Decades of U.S. military aid and Israeli occupation created the conditions for the attack on Iran in an unbroken chain of imperial violence.
Originally published in Black Alliance for Peace.
Overnight, the zionist entity of Israel escalated its war of aggression against Iran by launching unprovoked attacks on the Islamic Republic. The notion that a rogue ethnostate that is currently carrying out a genocide believes that it possesses the right to determine which countries can and cannot develop a nuclear weapon is both bizarre and egregious as well as brazenly hypocritical, and further demonstrates that the State of Israel operates firmly within the structures of white âsupremacyâ ideology, colonialism, and imperialism. Iran, like all sovereign nations, has the right to defend itself from aggression and uphold its security in the face of repeated threats and acts of war. This stands in stark contrast to Israel, which operates a settler colonial occupation of Palestine, as well as portions of Lebanon and Syria.
The idea of Israel, the zionist occupation, claiming a moral position is absurd. And the fact that the international community continues to give Israel any credibility is a dereliction of duty and forms a vacuum of morality for all of those who do not stand resolutely against its genocide in Palestine and its attacks on Lebanon, Yemen, Syria, and Iran. Israelâs immunity granted by Western colonial nations is a further reflection of the moral gulf between these states and the vast majority of humankind that subscribes to values that uphold People(s)-Centered Human Rights, self-determination, and dignity.
Israelâs unprovoked attack is another example of the lawlessness that is fully supported by the U.S. The Black Alliance for Peace (BAP) rejects the notion that the U.S. was unaware of this attack. The U.S. had the ability to stop this attack if it was serious about containing Israelâs perpetual war crimes and disregard for international law, which is a major threat to any form of true peace. The combination of Israelâs continued genocidal assaults and ethnic cleansing against the Palestinian people, and its bombings and occupations of portions of the sovereign nations of Syria and Lebanon prove that Israel and the U.S. are the most dangerous nations in the world. Their power must be dismantled.
To conflate Israelâs actions with Jewish values is the height of antisemitism. Zionism, an ideology of white âsupremacy,â must be wholly separated from Judaismâs teachings of justice, human rights, and inclusivity. Israel is no more a âJewish stateâ than the U.S. is a âChristian state.â Both are violent constructs of ethnonationalism. BAP firmly rejects the conflation of Judaism with the barbarism of zionism, just as we denounce the antisemitic trope that equates zionism with Judaism itself.
Israelâs militarism further threatens global stability by spiking the price of oil by 8 percent in one night. This economic shockwave further demonstrates why we must continue linking the devastation of war with the devastation associated with the climate catastrophe that is fueled by capitalist war profiteering interests of fossil fuel cartels and the military industrial complex who both benefit from the Israeli war machine at the expense of human life and the ecosystems necessary to sustain it. Israelâs aggression is capitalismâs credit card with an unlimited spending limit.
History will remember this moment and Israelâs barbaric acts as an indelible and ignominious stain on international âlawâ and cooperation, people(s)-centered human rights and the basic tenets of human dignity.
In Response, BAP Demands that :
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The UN Security Council and European Union impose immediate sanctions and consequences for Israelâs illegal acts, and institute an arms embargo.
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The international community must expel Israel from the United Nations. It has no place among fraternal nations.
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The international community categorically reject Israelâs fraudulent claims to jurisdiction over Iranâs lawful nuclear energy program.
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The IAEA investigate Israelâs unregulated nuclear program with the same rigor applied to others.
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U.S. lawmakers enforce laws prohibiting military aid to human rights violators by cutting off all arms transfers to Israel or face prosecution at the ICC and ICJ for complicity in war crimes.
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The ICC indict and prosecute Israeli and U.S. officials for continued war crimes throughout West Asia and the lawlessness of genocide perpetuated against the Palestinian people.
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All anti-imperialist, anti-war, pro-peace movements and organizations support Iran's right to sovereignty, self-defense, and self-determination against Israelâs murderous aggression.
No Compromise! No Retreat!
The Black Alliance for Peace, Coordinating Committee
Isaac Saney is a Cuba and Black studies specialist and historian at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.
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