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Restructuring capitalist parties in the European Community

Reflections on the recent EU elections

Hari Kumar
26/07/2024

The recent June election results across the European Union (EU) were predictable and reflect the current needs of EU capitalism. The ongoing crisis forces changes for the ruling class, and restructuring of their ruling parties. The problem for the ruling class is that a significant majority no longer trust or have faith in their rulers. Their traditional or standard parties ruling class parties have increasingly little appeal or ability to fool the working class and petit bourgeoisie. These standard parties are in two broad wings. Historically they were tailored to disguise this reality and to appeal to differing fractions of working people.

One wing of standard parties are the conservative parties basing an appeal to the petit bourgeoisie. In contrast, the standard ‘left’ parties form the other wing. They adopted pseudo-socialist slogans in social-democratic parties. They aimed their appeal at the more advanced section of the population, the working class – or those who have seen through – to a certain extent – the contradictions of classes within capitalism.

The increasing loss of credibility of both wings of the traditional parties forces re-structuring. They adopt new facades, with accommodations with openly neo-fascist parties.

This article focuses primarily on Europe, but its analysis applies to other capitalist countries.

What was the crisis faced by the capitalists over the prior ten years?

In Europe, there was a profound contraction in economic growth in the Eurozone. This is seen in the Gross Domestic Product.

from: The Michael Roberts Blog; June 22, 2024: “A soft landing or curate’s egg?” at: https://thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2024/06/19/a-soft-landing-or-curates-egg/

It was especially noticeable in Germany, long seen as ‘the locomotive’ of Europe.

Attempts to deal with this are being made. The more clear-sighted of the European ruling classes, recognise the need for more centralisation and pooling of resources as:

Europe’s share of the global economy is shrinking, and fears are deepening that the continent can no longer keep up with the United States and China. “We are too small,” said Enrico Letta, a former Italian prime minister who recently delivered a report on the future of the single market to the European Union.
For more than a decade, Europe has been falling behind on several measures of competitiveness, including capital investments, research and development, and productivity growth.
“Our organization, decision-making and financing are designed for ‘the world of yesterday’ — pre-Covid, pre-Ukraine, preconflagration in the Middle East, pre-return of great power rivalry,” said Mario Draghi, a former president of the European Central Bank who is heading a study of Europe’s competitiveness.”

Patricia Cohen; “Europe Has Fallen Behind the U.S. and China. Can It Catch Up?” NYT June 5, 2024

But equally some of the smaller nations within the EU fear being swallowed

“But many smaller nations, including Ireland, Romania and Sweden, have opposed ceding power to Brussels or changing their laws, worried about putting their national financial industries at a disadvantage.
Civil society organizations are also concerned about the concentration of power.”

Patricia Cohen; “Europe Has Fallen Behind the U.S. and China. Can It Catch Up?” NYT June 5, 2024.

Naturally the crisis of profits has been ‘carried’ by lower worker wages:

The depression of the working class standards of life are evident throughout the EU. More than 1/5th of the EU population is at risk of poverty.

No wonder the working class of these countries have lost hope in the ‘standard parties’.

The recent European elections June 2024

The European elections were unusually significant on this occasion. The major feature of the election results was the very large boost in votes for the neo-fascist right wing.

The very two countries that in latter years drove both economic and political decision-making – France and Germany were particularly affected. However across the EU, the “centrists” remain in the majority:

Casting ballots in 27 countries, voters largely backed centrists in European Parliament elections, but far-right parties made serious inroads in France and Germany… centrist political groups were poised to … still maintain a clear majority of more than 400 seats in the 720-seat assembly.

Matina Stevis-Gridneff “In E.U. Elections, the Center Holds, but the Far Right Still Wreaks Havoc”; NYT June 9, 2024.

The coded language of the “centrists” urges “rightists” to unite with them:

Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission and a member of the European conservatives… issued an open call to other centrists to work with her to guarantee “a strong and effective Europe.”

Stevis-Gridneff; Ibid.

German votes swing to neo-fascism

In Germany the fascist Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party was formed in 2013, and after 2021 was the fifth-largest party in Germany. It was founded by former members of the Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CSU) based in Bavaria but with close links to the CDU. In these 2024 elections it surged past the Social Democrats who hold the Chancellorship in the Ampel (traffic light) coalition. The AfD placed second overall across all parties:

“The result placed AfD behind the mainstream conservative Christian Democratic Union, but ahead of Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats, making it the country’s second-ranking party.”

Stevis-Gridneff Ibid; NYT June 9, 2024.

“Though the resulting gains – the AfD jumped to 16% from 11% in 2019 – were overall more modest than looked probable in the spring, across east Germany the far right came out ahead of all other parties.”

Mariam Lau, et al: EU elections: earthquake in France and a rightward policy lurch? Our panel responds”: Guardian 10 Jun 2024.

In Germany there is a split across north to south of the country:

From: Anteil der Stimmen für SPD, Grüne und FDP bei der Europawahl 2024. Quelle: Bundeswahlleiterin Kartenmaterial: © OSM; cited by Adam Tooze: June 14, Chartbook: “#293 “Nope!” or the political void at the heart of Europe’s supposed safe haven – Germany after the European elections.

This division follows the Cold War division of Germany into two. Former East Germany led by the revisionist pseudo-socialists, is particularly swayed by neo-fascism. Following the 1988 reunification of Germany the standard of living in the East of Germany remained even more depressed than that of the remaining proletariat of Germany. Hence the appeal of the fascist parties. The usual attacks of workign class living standards was led by the Social Democratic Party (SPD).

While German capital was slow to adopt deregulation and neo-liberalism, after 2010 it went all in with the so-called ‘Hartz Reforms”. These were effected by the SPD:

While deregulation went full swing in the Anglo-Saxon world (Reaganomics, Thatcherism), it was initially adopted half-heartedly in West Germany, … Incisive labour market reforms had to wait for the next government, Gerhard Schröder’s SPD-Greens coalition…. As a good Social Democrat, Schroeder did his part: pushing through the ‘Agenda 2010’ Hartz ‘reforms’ (regressions is a better word I think). Briefly this consisted of increasing part-time contracts; eroding workers committees; lower salaries for agency labour performing the same work; raising ages of retirement and reducing pensions and easing the way for a privatized pension system; reducing ‘allowed’ periods of unemployment from 36 months to 12 months; lowering of thresholds for firing; etc.

Hari Kumar, “An Initial Assessment of Angela Merkel’s Legacy”; Berlin Left; 25/07/2021

The leading SPD member Oskar Lafontaine was a minister, but resigned over this. He formed the broad coalition of the Die Linke – together with Party of Democratic Socialism – the legal successor of the East German state party the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED):

“Lafontaine placed himself at the head of the anti-Hartz IV mobilisation and arranged a shotgun wedding with the post-communists of the PDS. The result, in 2007, was Die Linke.”

Tooze A, Ibid; , Chartbook: “#293 “Nope!”

Die Linke became fractured, refused to take a principled left stand – and essentially lost any mass base it had, and became unviable even as a parliamentary party. Its subsequent split was led by Sarah Wagenknecht.

France rejects Macron ‘centrism’ – by endorsing neo-fascists

In France, a huge wave of support pushed the neo-fascist party ‘National Rally’ into leading place in the European elections. It is led by Marine Le Pen and the new demagogue on the national scene – Jordan Bardella – into serious contention for state power:

“National Rally, led by Marine Le Pen and her wildly popular protégé, Jordan Bardella, about 31.5 percent of the vote, and Mr. Macron’s Renaissance party about 15.2 percent.”

Roger Cohen and Aurelien Breeden “Battered by Far Right in E.U. Vote, Macron Calls for New Elections in France”; NYT June 9, 2024

In Le Pen’s wake follow even more openly reactionary forces:

Le Pen’s even more extreme niece, the name of whose party, Reconqute, suggests a “reconquest” of Europe from allegedly alien and especially Muslim inhabitants, as openly advocated by its founder Eric Zemmour.

Timothy Garton Ash; Wake up! After these elections, Europe is again in danger”; Guardian June 10, 2024.

The main structural processes under way

Two defining characteristics are seen regarding the “standard parties”. These are first the loss of any ‘faith’ or trust in them. Closely related to this is the normalisation of neo-fascism. Four aspects are described:

Trimming the sails of the more open fascists – or sanitisation

The more overt fascist parties in several parts of Europe have voluntarily, or under state pressure been forced to trim sail. The most repugnant features of fully-blown fascism are often discreetly abandoned. Or else they serve as flags that prompt the state or democratic movements, to move to outlaw the neo-fascist parties.

For example in Greece, the “Spartans” and their parent party “Golden Dawn” suffered set-backs:

A small far-right party that unexpectedly entered the Greek Parliament last year will not be allowed to field candidates for the European Parliament this summer after Greece’s Supreme Court found that it was essentially a reincarnation of the banned neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn… the Spartans, “offered their party as a cloak for the new political party of Ilias Kasidiaris,” the former spokesman of Golden Dawn who is currently in prison… Mr. Kasidiaris, who is serving a 13.5-year prison sentence, has campaigned from his cell in a bid to re-enter Greek politics… the Greek government moved to block from Parliament the National Party-Greeks, founded by Mr. Kasidiaris, by pushing through legislation that barred from the legislature parties whose leaders have been convicted of serious crimes.

Niki Kitsantonis, “Far-Right Greek Party Is Banned From E.U. Parliament Elections”; NYT April 25, 2024

In France, Macron’s sudden call to new elections assisted the ‘normalisation’. Marine Le Pen, leader of the National Rally, has worked hard to invalidate charges of obnoxious antisemitism and racism.

Ms. Le Pen, for her part, has distanced herself from Alternative for Germany, or AfD, a far-right party that appears to have become too extreme even for its fellow travelers. In May, Ms. Le Pen and her group in the European Parliament, none of them shy about nationalism, kicked the AfD out after one of its leaders made statements that seemed to justify membership by some in the SS, the Nazi paramilitary force…
“Throwing the AfD under the bus was a fantastic political gift” for Ms. Le Pen, said Jacob F. Kirkegaard .. a senior fellow with the Peterson Institute for International Economics. “She can position herself as ‘not the far right.’”

Emma Bubola “A Surging Hard Right in Europe Stumbles Over Its Own Divisions”; June 3, 2024 NYT

The positions of Le Pen’s party substantiated the label of fascism that had plagued the founder of her party, her own father. To a large extent she has succeeded in disowning him – he was expelled – to camouflage her real intent. Her protégé follows suit:

Mild-mannered but charismatic and media savvy, Mr. Bardella is in many ways the living embodiment of Ms. Le Pen’s years long efforts to normalize her party. A clean-cut, strong-jawed TikTok star, he never raises his voice. Yet his positions on issues like immigration and crime match Ms. Le Pen’s. The difference for a significant number of voters is that he does not share the Le Pen family name — and its unsavory association with the racist and antisemitic roots of the party’s founding as the National Front, by Ms. Le Pen’s father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, in 1972.

Roger Cohen and Aurelien Breeden “Battered by Far Right in E.U. Vote, Macron Calls for New Elections in France”; NYT June 9, 2024

In Germany, the AfD was also forced to trim sail following events of the last 6 months. These included the revelations of secret meetings aimed at a coup; and the open minimisation of Hitler’s regime. There followed mass anti-fascist demonstration. But the AfD has not so made any meaningful positional changes – nor can it:

the AfD is a party so extreme that even Le Pen decided she did not want to be in the same European parliamentary group with it, after Maximilian Krah, its charming lead candidate, said in an interview that not all members of the SS were criminals.

Timothy Garton Ash; Wake up! After these elections, Europe is again in danger”; Guardian June 10, 2024

But a crack has developed in the European neo-fascist front as to how far to take such ‘sanitisation’ or ‘cosmetic’ varnishes.

As the neo-fascist parties drift towards a semblance of respectability, some sections eye a new compact with the older conservative parties. Including Italy – where Georgi Melloni resists critiques for being ‘soft’. This became manifest by opposing Orban’s push for a single neo-fascist block across Europe. Orban’s vision is sweeping:

Orban recently urged Meloni and France’s National Rally presidential hopeful, Marine Le Pen, to create a hard-right “super group” to challenge the mainstream coalitions, the conservative European People’s party (EPP) and the centre-left Socialists & Democrats (S&D). Orban’s big idea seems to be that Fidesz and like-minded parties, such as Poland’s Law & Justice (PiS), Spain’s Vox and the Sweden Democrats rally around Meloni and Le Pen. “The future of the sovereignist camp in Europe, and of the right in general, now rests in the hands of two women,” he told the French magazine, Le Point.

Simon Tisdall; “In thrall to Viktor Orbán and the hard right, Europe is facing its moment of truth”; Guardian and Observer London, 9 Jun 2024

The Italian leader Georgi Meloni is the first female Prime minister of Italy, elected in 2022. She leads the right wing Brothers of Italy (FdI). Since 2020 in the European Union, she also leads the European Conservatives and Reformists Party. She is anxious to “work with” the President of the EU Ursula von der Leyen:

“Meloni’s hopes of morphing into an Angela Merkel-like “essential leader” of a rightwards-shifting Europe, could scupper Orban’s plan. Meloni’s collaboration with the electorally challenged, centre-right commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, reflects wariness over the Orban-Le Pen connection – and a broader split between the hard right and extremist headbangers such as Germany’s Alternative für Deutschland (AfD).“

Simon Tisdall; “In thrall to Viktor Orbán and the hard right, Europe is facing its moment of truth”; Guardian and Observer London, 9 Jun 2024

More recently however Meloni drew back from overtures of von der Leyen. The game proceeds.

The standard conservative parties steal neo-fascists clothes

The more “reasonable” standard right wing parties have loudly adopted parts of the rhetoric and policies of the neo-fascists. In doing so they ‘normalise’ the practices and policies of the neo-fascist and pave the way for them to move forward. The process is especially clear in France and Germany where one key issue is immigration.

As their theft becomes broader, in some countries there is a move to new party formations of the conservatives. For example the signalled rejection of the Conservative (Tory) part in the UK prompted Nigel Farage to openly proclaim his intent to take over the Conservative Party with the Reform party. Now that the Reform Party has a presence in the Houses of Parliament this will become move evident.

Farage is more likely to succeed in an ultra-right wing make over of the former Tory party, than was Liz Truss and her allies.

The standard social-democratic parties also steal neo-fascist clothes

In addition, the standard Social Democratic Parties also steal the clothes of neo-fascist parties. In Germany in the last months a drum-beat of tightening the immigration laws is sounded by the SDP. Such parties persist in paying lip-service to prior notions of a social security framework. But meanwhile they continue to steadily erode it. In parallel, new parties posing as being of the left also adopt neo-fascist clothes.

For example the Sarah Wagenknecht Party in Germany. Her origins lay in the former East German left. In an ominous sign – the split she led out of the SPD very recently has adopted her name for the new party – “Alliance Sahra Wagenknecht for Reason and Justice”. A personal naming that portends a personality cult.

Her stand is almost identical with the AfD on immigration. Which class does she represent? In a recent interview her objective position of support of small and middle industry owners – the so-called “Mittelstand” – is made clear:

“Our Mittelstand firms are under massive pressure. In 2022 and 2023, energy-intensive industrial firms sufered a 25 per cent decline in output. That’s unprecedented. They are just starting to announce mass redundancies. These small and medium-sized family-owned firms—lots of them specialist engineering works or makers of machine-tools, auto parts, electrical equipment—are really important for Germany. They’re mostly owner-managed or family-run, meaning they’re not listed on the stock exchange and often have quite a rugged character. But they have their own sort of business culture, focused on the longer term, the next generation, rather than quarterly returns. They’re embedded in their local communities, often doing business-to-business trading. They want to retain their workers, instead of exploiting every loophole, like the big corporations—of which we have plenty, too. It’s the Mittelstand frms that are really suffering in the current crisis. With continuing high energy prices, there is a real danger that manufacturing jobs will be destroyed on a large scale.”

“Sahra Wagenknecht condition of Germany – Interview”: by Thomas Meaney & Joshua Rahtz; New Left Review 146; March-April 2024; further comments by Hari Kumar at: Marxmail May 30, 2024.

Meanwhile the wider body of Social-Democrats in all countries signal to the capitalist class that they do not intend to rain on their parade, saying that the way to progress is to “create wealth” in the country. So says Sir Keir Starmer in the UK. To ensure that no one mistakes where that wealth is to be located, the likely future Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves steps in. She insists that there will be no taxes on the top 1% of the income earners – namely the richest of the rich.

The accentuation of the crisis by two wars

Another major reason for the erosion of any credibility for these parties is their hypocrisy on Gaza. Especially when this is compared to their positions on the Ukraine. For the latter, any amount of arms funding for Ukraine to defend against Russian imperialist attack is given. For the former – enormous support is given to the Israeli state attack on the Gazan people.

What steps can the working class take?

There are two major problems that face the class.

First, there is no mass communist Marxist-Leninist party that can take any leading position.

In its absence, a United Front of all progressive and united forces is needed. Where is this happening? Thus far only in France has there been such a large-scale attempt to form one. The prior history of the distortions of the Popular Front become even more relevant now (the Communist League on Popular Front).

A prior longer version of this was published at MLRG.online

Help, Anti-Deutsche Keep Quoting Adorno at Me

Gaps and Misunderstandings of the Frankfurt School’s Concept of Antisemitism Allow for its Weaponization against the Left

Charlie Ebert
24/07/2024

Supposed critiques of antisemitism are increasingly weaponized in defense of war and racist, imperialist, and colonial projects, including the ongoing genocidal violence against Palestinians in Gaza. While this weaponization is happening in many places, German language public debates seem to take it to another level: here, antisemitism is and has been discussed for years as if it was not a form of racism: State-funded educational work separates antisemitism from racism and in the humanities and social sciences, antisemitism research is methodologically and institutionally isolated from other research on racism. While the broader political history and function of this exceptionalization have become more obvious and widely discussed, there are still open questions when it comes to its theoretical foundations.

In German language critical theory, the concept of antisemitism is often based on the works of the early Frankfurt School’s research in Germany and the US from the 1920s through the 1950s. One common reference point is the chapter on antisemitism in the Dialectic of Enlightenment (1944) by Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer. This text is an exemplary case of an approach to antisemitism that can actually be useful in current debates and research – but only if it is properly reconstructed and re-interpreted within an updated Marxist anti-racist theoretical framework.

Adorno/Horkheimer ground their approach in a theory of society that resists the essentialization and dehistoricization of antisemitism. However, the fact that they are often cited to support such a flawed understanding of antisemitism is not (only) because of misunderstandings, but also because of an important gap: Adorno/Horkheimer’s approach lacks a concept of racism beyond antisemitism. Although they mention other racist practices, they do not offer a similarly complex theory for them. This weakness has enabled the (flawed) interpretation that, today, allows for Adorno/Horkheimer to be cited in support of the exceptionalization of antisemitism – to the point that the critique of antisemitism is used against anti-racist movements. Opposing this interpretation, I argue that antisemitism is, in fact, a form of racism and needs to be understood in its function in racialized capitalist societies.

Looking at antisemitism through its social function means asking: What does it do? Who and what does it serve?

“Elements of Antisemitism” is a chapter in the Dialectic of Enlightenment, a book famous for its critique of instrumental reason in capitalist society. Written in the early 1940s, as Anson Rabinbach has shown, the chapter on antisemitism was developed rather late in the process, when the magnitude of the National Socialist extermination project became known. In this chapter, Adorno/Horkheimer try to explain antisemitism based on a Marxist critique of society and on a psychoanalytically grounded view of human socialization. They assume that antisemitism has a social function, implying that any approach to understanding it must consider economic as well as political, cultural and social-psychological factors.

For fascism, Adorno/Horkheimer argue, antisemitism helps to identify an imaginary political opponent and thus create mass mobilization. For liberalism, on the other hand, antisemitism helps deny liberal-capitalist society’s effects on the dispossessed majority of society by constructing a social group (‘the Jews’) that is falsely blamed for these effects. In both cases, antisemitism helps to maintain the status quo and redirect potential resistance into channels that are harmless for those in power. Like a pressure valve, antisemitism regulates pressure within class society. One reason antisemitism can take on this function – and the one I am focusing on here – is because it contains a hatred that results from the suffering caused by class relations.

For Adorno/Horkheimer, the “economic ground” of antisemitism is “the disguise of domination in production” in capitalism. Simply put, while feudal relations are directly oppressive and personal, in capitalism, social domination is mediated by capitalist production: Workers are not forced to work by a lord, but by the material necessity to feed and house themselves and their loved ones. The labor contract falsely identifies it as the workers’ free decision to enter into a relationship in which they only receive wages, while the surplus value they produce is appropriated by the owners of the means of production. This betrayal, happening under the guise of the labor contract, is then experienced as a problem of trade and markets, where workers realize that their wage does not enable them to live well. Markets thus appear to be responsible for the negative effects of the appropriation of surplus value in capitalist production.

The distortion effect of the labor contract is amplified by what we might call productivist ideology: that the production of goods tends to appear as somehow more honest and respectable than circulation (read: trade or working with money). Think about the mainstream image of the ‘self-made’ business owner versus images of parasitic merchants and bankers. The idea such images convey is that production creates value, while trade is merely extractive – and therefore parasitic and the root of suffering. A Marxist critique of capitalism, however, can help us understand that those who actually own the means of production appropriate the surplus-value produced by workers. According to Adorno/Horkheimer, they are as parasitic as those working in trade and finance.

Now, what does this have to do with Jews? In Europe, for a long time, Jews had very restricted access to land, professional guilds, or sedentary lifestyle, and were therefore pushed towards work in trade and monetary transactions. Because the injustice of the economic system was falsely attributed to the sphere of circulation and Jews moved within this sphere in a visible way, they were often blamed for the injustice of the economic system. As with many racialized naturalization effects, living conditions of a minority, although created by the dominant society, come to appear as characteristics of the minority.

While Adorno/Horkheimer use Marxist ideology critique to explain the economic ground of antisemitism in class society, they also deploy psychoanalytic concepts to describe those aspects that defy rationalist explanations. This thread in their analysis is based on empirical studies in social psychology and addresses aspects of fascism that do not make sense at first sight, e.g. why Germans during National Socialism wanted Jews to be expropriated, even though they did not materially profit from this expropriation. Offering a theory of human drives and of the processes through which we all become functioning members of capitalist societies, they shed light on what might lead to violent outbursts and false projections onto unprotected minorities – among others, Jews.

Interestingly, Adorno/Horkheimer point out that victims of such dynamics can also become perpetrators, and that not only diasporic Jewish minorities but all kinds of Others can become the object of projections and violent hatred. They also insist that what bourgeois subjects hate in minorities often hints towards repressed desires that cannot be fulfilled under capitalism, such as for “happiness without power, … wages without work, … a homeland without a boundary stone, … religion without myth.” Such resentment and hatred therefore serve the existing social order: If you hate those you think live differently, instead of the forces that deny you to live differently, you will not strive for overcoming the status quo. In this perspective, the only way to end antisemitism becomes clear: the struggle to abolish capitalist class rule alongside liberation for everyone.

Now, what can this approach help us understand – and what can’t it?

Adorno/Horkheimer’s approach helps us better understand National Socialist politics, ideology, and economy – also in relation to other imperialist and colonial projects in the 20th century. Puzzling aspects become clearer, such as the centrality of the extermination of the Jews and the fantasy of the Jewish world conspiracy in the Nazi elite’s war strategy: As historian Adam Tooze has argued, the “grand strategy of racial war” played an important role in NS domestic and foreign policy, to the point that it contributed to the Nazis losing the war.

Because Adorno/Horkheimer analyze antisemitism as a symptom of the social political conditions under which it emerges, it is obvious that specific antisemitic symbols or images they mention should not be decontextualized or viewed as transhistorical signifiers of antisemitism. Their approach enables us to examine antisemitism under changing historical and social conditions, without declaring every image of a Kraken or sharp critique of landlords as inherently antisemitic.

This perspective of analysis should also not be limited to antisemitism: approaching a social phenomenon via asking who and what it serves, economically, politically, and psychologically, instead of essentializing its context-specific features and symbols, is helpful for understanding processes of racialization, authoritarianism, and systemic and/or genocidal violence more broadly.

Applying this approach to other forms of racism, however, brings a weakness of Adorno/Horkheimer’s work into focus: Although they mention other forms of racism, they do not provide a concept of racialization or racism beyond antisemitism. In the chapter on antisemitism in the DoE, Adorno/Horkheimer mention anti-Blackness, but only as a backdrop from which to distinguish antisemitism. They also mention hatred of diasporic, migrant ways of life, but only insofar as this hatred concerns Jews. In both instances, the presupposed concept of racism remains implicit. This observation also holds if we consider other works, such as Guilt and Defense, and is further underlined by the fact that some of their works enforce racist stereotypes, such as Adorno’s writings on Jazz. (Of course, this has been pointed out before, e.g. by Alex Demirović 1992.)

Even though Adorno/Horkheimer themselves did not try to conceptually grasp processes of racialization beyond antisemitism, their approach can and should be contextualized within the growing body of theory on colonialism, racism, and processes of racialization in class societies. Because they look at antisemitism through its social function, their concept shares the theoretical and political thrust of approaches that understand racialization only in relation to its social conditions.

Contextualizing the critique of antisemitism within anti-racist theories

After the Second World War, biologistic theories of race were discredited, decolonial liberation movements changed political and economic landscapes, and migration from global majority countries to Europe increased. In this context, a culturalist racism – which refers to supposedly incompatible cultures instead of ‘biological’ ‘races’ – emerged. This shift, described by Frantz Fanon already in the 1950s, led anti-racist theorists to fundamental debates on the concept of racism. The challenge was to include different social formations in the analysis, even if the specific mechanisms of racialization – legal, economic, social – and the ideological justifications at play are different.

Responding to this challenge, approaches have included what Manuela Bojadžijev calls “Anti-Racism as Method”: the assumption that race and racism cannot be defined in absolute terms, but only in relation to their material and social conditions. Anti-racism, in this view, is a praxis that both describes and opposes racializing regimes, thereby revealing, as Paul Gilroy writes, that racialized categories “mark sites and boundaries of class struggle.”

In this perspective, racism is always the subject of social conflict and racialized social groups only exist as groups as long as the conditions make them such. It also implies that racism is an intrinsic part of class society, not external or marginal. Therefore, just as Adorno/Horkheimer suggest with regard to antisemitism, all racialized phenomena have to be analyzed in a way where economic, political, cultural and social-psychological factors are considered.

Within such an understanding of racialization, it only makes sense to include Jews and the concept of antisemitism and to refuse separating them from anti-racist theory and praxis. Looking at antisemitism through this framework can help us understand it in relation to other forms of racism, especially where the supposed ‘protection of Jews’ is instrumentalized against other minorities. It might even help us better understand other racist phenomena that contain elements of what used to be associated with modern antisemitism (e.g. the relative flexibility of physical and cultural markers of racialization, the fact that what is persecuted is constructed in the process of persecution, as well as pogroms as instances in which destructive and eliminatory violence is unleashed).

If we understand that all forms of racism have specific mechanisms and functions, depending on material and social context – therefore also different modes of operation, logics, symbols – then there is simply no reason to believe that antisemitism is so unique that it should be in a category of its own. So why would anyone insist on this uniqueness and why would they use Adorno/Horkheimer to make this claim?

Objection: What about the unique features of antisemitism?

The reason why Adorno/Horkheimer can lead us to believe that antisemitism is especially unique or not a form of racism at all is because they were working with a reductionist understanding of racism at best, from which they differentiate antisemitism. Although it was correct that they needed to expand the theoretical and methodological toolbox of Marxist theory to understand the persecution of Jews – this is true for any other form of racialized oppression or persecution. The complexity in Adorno/Horkheimer’s approach indicates how theoretically sharp and nuanced every approach to understanding racism and racialization within capitalist class society should be.

While this may seem obvious to many readers of The Left Berlin, it is still a contentious point to make in German academic critical theory and social sciences. Despite some scholars pushing for wider acceptance of anti-racist theoretical frameworks in critical theory and including antisemitism in these, one may still get surprised or worried reactions (and occasionally be followed to the S-Bahn by an upset philosopher insistent on discussing the singularity of the Holocaust). The exceptionalization of antisemitism in German theoretical debates, combined with the overall lack of understanding processes of racialization in class society, has not only produced conditions that make it seem original or provocative to argue that antisemitism is racism. It has also, and that is the more important issue here, contributed to the decontextualization of the critique of antisemitism to the point that it can comfortably be used against leftist and anti-racist struggles today.

To be clear, I am not only opposing attempts to separate antisemitism as unique from other racisms. I also oppose the position that it is unnecessary to look at the specifics of antisemitism. If we aim at abolishing all racism, it is absolutely helpful to look closely at when and why violence is aimed at erasure, and when and why it is structural violence or everyday police violence, intended to maintain the racist stratification of the working classes. My point is that it is precisely when you look at the specific ways in which different forms of racism function in relation to each other that you can come to a better understanding of the respective phenomena and, above all, of the society that produces them.

This is where I want to get back to the current situation in Germany. Here, anti-Muslim racism and structural violence against migrants and refugees coexist and interact with both actual antisemitism and moral panics about antisemitism. In the context of racist repression against Palestinian communities and criminalization of solidarity with the Palestinian struggle for liberation, we see an increasing use of antisemitism as a border mechanism and the instrumentalization of ‘Jewish safety‘ (as Danna Marshall and Ma’ayan Ashash argue). We see how differently racialized social groups are being constructed and instrumentalized with different functions. And, of course, we see resistance and organizing against these mechanisms. A theory of racism and racialization, and especially a theory of antisemitism, must be informed by these struggles and serve the project of building solidarity in class struggles.

Wartime Survival Guide

The one who gets disappointed earlier gains more.

Ilya Kharkow
22/07/2024

Last year, I flew to Prague to meet an old friend. Sitting in a bar, he told me he was glad to live in one of the safest cities in the EU.

There was a stack of Czech newspapers on the bar counter. I picked one up. As I flipped through it, not understanding a word, my friend talked about the sense of security in Europe.

Suddenly, he pointed to an article. The headline read, Nothing Has Changed in Czechia Six Months After Brutal Terrorist Attack On Gay Bar.

After that, my friend talked about the power of NATO. But at the same time, he said that, according to the news, the Czechia is not ready for war; that the Baltic countries have declared unpreparedness. The same is being said by Poland and Germany.

That was when I decided to write a survival guide for ordinary people, turning my wartime experiences into advice. This could save them – or show them how insignificant their current problems are compared to those faced during a war.

So, here is my 20-item survival guide, for anyone who doesn’t want to kill anyone else and strives to save their own life:

If missiles are falling on your city, the safest places are metro stations (they are deep enough to save your ass), as well as railway stations (transport communications are highly valued during war, even by the enemy).
Military facilities and power plants are likely to become targets, so if you live near one, it’s best to move.
There’s no point in taping your windows; in the event of a missile detonation, the shards will scatter throughout the room anyway.
Hide behind two walls to protect yourself from explosions.
Tiled walls can be as dangerous as glass shards during an explosion.
Do not trust government officials. People can commit great treachery if their superiors remove their responsibility by giving them orders.
Do not trust patriots. They are friends of the state, not fellow citizens.
If you don’t want to end up on the front lines, avoid living at your registered address. Move somewhere (in my case it was firstly an office, then a flat rented without a contract). Be sure, the state will use any information it has about you to turn you into a soldier.
Don’t rush to hide in the countryside. In a big city, there are more people, making it easier to stay hidden. In a village, everyone knows each other, so newcomers stand out and will be reported.
If state media spreads rumors about the possible sabotage, every unfamiliar person will seem suspicious, including you.
The military protects the state’s borders, not you. Their goal is to send you to the battlefield so you can defend the borders instead of them.
Don’t believe state propaganda. Protecting your family doesn’t mean leaving them under bombs to go to war. Protecting your family means ensuring that none of them get hurt.
Buy canned food, but don’t forget Snickers bars. Food is not only calories but also currency in emergency situations.
Don’t expect your friends to save you. During wartime, a person saves themselves first, then comments about it on social media, and only after might they come to help. Rely only on yourself.
If your home is bombed and you have to seek shelter, don’t rush to the ones provided by the state. The military and police might forcibly take men from there to the front lines, and on TV, they’ll present them as a line of volunteers.
Pay attention to what people take with them when leaving their homes. This can reveal things about them they might prefer to keep secret.
Limit your time watching the news. In reality, a missile explodes once, but on the news, it explodes thousands of times which can destroy your psyche.
Stock up on painkillers. It’s unlikely you’ll find a dentist willing to treat your tooth when the neighboring building is on fire.
If your teeth are fine, you can trade the painkillers for food with those who didn’t take care of their health in time.
Stock up on lubricant and condoms. War is stressful, and stress often increases sexual desire – not only on the front lines. Sexual activity also increases on the home front.

Europe. NATO. Attack on a gay club. Newspapers lying on a bar counter. I flew to Prague to meet an old friend. Sitting in a bar, he told me he was glad to live in one of the safest cities in the EU. I didn’t tell him that during my last visit to Prague, someone tried to rob me on the train. Instead, I smiled and promised myself to write a survival guide that would make others’ suffering less than what I once had to endure.

This piece is a part of a series, The Mining Boy Notes, published on Mondays and authored by Ilya Kharkow, a writer from Ukraine. For more information about Ilya, see his website. You can support his work by buying him a coffee.

The rise and fall of the hubris of the Israeli leadership

Family visit in Israel: no words of peace

Mati Shemoelof

Netanyahu embodies Israel’s Oedipus, relentlessly pursuing total victory in the Gaza war. However, his hubris will inevitably lead to regret when he realizes the catastrophic consequences of his actions. His reluctance to cease the Gaza conflict is not solely driven by military objectives but also by political motives: avoiding elections, thwarting a state inquiry into the October events, and postponing his court appearance until March 2025. Netanyahu’s determination to prolong the war illustrates his desire to evade legal accountability, demonstrating that his personal concerns outweigh the nation’s welfare. Four years ago, when the Supreme Court was required to address petitions against Netanyahu’s continued tenure, his supporters claimed that the dual roles would not hinder him and that a Chinese wall separates the defendant from the Prime Minister. It turns out that it is difficult to run a legal system while also managing a country in such a deep war crisis. Netanyahu’s hubris will drag Israel further down, but ironically, his refusal to recognize a Palestinian state might lead to the opposite result.

At the end of June, I went to Israel to visit my family. Israeli fighter planes did not stop circling over our home in Haifa, and the fear was palpable at every moment. The newspapers reported that the IDF spokesperson stated the military would remain in Gaza for at least another six months and control the border with Egypt. There is no sign of a hostage deal that might calm the entire region, which is being destroyed. To make matters worse, there are no indications that Benny Gantz, who left the Israeli government to sit with the opposition, will discuss a proper way out of the turmoil—a peace process with the Palestinians. In post-October 7th Israel, the peace process, the end of the occupation, and the establishment of a Palestinian state are seen not as solutions to the escalating regional crisis but as rewards for Palestinian aggression. Israel stands at a crossroads: one path leads to a hostage deal and a permanent ceasefire, while the other leads to the deepening of fighting, potentially against Hezbollah in Lebanon and possibly Iran in the future.

As we entered the city of Haifa, the GPS signal was lost. The entire city is functioning without location services due to the ongoing military conflict with Hezbollah. The fear of an impending war with Hezbollah from the north is palpable among my family members. How can you plan life this way? The IDF spokesperson announced a temporary truce in Gaza operations, warning that if Hezbollah does not cease its activities, war will soon commence. Western countries, including the USA, Britain, and France, have already advised their citizens to leave Lebanon. According to the American Bloomberg website, former head of the National Security Council, Eyal Hulata, stated that a war with Hezbollah could result in 15,000 Israeli casualties. On July 3, 2024, the deputy leader of Hezbollah said that the only sure path to a ceasefire on the Lebanon-Israel border is a full ceasefire in Gaza.

I went to the sea with a friend who confided his fears about Israel’s future. The climate was oppressively hot, and the air was heavy with moisture. The jellyfish had already migrated south, possibly reaching Egypt by now. As I listened to my friend, I could see he was traumatized by the Gaza war, and I also found myself contemplating the future of the entire region.

This tragedy affects all the peoples of the region, but especially the Palestinians in Gaza, who live in a small strip of land with no infrastructure, teetering on the brink of famine and epidemics. There is no safe place in Gaza, most of which has been destroyed by the IDF, and tens of thousands of innocents have been injured or killed. The war also affects the residents of the occupied territories, who suffer under the violent actions of settlers’ militias, actions that are often supported by the IDF and police forces, under the influence of ministers Ben Gvir and Smotrich. The army invades the occupied territories weekly, often resulting in the deaths of innocent people. And the violent settlers attacking the Palestinians villages and there is no one who could stop them.

The war also harms Israel, which is increasingly isolated and boycotted internationally. Hundreds of thousands of residents have fled settlements in the south and north, bearing the enormous cost of the ongoing conflict. The government’s refusal to address the issue of hostages is tearing the country apart from within. The economic damage from the Gaza war is also impacting neighboring countries—Egypt, Lebanon, and Jordan. According to a report in the New York Times, based on estimates from the United Nations Development Agency, in just three months, the war has wiped out $10.3 billion, which is 2.3% of the combined GDP of these three countries. Egypt is also grappling with the loss of revenue from Suez Canal traffic and tourism, finding itself in a dire situation after eight months. Lebanon, already one of the poorest countries in the world, faces the displacement of hundreds of thousands of residents from southern Lebanon due to war fears. Even before the war, Lebanon was on the brink of bankruptcy, and now the situation has worsened with the loss of tourism income and the looming threat of conflict.

During my visit, I noticed that the word “peace” is absent from the media, and there is no real conversation about the future of Israeli-Palestinian relations. One of Netanyahu’s hubristic traits is his reluctance to discuss the future in Gaza, recognizing the existence of a Palestinian people who demand peace and justice. Therefore, it is crucial to consider three possible solutions for the day after a hostage deal and ceasefire in Gaza:

1. Complete annexation of Gaza and the establishment of Israeli Jewish settlements on Gaza land

This option is favored by far-right extremist leaders Ben Gvir and Smotrich. Channel 14 host Yanon Magal stated in an interview with the Prime Minister: “A large part of the public thinks that territory should be taken, and the Gaza Strip should be settled.” There are even more radical voices, such as the “Awaken North” movement, contemplating re-occupation and settlement in the south of Lebanon.

2. The Gaza Strip controlled by the Israeli army

This scenario would likely lead to civil resistance and the strengthening of Hamas.

3. A full peace process with the Palestinians, arranged under the umbrella of international powers and mediated by moderate Islamic countries such as Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar.

This would include the deportation of Hamas leaders, the rehabilitation of Gaza, and the transfer of control to the Palestinian Authority within Gaza.

In an interview with Channel 14, Netanyahu rejected the first option, calling the annexation of Gaza an unrealistic idea. The second option, military control of Gaza, is the path we are currently heading down under Netanyahu’s leadership. Why isn’t Netanyahu’s coalition or Gantz’s opposition discussing the third option? Because they, too are infected with hubris. After decades of Netanyahu’s control over state mechanisms, the opposition has accepted the basic assumption of an overwhelming fear of a Palestinian state, even if it is demilitarized and coexists alongside Israel.

Hubris is a fitting term to describe Netanyahu’s lack of leadership

Why do I consider “hubris” an apt term to describe Netanyahu’s lack of leadership? The term originates from ancient Greek, denoting excessive pride or self-confidence. In classical literature, hubris often characterizes individuals who, by overestimating their abilities or importance, provoke the gods or exceed the limits of what is feasible, ultimately leading to their downfall. Netanyahu disregards the imperative for peace, healing, and reconciliation with Palestinians, opting instead for a militaristic approach to navigate his ongoing corruption trials.

Israeli journalist Amir Oren of Haaretz writes, “Netanyahu is simultaneously managing four fronts: legal, military, political, and diplomatic (and possibly family and health). In each, his aim is to buy time.” Netanyahu’s hubris mirrors a prevalent mindset in Israeli society, one historically dismissive of Palestinian aspirations for equality, justice, and peace, including the establishment of their own demilitarized state. This hubris deepens the binary divide within Israeli identity and fosters a mentality of “we are the eternal people” versus “the Amalek seed,” dehumanizing Palestinians by attributing collective blame for Hamas’s actions.

Memories of past atrocities, such as the October 7 massacre and the refusal to return the hostages obstruct prospects for reconciliation. Nevertheless, courageous leaders can defy public opinion, reminiscent of when Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin pursued the Oslo Accords despite initially advocating for harsh measures against Palestinian protesters during the first intifada. This resulted in the enduring peace agreement with Jordan, where Jordan even defended Israel against Iranian missile attacks.

A survey by Israeli Channel 11 (June 2, 2024) reveals that 40% of the public supports President Biden’s proposed framework for a hostage deal and cessation of the Gaza conflict, with an equal proportion believing it will conclude hostilities. In contrast, 27% oppose the framework, and 34% foresee renewed conflict post-deal. Despite Israeli public support for Biden’s proposal, Netanyahu persists in disregarding these voices. His reluctance stems from facing an internal inquiry commission regarding the October 7 massacre upon cessation of hostilities, potential coalition losses in upcoming elections, loss of immunity from corruption charges, and the prospect of facing ICC in Hague.

Social shifts, particularly among younger Woke generations in America and Europe, signal a departure from the entrenched narrative of continued Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories. Increasing global dissatisfaction with colonial norms, coupled with heightened awareness of Global South struggles, heralds an unprecedented shift. While acknowledging the need for a self-reflection process within the Palestinian movement following the October 7 massacre, Israeli society must also reflect on its treatment of Palestinians through administrative detentions, blockades, and other colonial measures.

In Israel, dissenters are often dismissed as radicals or labeled anti-Semitic, failing to consider the millions of Palestinians living without basic rights alongside them. Like characters in a Greek tragedy awaiting revelation, Israel must awaken to recognize how its occupation fuels conflicts like the Gaza war, Hezbollah clashes, and hostilities with groups such as the Houthis.

Dialectically, as long as Israeli leaders—whether from the right or left—persist in hubristic attitudes toward Palestinians, Israel faces increased global isolation and boycotts, akin to South Africa’s historical experience. Leadership must defy electoral promises and initiate a political process for peaceful coexistence and justice alongside Palestinians.

It may culminate tragically, with countless lives lost on both sides and irretrievable time wasted. As I journey back to Germany, anti-Netanyahu graffiti and flags line the route, and airport images of hostages prompt questions about their return. Paradoxically, Netanyahu and his camp have already labeled the voices demanding their return as “Leftist,” dismissing it as if it weren’t a genuine human rights demand. Yet, a singular solution remains: two nations sharing their homeland peacefully, free from violence, perhaps a reality to emerge long after my time.

Mati Shemoelof is a writer, editor and curator based in Berlin. His site: http://www.mati-s.com

This article was originally published in German in the Berliner Zeitung. Reproduced with permission.

The Radical Jewish Tradition – A speech introducing a book

Speech from the book presentation in Berlin, 18th July 2024

Janey Stone
20/07/2024

Introduction: Hallo zusammen. Vielen Dank, dass ihr mich heute Abend hierher eingeladen habt, um über das Buch zu sprechen, das ich gemeinsam mit Donny Gluckstein geschrieben habe. Ich freue mich sehr, hier in Berlin sprechen zu dürfen.

Berlin has become a centre of support for Palestine and developed an alternative position as to what is Antisemitismus und Antizionismus. A look at German history shows this is an actual theme of it.

Und ich bin auch hocherfreut, dass ich alles teilweise auf deutsch sagen kann, da ich schon lange deutsch lerne. Ich spreche jetzt auf English und zum Schluss komme ich noch einmal auf Deutsch zurück.

To start off with – I’m a Jewish Australian. A large part of my mother’s family emigrated to Australia in the 1930s from a small town in Poland. Every single family member who remained behind died in the Holocaust. So I’m not a holocaust survivor in the formal sense, but my existence is marked by that event.

I am a life long socialist, and I’ve been an active anti-Zionist almost all my adult life. I’ll by talking about why a book like this matters today. The book ends in 1948 – 80 years ago. Perhaps some people might think this is a niche history – interesting but not important today.

But history matters because the battle for memory is also a battle for the present.

The Zionists constantly invoke Jewish history as a justification for their support of Israel, so an alternative view is very immediate and urgent. The Zionists don’t want us to know there is a different answer to antisemitism than the Israeli state.

Our book brings together a range of material and information available but scattered in many places. We trace antisemitism, modern Jewry and Jewish political currents; moving to Jewish radical history, focusing on Russia and Poland; the and Jewish in emigration to London and New York. We then discuss Nazism in Germany, the Holocaust and how Palestine impacted the radical Jewish tradition.

We introduce at the beginning the “lachrymose (or tearful) conception of Jewish history”. Or the idea that the main element of Jewish experience has been suffering, it’s always been so and can’t be changed. In other words, Jews are eternal victims.

There are three ways to respond to this idea. Firstly, you can say we can’t do anything about antisemitism, so we withdraw into our own ghettoes, customs and religion, we do nothing, and remain victims. The second option is to change from a victim by joining the perpetrators: become an exploiter and an oppressor yourself.

Zionism combines both of these. They start saying that we can’t do anything about antisemitism and non-Jews will always be antisemitic. But then they say victims must to take lessons from the colonialists, imperialists, the ruling class and even the antisemites. Let’s set up our own state and become just like them.

But there is a third option. In this book, Donny and I show that while the oppression and suffering are certainly there, it’s not true that Jews are nothing but victims. They have always resisted and fought back. The radical tradition is the history of working class and socialist Jewish struggle against both antisemitism and their position at the bottom of society. Against both oppression and exploitation. It’s the tradition that says we can fight to defend ourselves. The tradition that knows what antisemitism is, but doesn’t accept it as eternal or plan to go somewhere to set up oppress someone else. And this tradition has historically been entwined with the working class and socialist movements.

Most people have heard about some parts of this story. Everyone knows about the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising and the Battle of Cable Street in the East End of London 1936. Many are aware of the 1908 strike of mainly Jewish women garment workers in New York, known as the uprising of the 20,000.

But these are usually treated as one-off events. I asked myself, where did these mass actions come from? Things like that don’t just come out of the blue. I was simply astonished at what I hadn’t previously known about. realised these were just the peaks of a movement with connections over at least 6 decades over continents.

This book rediscovers this history to set it in the context of what antisemitism is, and the role of Jews in the socialist and radical movements between the 1880s and 1948.

This was a very exciting journey. I want to take you on some of the stops on that journey and some exciting and inspiring stories.

Tsarist Russia

One of my first discoveries was that Jews had fought back against pogroms in tsarist Russia. Previously may image was of frightened Jews huddling in synagogues. But there were armed self defence groups, led by the Jewish Labor Bund but also with other socialists and leftists involved, Jews and non-Jews.

The Bund put out a call for armed self-defence after a horrific pogrom in Kishenev in 1903: “[W]e must come out with arms in hand, organise ourselves and fight to our last drop of blood. Only when we show our strength will we force everyone to respect our honour.” And a year later they were able to say “There are no longer the former, downtrodden, timid Jews. A new-born unprecedented type appeared on the scene—a man who defends his dignity.”

The self defence groups were led by the Bund in coalition with radical and socialist groups. They didn’t see the issue as just about Jews. What they said was that the struggle against antisemitism was “also directed against the ruling class and for socialism. Thus the two struggles were one”.

And they enjoyed successes. For instance in 1906 in Bialystok in Poland they completely protected major working-class sections of the city: “At every corner of the poor section of Bialystok, patrols of the Jewish Self-Defence League were stationed with revolvers and grenades… They guarded the streets and fired warning shots into the air. If a gentile went by carrying loot, they would frighten him until he threw down the stolen package and fled”.

A very different picture to huddling in the synagogue.

Migration to the West

Nonetheless pogroms continued. Poverty and misery of life in tsarist Russia led hundreds of thousands of Jews to emigrate including to the UK, the US.

In the US almost continual struggle in Jewish areas of New York occurred from the late 19 century until WW2. Jewish men and women fought the bosses and the state with the support of socialist organisations.

Early on there was strike after strike as Jewish workers fought to establish trade unions. After the turn of the century, activity moved into the community. In May 1902 an increase in the retail price of kosher meat outraged housewives and a crowd of 20,000 women set out.

One newspaper reported that “an excitable and aroused crowd [mostly of women] roamed the streets…armed with sticks, vocabularies and well-sharpened nails”. The police attacked but they didn’t have it all their own way—one woman retaliated by slapping a cop in the face with a moist piece of liver!

When the issue spread to Brooklyn, the New York Times had this headline: “Brooklyn mob loots butcher shops. Rioters, led by women, wreck a dozen stores. Dance around bonfires of oil-drenched meat piled in the street—fierce fight with the police”.

The Times ended by calling for the repression of this “dangerous class…especially the women [who] are very ignorant”.

When a magistrate asked one woman why they were rioting, she replied: We don’t riot. But if all we did was to weep at home, nobody would notice it”.

Once more – the falsity of the lachrymose or tearful conception.

The meat boycott was followed by a series of rent strikes again led by women. And then the community action fed back into the workplace in 1908 with the Uprising of the 20,000. Female Jewish garment workers went on strike over piece work rates and other issues.

Leading up to the strike, socialists called a large parade on a date honoring an 1857 demonstration of New York garment workers, which police had attacked and dispersed. The 1908 demonstration was so successful that German socialist Clara Zetkin proposed an International Working Women’s Day in 1910. This has continued ever since.

So when talking about the Jewish radical tradition – we commemorate the real heritage of International Working Women’s Day which is Jewish, internationalist, socialist and working class.

Now I head over to London where in the East End, conditions were indescribable. Many Jewish socialists understood how important class was here. Many bosses and landlords in the slums were also Jewish and synagogues generally preached acceptance. As one early socialist in the East End said:

“The underlying class struggle exists also amongst Jews… Therefore Jewish workers must unite among themselves against the other spurious unity—that with the masters!”

The early Jewish radical movement in London is full of stories about all sorts of currents – anarchists, socialists, early trade unionists, Marxists and many others.

The leader of the anarchists was a German Rudolf Rocker, who wasn’t Jewish. But he learnt Yiddish and threw in his lot with the Jewish East End. They set up a club which became a centre for radical and trade union activities throughout London. It was particularly important during strikes. It also provided premises for a Jewish socialist newspaper, and was an educational, social and cultural centre as well. They welcomed everyone – Jews and non-Jews, young and old, men and women. Above all it was a centre for political debate and argument.

The Jewish anarchists were very much “in your face atheists”. They ostentatiously ate ham sandwiches outside the synagogue on Yom Kippur the most important fast day of the year. Perhaps this was a bit sectarian. But we should remember atheism was as an important political topic then.

Over decades the workers struggled against the sweating system and their appalling working and living conditions. But not alone. In 1889 the Jewish tailors went on strike and received a large donation from dockers.

Then in 1912, during a major dock strike, Jewish families took in and cared for dockers’ children helping the dockers to stay out on strike. And then 24 years later in 1936, the dockers again returned the favour and constituted the militant vanguard of the mass demonstration at Cable Street.

One of the participants, Bill Fishman described it: “I was moved to tears to see bearded Jews and Irish Catholic dockers standing up to stop Mosley. I shall never forget that as long as I live—how working-class people could get together to oppose the evil of fascism.”

So Cable Street didn’t come out of the blue. I was also very excited to discover another movement at the same time which fed into the resistance to the fascists. That was the tenants’ movement which carried out rent strikes in the same period.

One of the leaders said this: “It was a genuine united movement of the people, drawing together Jews and Christians at a time when antisemitic propaganda was being stepped up, helping to isolate and expose both fascists and right-wing local Labour leaders.”

Let’s move back to Europe. The “lost world” of Jewish life in interwar Poland is very often invoked with nostalgia – the romanticised shtetl (small town) focusing on food, family warmth and traditional customs. But there is another side to the story.

Arnold Zable, an Australian refugee activist and writer, describes his trip to Poland to meet people of his parents’ generation. He says:

“Stories survived, countless tales of partisans and revolutionaries, resistance fighters and firebrands engaged in a fiery struggle.”

From Arnold’s words I got the idea for the sub title of our book: ‘Revolutionaries, Resistance fighters and firebrands‘. With rising antisemitism in Poland in the 1930s, the Bund again set up self defence groups.

Today, the Jewish working class says to the fascist and antisemitic hoodlums: the time has passed when Jews could be subject to pogroms with impunity… Pogroms [will not] remain unpunished.

The Bund didn’t want confrontations between Poles and Jews but between fascists and anti-fascists. So they deliberately drew in non-Jewish workers. The Bund and the Polish Socialist Party collaborated over Mayday parades and held general strikes against pogroms and antisemitic attacks. That cooperation built up over many years habits so when the nazis invaded in 1939, thousands of Jews found a hiding place in the flats of non-Jewish workers.

And this brings us to the war and the Holocaust and the worst of the myth of Jewish passivity – that Jews went to the concentration camps like sheep to the slaughter.

But there were underground resistance movements in approximately 100 ghettos and armed uprisings in 50. There were also uprisings in 21 concentration camps and approximately 50 Jewish partisan groups. About 10,000 people survived in family camps in the forest.

Forced labourers in shoe factories sabotaged by putting nails in boots and tailors sewed left arms into right armholes of coats and vice versa. The united underground organisation in Minsk had a culture of solidarity between Jews and non-Jews. It ran a clandestine press, smuggled children out of the ghetto and helped 10,000 to escape to the forest, most of whom survived the war.

There are so many more stories I could tell you, but if I told you all of them you wouldn’t buy the book! So I will end with this – the women couriers who maintained communications between the ghettos.

They smuggled people, cash, fake IDs, underground publications, information and weapons. They hid items in their clothes, their bras, in sanitary towels, in their shoes, in sacks of potatoes. They smuggled guns in loaves of bread and coded messages in their plaited hair. Most of these women were members of Jewish socialist youth groups or communists. Yet they are virtually unknown.

So my last story is about a communist Niuta Teitelbaum – blonde and blue eyed and looking like a naïve young Polish teenager. But as an assassin she used to walk openly into the offices or homes of gestapo officers and shoot them in cold blood. One day she strolled up to the guards outside a gestapo prison, feigned shame, and whispered that she needed to speak to a certain officer about a “personal matter”. The guards assumed that she was pregnant, and they politely showed her the way. Once in the officer’s room she pulled out a concealed pistol with a silencer and shot him. On the way out, she smiled meekly at the guards who’d let her in.

The couriers endured prison, rape, humiliation and beatings and kept on fighting. The astonishing bravery, intelligence, resourcefulness, drive, determination and self-sacrifice of these women fully destroys the myth that Jews “went as sheep to the slaughter”.

I’m now going to wrap up and end in German. The following translates the German spoken words:

I want to say how exciting and inspiring I find this whole history – a Jewish radical tradition, a tradition of socialists who fought back against oppression and exploitation, a history of resistance and of the struggle to change the world. A history of people who didn’t just weep and hide away, who refused to be just victims or to join the oppressors. This history has been a joy to rediscover.

But this history doesn’t just belong to Jews. It belongs to all of us here in this room, and to all of those who are engaged in struggle against the horrors of our society, of oppression and exploitation and of war. This isn’t an academic or a sectional history but is avowedly partisan, a history to support and inspire struggle.

So I want to end with the words of Marek Edelmann, a Bundist and participant in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. After the war Edelmann went back to Poland and remained a radical all his life. During the second Palestinian Intifada Edelman wrote a letter to the Palestinians. He compared them to the Jewish Fighting Organisation that had led the Warsaw ghetto uprising. He addressed it to “commanders of the Palestinian military … to all the soldiers of the Palestinian fighting organisation”.

Just as Edelmann linked the resistance fighters in Warsaw, so do I link the Jewish radical tradition with today’s fight of the Palestinians against expropriation, persecution and genocide. I stand with Palestine. I hope the book that Donny and I have written will contribute to the ongoing struggle for their freedom and for the freedom of all of us.

As Milan Kundera says:

“The first step in liquidating a people is to erase its memory. Destroy its books, its culture, its history. Then have somebody write new books, manufacture a new culture, invent a new history. Before long that nation will begin to forget what it is and what it was… The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting.”

Copies of Janey’s book The Radical Jewish Tradition: Revolutionaries, Resistance fighters and firebrands are available for €15 from team@theleftberlin.com.