Genocide is no longer a red line for Germany’s Die Linke
Genocide is no longer a red line for Germany’s Die Linke
Reinstating Kilani’s party membership would go a long way in proving that genocide actually is a red line for the traditional German left.
Linke (The Left) party expelled with immediate effect Palestinian-German member and activist Ramsis Kilani for his vocal opposition to "Israel’s" ongoing genocide in Gaza. In doing so, it followed in the footsteps of the only other mainstream leftist party in the country, the Greens, in exhibiting the infamous Palestine exception to progressive politics.
Kilani, a self-described Marxist, called his expulsion "a sad commentary on a leftist, internationalist party", left-wing daily junge Welt (jw) reported. The decision made by the Landesschiedskommission, the party’s state-level arbitration body was damaging "to all of us who fight for universal human rights", the activist wrote on Instagram.
Katina Schubert, one of two members from the party’s right-wing who had brought forward the motion to expel Kilani denied that his Palestine solidarity activism had anything to do with the decision, saying that it was based on his "relativisation of Hamas terror, selective criticism of violence against women as a weapon of war and denial of "Israel’s" right to exist", the jw report went on to say.
Yeah no wonder conservatives are winning victories all across the democratic world. It seems the left wing has suffered a collective lobotomy. We live in a world where the left is fragmented in purpose, condoning the unacceptable, and ineffective in climate action. It would be cool if the left was, you know, actually the left, instead of trying to be more like the cool right wing because they think that's what would win them more votes. Have some dignity, guys. Nobody is going to vote for the second, third or fourth best party at being right wing.
Not so simple. France has a radical leftwing party (The France Unbowed) that has been denouncing the genocide in Gaza for months. They got 70 deputies in the last snap elections, far from giving them any mandate to govern the country... Their activism is indeed a way to get votes from French people of Maghreb origins. Still, people label them as antisemitic because they won't accept the self-defense narrative that is being pushed by Israel.
I get that, i really do, but sometimes you just gotta take the loss for being unpopular if the cause is right. Israel is less popular today than it was yesterday. Sometimes you can't help that your core principles are not valued by the majority at the moment, for whatever reason. If events change the minds of people, there's a steady alternative to go to. To debase one's principles to appeal to the right wing voters will only make their constituency not vote. People who are right wing won't vote left because they are more anti immigration or more pro Israel. But people who vote left won't probably vote at all if the alternatives are right wing or right wing light. They just won't see themselves represented at all. Then you get low voter turnout.
I mean, whether people want to admit it or not, the mixing of some pretty uncomfortable anti-zionist language with the legitimate criticism of human rights atrocities in Gaza, as well as the extreme purity testing which accompanies it, is seriously harming the peace movement.
Anti-Zionism is anti-fascism, it should be a baseline on the left. That's not "purity testing"
From their statement, it sounds less like genocide isn't a red line for them, and more like they just straight up support genocide.
the only other mainstream leftist party in the country, the Greens
That particular mainstream "left" party is so left they should rename themselves "Browns"