Decisive rupture over Syria in Palestinian solidarity movement: the fault line is hating on Jews & Muslims

For so many decades Palestinians stood alone pilloried as terrorists; the solidarity movement was small, fragmented, & not internationally coordinated. After Palestinian groups issued the call for BDS in 2005, there was rapid growth in solidarity around the world & a concrete project to express it in action.

Regrettably, the new movement drew in some who mistook the principles of solidarity & thought their hatred of Jews would fit right in. Even KKK grand poobah David Duke got involved & began putting out videos supporting Palestinians. As a vicious supremacist, his only intention was to find a venue for his hatred of Jews, to feed anti-Semitism & corrupt Palestinian solidarity. He’s a white supremacist & doesn’t give a rat’s ass about Palestinians.

Many activists took on that anti-Jewish crap & explained in no uncertain terms that it had no place in the movement & would not be tolerated. Nor did the detestable likes of David Duke have any place. Much of that talk was silenced & manifest mostly in language & hating on “Israhell.”

Apparently, the necessary education work was insufficient & the haters only went sub rosa. Now the hatred of Jews has merged with the hatred of Muslims along with willful ignorance & is now fully taking its revenge in support among Palestinian supporters for the Assad dictatorship & Syrian & Russian bombing of civilians.

Eva Bartlett, a professional propagandist for Assad, spent time in Gaza getting political credentials. She now leads that current in the Palestinian solidarity movement & speaks of the “NATO/Zionist agenda” in Syria. That current agrees entirely with David Duke & extreme supremacists who also support Assad as a way to destroy Israel–not because it is a colonial project which must be replaced with a democratic secular state where Palestinians & Jews live in harmony–but because they hate Jews.

Journalists like Rania Khalek, Ben Norton, & Max Blumenthal, once known for their coverage of Palestine, have now completely discredited themselves with plagiarisms, reliance on Assad & Russian propagandists, & self-absorbed vituperations against those who call them out for Muslim-hating & war mongering.

Anyone who wants to understand the political nexus between Syria & Israel has mountains of resources to study which expose a history of Syrian treacheries & betrayal of Palestinians. But no anti-Semite is going to do that study because their convictions are based on the hatred of Jews & they will truck with no evidence to the contrary.

As in the antiwar & socialist movements, there is a decisive rupture developing in Palestinian solidarity. On the one hand, it seems devastating because of its impact on Palestinians. On the other hand, it is a necessary political winnowing of the wheat from the chaff. No solidarity movement of such consequence can be solidly built on foundations of social hatred for anyone.