#OccupiedPalestine #Australia #BDS
"Kosher and Unkosher Terrorism
To ensure as Shakespeare writes, 'that this foul deed shall smell above the earth,' the Australian government has taken every possible step to weaponize the grisly Bondi Beach killing committed by two psychopaths, allegedly linked to the Islamic State- to punish the Boycott and Divestment and the Palestinian solidarity groups. These are peaceful movements with no connection to fundamentalist ideology or violence. Yet it proved convenient to 'cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war' against the undesirable oppressed, who have no link whatsoever to the assailants.
Although the Australian government itself does not classify the attack as terrorism but a hate crime, it has nonetheless cravenly embraced Netanyahu’s framing of a world divided between those who 'seek light' and those who 'promote darkness.' Under this logic or lack of it, protesters opposing Israel’s genocide in Gaza are cast as purveyors of 'unkosher terrorism,' while Israel’s mass killing-described by The Lancet, (October 2024), as having claimed over 200,000 Palestinian lives, half of them children-is reframed as kosher terrorism,' justified as self-defense and carried out in the name of enlightenment. In normal times one would have laughed at such a grotesque jest, but in the era of genocide, laughter is no more an act of resistance but an expression of one’s helplessness.
The framing has emboldened the New South Wales premier, Chris Minns, who is now trying to pass a legislation banning the peaceful marches and the slogan of 'Globalize the Intifada' -a call for global resistance to genocide- for up to three months. For him, it was an opportunity-a manna fallen from heaven- which he seized with both hands. His fascist tendencies and anti-Palestinian biases were evident, which he openly expressed during the last two years–when marches were regularly held all over Australia including Sydney. Now through blatant suppression, he wants 'to organize a peaceful summer', but does he know that 'organization for peace,' Marcuse says, 'is different from organization for war; the institutions which served the struggle for existence cannot serve the pacification of existence. Life as an end is qualitatively different from life as means?'
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Two factors explain this crackdown. First, the obvious: the Australian ruling class is wedded to Zionism- a settler-colonial project- not because of its intimate relations but due to the identical nature of their birth, for both are the products of a settler-colonial project. The Australian ruling class belongs to the same category as that of the Zionist entity, with a difference that the former has finally recognized the territorial rights of the First Nation. Second, the Palestinian movement is challenging the entire bourgeois structure- the prevailing economic system. Even demanding a ceasefire is an act of resistance. It’s contradictory to the interests of the military-industrial complex-the corporate sector that controls the means of production and destruction."
https://dailytimes.com.pk/1425613/kosher-and-unkosher-terrorism/
