that gives to the police special powers in point of telephone interceptions and expulsions, without a lawsuit, of illegal and regular immigrants.
This kind of process takes place in the European countries and also in Italy. However, the significance and the international influence of the Palestinian question on the radical leftist organisations of the Western world leap to the eye, while the liberation of Southern Lebanon from the Israel army by the Hezbollah has demonstrated that imperialist plans can be defeated. It's not by chance that in our country there is a massive mobilisation in support of the Palestinian resistance (as in the demonstration in Rome last spring), while new and old reformists have chosen not to support the Intifadah Al-Aqsa just when the Palestinian resistance needed more than ever an international support.
Also the issue of the 13 Palestinian activists who were expelled after the siege of the Nativity basilica has shown the true significance of the intervention of reformism and neo-reformism in the movement in support of the Intifadah: they only want to use their intervention within the diplomatic and "humanitarian" activity of the imperialist powers in the area. An activity which aims to get rid of the main organisations of the Palestinian Resistance, included the left wing of Al Fatah.
On the other hand, these events have definitely shown that the radical left of our country has not yet understood how the Palestinian resistance could be an effective "engine" for the political regroupment and unity of the anti-capitalist and antimperialist organisations in the imperialist States.
We have pointed out that for a long time: in fact a defeat of the
Palestinian revolution could negatively influence also the conditions of the working classes in the imperialist metropolis, being the premise for intensifying the attack against the proletariat.
Criticising the causes and the foreseeable results of the Oslo process, our comrade Patrizia Borin stated some years ago: "We should remember that the absence, on the international level, of a leftist movement able to truly support the anti-capitalist organisations of the Southern countries had a crucial effect over this historical defeat of the Palestinian people".
That's why the editorial staff of "Senza Censura" has tried to underline the Palestinian question also in this issue, setting it in the context of the immediate perspectives of development of the imperialist intervention in the Middle East (EUROMED) and in other points of crisis of the same area (Turkey).