Excerpts - Ultimately, the Western left’s quixotic search for a secular progressive alternative to Hamas overlooks a simple fact: at this particular historical juncture, the political forces that are still holding onto and leading a resistance agenda are not of the secular left.
Hamas is an easy scarecrow here. It is an Islamist political group that both centers a politics of defiance and pushes a social agenda that seeks to reconstitute the Palestinian subject. Critics of resistance can easily point to shortcomings in Hamas’s socioeconomic outlook or deride its “socially regressive” agenda. But they aren’t really interested in undermining Hamas’s social agenda. In truth, they want to undermine or distance themselves from the form of resistance that Hamas chose to pursue. But many of Hamas’s critics offer nothing in their alliance system, in their forms of struggle, or even in their intellectual output that could match its work to accumulate power in the Gaza Strip and its opening of a strategic pandora’s box that has overflowed and deformed the colonial regime, providing a historical moment that includes among its many possibilities the potential for Palestinian liberation. Hamas isn’t going anywhere in Palestinian politics. It is an energetic political entity that has astutely learned from the mistakes of its predecessor, the PLO, both in warfare and negotiations. It has meticulously invested its intellectual, political, and military resources into understanding Israel and its psychic center of gravity. Whether we like it or not, Hamas is now the primary force leading the Palestinian struggle. The left must confront this basic fact. One cannot ground solidarity with Palestine on a politics that dismisses, overlooks, or excludes Hamas. This stance fails to grasp the complexities and contradictions inherent in the Palestinian struggle. In doing so, the left overlooks the dividing line between collaboration and resistance to its peril. The Left must confront this basic fact. One cannot claim solidarity with Palestine and dismiss, overlook, or exclude Hamas. Full - https://mondoweiss.net/2024/05/the-question-of-hamas-and-the-left/ -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Groups.io Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#30712): https://groups.io/g/marxmail/message/30712 Mute This Topic: https://groups.io/mt/106591523/21656 -=-=- POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. #4 Do not exceed five posts a day. -=-=- Group Owner: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://groups.io/g/marxmail/leave/8674936/21656/1316126222/xyzzy [[email protected]] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
