Statement by Laura Garza, Socialist Workers Party candidate for U.S. Senate from California, Nov. 21.
The systematic slaughter of 1,200 Jews by Hamas, backed by the counterrevolutionary regime in Tehran Oct. 7 marks a watershed in world politics, accelerating the crisis of the capitalist world order and forcing governments and all political forces to take a side. At issue is Jew-hatred — a deadly feature of the imperialist epoch that the working class needs to fight.
Workers and our unions have a vital interest in exposing Jew-hatred and defeating the reactionary forces that utilize it as a weapon here and worldwide.
The working class is the one social force that is capable of ending Jew-hatred for all time, by building a party that can lead the fight to replace capitalist rule with workers power, overturn the exploitation of the vast majority by the propertied few, and on that basis set out to lead the struggle to end all oppression.
Some union officials, like the leaderships of the United Electrical Workers and the American Postal Workers Union, put aside Hamas’ slaughter to focus on calls on the Israeli government to agree to a permanent cease-fire. This has nothing to do with the pause in the fighting Nov. 23 to facilitate the release of hostages. Hamas leaders have made clear that as long as they exist, there will be more pogroms until all Jews are dead or driven out of the region.
Calls for a cease-fire are against the interests of all the toilers, including Palestinians in Gaza who suffer under Hamas’ dictatorial rule. The reactionary Islamists use the misery they themselves have caused to get funding from the U.N. and elsewhere. A cease-fire would give a respite to Hamas so it can rearm and regroup, with backing from Tehran, and seek the destruction of Israel.
As the capitalist crisis worldwide deepens and revolutionary struggles by working people grow, sections of the capitalist rulers will turn to fascist thugs to try to crush the unions. Jew-hatred will be their banner. This is the lesson of the Hitler regime.
Hamas’ torture, rape and murder of Jews and the continuing abuse of the over 200 hostages they seized is abhorrent to tens of millions of working people.
Fighting Jew-hatred is a life-or-death question for the unions. They should publicize and join actions against Jew-hatred and in defense of Israel’s right to exist as a refuge for Jews, like the recent demonstration of almost 300,000 in Washington, D.C. They should join in defense of Jewish students under attack at a growing number of U.S. universities.
That is the road to building a labor movement that can defend itself against attacks by the bosses, their government and the ultra-rightist thugs they will unleash. This is the road to taking political power and championing the interests of all the oppressed.