This is an edited version of Gilbert Achcar's second contribution in the final session of the day, entitled "Solidarity and the Socialist perspective", "What kind of forces should socialists be dealing with in the Middle East? The established socialist principle is to support the popular resistance to imperialism despite the leadership of the movement.
Our anti-imperialism iS. unconditional. We are opposed to imperialist governments intervening militarily or trying to impose their will anywhere. Supporting the withdrawal of imperialist troops from the region is objectively a way of supporting people's right to resist. We don't try to impose preconditions based on the nature of the leadership.
But this means that we have to avoid a simplistic approach that says "the enemy of my enemy is my friend".
We need to look the real circumstances on the ground. It's much more complicated than just giving support to whoever is fighting imperial1sm.
Iraq is a case where you couldn't meaningfully say "support the resistance". The key forces fighting the occupation were also fighting a sectarian war. You can't identify any forces deserving direct support. There isn't any kind of significant progressive national force existing on the ground.
The tragedy in Iraq is that the only force that could have been a source of hope, the Iraqi Communist Party, behaved disastrously after the occupation.
They joined Bremer's council and discredited themselves. In the last elections • they got less than 1% of the
This contrast with the situation in the 1950s where the Communists led demonstrations of more than a million people and had huge support among the Shites. When you look at the forces that are now dominant you can see how big the regression has been.
The Oil Workers' Union is the only significant working class force. This deserves the
page 17 of the scan
and ecology