As Israel Attacks Iran, in the Name of ‘Self-Defence’, Hundreds of Delegates
in Vienna Reject Western Imperialism Mad Dog
Tony Greenstein's speech at the Anti-Zionist Jewish
Congress, Vienna 14 June 2025
The
conference which I attended from June 13-15, organised by a small Steering Committee based
in Vienna, was a truly joyous coming together of Palestine solidarity activists
the world over. There was even a delegation from Indonesia.
The
conference itself was overbooked with hundreds of people having to be turned
away. Jewish and non-Jewish people of all faiths and none were united in a
determination to see an end to the poisonous ideology of Zionism which motivated
the creation of the Israeli state.
Ilan Pappe speaking at Anti-Zionist Jewish Congress 13 June 2025
On
the eve of the conference Israel launched an unprovoked attack on Iran, almost
certainly in co-ordination with the United States and Britain, using Iran’s
nuclear facilities as the pretext for the attack.
Tonight
we hear of a massive Iranian counter-attack which has hit Tel Aviv, the centre
of the failed state with Tel Aviv being hit particularly hard. It is small
justice for razing Gaza to rubble but welcome nonetheless. The sooner Israeli citizens
become accustomed to their own homes being bombed, the sooner they may
recognise that Palestinians have had to put up with this particular Israeli speciality
for far too long.
Ghada Karmi Francesca Albanese Rahma Zein & Rima Hassan @ Vienna AntiZionist Jewish Congress 13.6.25
Zionism
was called by one speaker, Ghada Karmi, an ideology of evil and it is entirely
appropriate.A state 47% of whose Jewish
citizens responded in a poll undertaken by Pennsylvania State University to say
they wanted to exterminate every last human being in Gaza.
The
state allegedly set up as compensation for the annihilation of Jews in the Holocaust
has become the mirror image of Nazi Germany.
Israelis
commemorate the Holocaust on 3 separate days each year and for the rest of the
year they keep their remaining holocaust survivors in poverty. The holocaust,
like anti-Semitism, has been weaponised to legitimise a state based on the same
founding principles that Nazi Germany was founded on.
There
were a range of speakers today – both on live video call and in person. The
Conference was open by veteran Israeli anti-Zionist Haim Bresheeth from Britain’s
Jewish Network for Palestine.
The
first session’s speakers were Ghada Karmi, Ilan Pappe and Rima Hassan, the
heroine of the freedom flotilla and Francesca
Albanese, the fearless UN Special Rapporteur on Palestine. The latter two appeared
by video link. Rima had intended to attend in person but because of her
kidnapping by Israel she was unable to make it. The session was moderated by
Haim Bresheeth.
We
had a special video greeting delegates from Roger Waters who Iunderstand very generously helped fund the
conference which was enormously expensive.
The
next session was moderated by Ronnie Barkan. Yakov Rabkin spoke by zoom, with Donny Gluckstein,
Haim Bresheeth and Awad Abdelfatah speaking in person.
Speakers at the next session were Ilan Pappé, Ghada Karmi, Ramzy Baroud
hosted and moderated by Peter Eisenstein and Gülmihri Aytaç
After the evening meal the final session had the Jewish podcaster Katie
Halper, Rahma Zein, Wieland Hoban and Astrid Wagner.
Tomorrow morning starts with a session From Pride to Denial: Arab Jews and Integrating
in the Arab World with Iris Hefets,
Reuven Abergel, and Camille Levy Sarfati speaking.
After that there will be a session on Reclaiming Anti-Fascism and Fighting
the Instrumentalisation of Antisemitism at which Tony Greenstein, Stephen Kapos,
Wieland Hoban and Wilhelm Langthaler will speak.
In the afternoon there will be a session on Decolonisation and Liberation: The
Relevance of Historical Models when Ronnie Barkan, Ramzy Baroud and
Roshan Dadoo will be speaking.
The final session tomorrow Against Zionism and Imperialism: The Move to Ending
Impunity, Implementing Sanctions will include Peter Eisenstein, Haim Bresheeth, Tarkan Tek and Irina Vana as
speakers.
The Congress will continue on the Sunday with three parallel workshops
taking place over two sessions, with feedback and discussion on workshops.
The Congress represents the first visible sign of the cracks in the
previously monolithic support of diaspora Jewish communities for Zionism and Israel.
Jewish people world wide are waking up the fact that they are being used by the
imperialist elites as a moral alibi for Israel’s genocide and mass murder and
apartheid. An Israel which is occupying Lebanese and Syrian territory, and which
will threaten Jordan and Egypt in the future is attacking Iran and Yemen now.
Israel is imperialism’s mad dog run wild in the Middle East. Every time
it attacks a country it is for self-defence. Just like its bogus attacks on
people as ‘anti-Semites’ this dressing up of continual attacks on its
neighbours as ‘self-defence’ is wearing thin as shown by every poll in Western
countries, including the United States.
Today we have a situation where the elites in society everywhere
support the Zionist State of Israel but the people are increasingly expressing
theirrevulusion at a state whose
militarism is resembling that of its ideological father, Adolf Hitler.
For further details of speaker see below and for the programme see here.
Stand Up to Racism/SWP Are Taught a Lesson You Can’t Stand Up to Racism While Marching With Zionists
Tony Greenstein Speech at Glasgow Palestine March Against Genocide 16 March 2024
Ronnie Barkan, an Israeli Jew and supporter of Palestinian Action and myself were invited by Scottish
Palestine Solidarity Campaign to speak and address a demonstration in Glasgow City
Centre, on Saturday.
There were a number of
other speakers from Glasgow’s Muslim and Palestinian communities in addition to
the Chair of Scottish PSC, Mick Napier, who was the master of ceremonies. We
also had children leading the chanting and one reading out her poem. Children
also led the demonstration to symbolise the appalling death toll of children in
Israel’s monstrous attack.
The civilian who was run over and mutilated by Israeli tank bulldozers was already in custody, with visible marks of bruising and restraints on what remains of his body. pic.twitter.com/HzdKbZatdr
After the initial
speeches the march set off on a circular route back to its initial starting
point where there were more speeches.
It is very clear that
Glasgow, like so many other towns and cities in Britain, has been energised by
the genocide and slaughter in Gaza and the complicity of Britain’s political
leaders – Sunak and Starmer in that slaughter.
It is a sad reflection of
the state of Britain’s democracy that over 70% of people support an immediate ceasefire whereas Starmer and Sunak
support the war crimes of Israel and go along with the narrative that Israel’s
war is against Hamas rather than against the Palestinians of Gaza as Israel’s
leaders themselves admit.
Glasgow Palestine Solidarity March Saturday March 16th
Nearly 70% of Americans also support a ceasefire but this too has had no
effect on the President, Genocide Joe Biden or Congress. It shows how democracy in the West is a charade and that the people who rule us are those with the deepest pockets, like Sunak.
Glasgow Palestine Demonstration 16 March 2024
The elites that
govern us do so in their interests not ours. Our views don’t count when the
interests of the corporations are at stake. The United States however suddenly
remembered about international law when the Houthis started attacking Israeli ships
in the Red Sea. It seems trade is more important than the mere death of thousands of Palestinians.
So it is quite
understandable that Rishi Sunak, an empty politician devoid of a single
original thought, mediocre even by the standards of British politicians, when voters in Rochdale gave their verdict on Israel’s slaughter, came dashing
out of Downing Street, all scowl and rage, to berate us about the violent mobs
and hate stalking our streets.
Why Jewish children were,
he told us, afraid to wear their school uniforms such was the level of hate.
Anti-Semitism was just around the corner and even worse Jews couldn’t go into
the centre of London for fear of mobs of Palestinians and other anti-Semites.
Of course anti-Zionist Jews on the march are invisible because we don’t provide the moral
alibi that imperialism desires in its forever wars.
If the majority of British Jews and their communal organisations in this country had any self-awareness or understanding of their role as stool pigeons they might realise that Jews are being used and manipulated by crooks like Sunak and Starmer in order to justify further attacks on democratic rights such as freedom of speech and the right to protest.
There is no evidence that anti-Semitism
is increasing, if only because the IHRA misdefinition of anti-Semitism has conflated anti-zionism and anti-Semitism
making any statistics meaningless. I suspect that virtually all the alleged incidents of anti-Semitism relate to Gaza and the claims of the Board of Deputies that British Jews support genocide in Gaza.
Very few incidents are likely to occur because of traditional anti-Semitism i.e. irrational hate or hostility to Jews as Jews because of stereotypes that they are rich or engaged in conspiracies against non-Jews. The familiar neo-Nazi tropes of a bygone age.
If there is an
increase in anti-Semitism then whose fault is that if not those who go out of
their way to associate British Jews with Israel’s crimes? It is Sunak and Starmer
who bear the responsibility for any increase in anti-Semitism for associating British Jews with the genocide that is taking place.
Jews are the stool
pigeons, the pawns and pets thrown a bone by the British ruling class in exchange for their role in legitimising the crimes of British imperialism in the Middle East.
But if anyone was to
suggest that Jews bear a responsibility for Israel’s actions then that would be
called anti-Semitism under the IHRA
definition of anti-Semitism which gives as an example of anti-Semitism ‘Holding
Jews collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel.’ This is usually called having your cake and eating it.
Faced with the
unpopularity of Britain’s support for Israel what does Rishi do, with the full
support of that waste of space Starmer? He promises to bring in new laws to
make protests and demonstrations a criminal offence.
And the
Islamaphobe-in-Chief of the Cabinet, Michael Gove, who engineered the infamous Trojan Horse Affair, promises to redefine
extremism so that anyone opposed to capitalism and war is, by definition an
extremist. Some people might say that supporting the bombing of hospitals and
torturing their doctors is a sign of extremism but who am I to question this
government fruitcake?
Stand Up to Racism & the SWP + the Police
Welcome & Protect Zionists on their 'antiracist' march
None of which excuses the
Socialist Workers Party in the guise of Stand Up to Racism for deciding, for a
seventh year in a row, that they would hold a March Against Racism in conjunction
with genocidal racists in Glasgow Friends of Israel and COFIS.
This year they decided to hold their march and demonstration on the
outskirts of Glasgow outside the BBC Scotland offices and what a
miserable affair it was.There were less than 300 of them with some 10 Zionists frothing at the
back.
At a time of genocide
Palestinians and their supporters had decided that unlike previous years it was
best to simply ignore them and their police minders.
Instead people flocked to
the SPSC demonstration in the city centre and the SUTR/SWP and the massed ranks of
Scotland trade union officials, all 300 of them, were left to enjoy the company of far-right Zionists. This is proof
of one thing – that SUTR is a paper campaign backed by trade union bureaucrats
and just about no one else.
Stand Up to Racism march 2019 with Zionists - notice the close co-ordination between Police & stewards
Jonathan
asks ‘Why is
the same western media obsessively reheating five-month-old allegations against
Hamas so reluctant to focus on Israel’s current, horrifying atrocities?’ and the
answer has to be that when it comes to the crimes of Western imperialism’s
watchdog in the Middle East anything goes.
If in future years SUTR/SWP don’t
learn the lesson of this year then it’s clear that they are best ignored. The
SWP should be left with its Zionist friends to oppose ‘racism’.
Tony Greenstein
The Zionist
Organisations that SUTR/SWP are Marching With - In Their Own Words
Glasgow Friends of Israel member Edward Sutherland, a Christian Zionist, in May 2022 was reprimanded
by the General Teaching Council for posting ‘vile’
anti-Semitic messages on Facebook using an alias, Stevie Harrison.
Sammy Stein (right), Chair of Glasgow Friends of Israel and Max Dunbar, ex-BNP and neo-Nazi holocaust denier have a friendly chat before harassing Scottish PSC stall
The reference of John Byrne to 'payback' is the murder of 50 Muslims in New Zealand in an attack by a neo-Nazi
Razan al-Najar was a medic tending to the wounded when Israeli snipers murdered her. The disgusting suggestion by GFI that she deliberately got herself killed or that Hamas raped/bribed her shows the depths to which SUTR's friends will sink. Israeli snipers killed over 300 and injured thousands of peaceful demonstrators at the Great Return march in 2018 and GFI support that.
Hostages
tortured to death. Parents executed in front of their children. Doctors
beaten. Babies murdered. Sexual assault weaponised.
No, not
Hamas crimes. This is part of an ever-growing list of documented atrocities
committed by Israel in the five months since 7 October - quite separate
from the carpet bombing of 2.3 million Palestinians
in Gaza and a famine induced by Israel’s obstruction of
aid.
Last
week, an investigation by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz disclosed that some 27 Palestinians
seized off Gaza’s streets over the past five months are known to have died
during interrogations inside Israel.
Some were
denied medical treatment. But most are likely to have been tortured to death.
Three
months ago, a Haaretz editorial warned that Israeli jails “must not become
execution facilities for Palestinians”.
Israeli soldiers inside an evacuated compound of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) in Gaza City on 8 February, 2024 (AFP)
Israeli
TV channels have been excitedly taking viewers on tours of detention centres,
showing the appalling conditions Palestinians are kept in, as well as the psychological and physical abuse they are subjected to.
An
Israeli judge recently called the makeshift cages in which Palestinians are
held “unsuitable for humans”.
Remember,
a large proportion of the 4,000 or so Palestinians taken hostage by Israel
since 7 October - probably the vast majority - are civilians, like the men and
boys paraded through Gaza’s streets or held in a stadium stripped of clothing before being dragged
off to a dark cell in Israel.
Women
abused
According
to Israeli media, many dozens of Palestinian women - including pregnant women -
have been seized too, but in their case off camera.
Presumably,
Israel has wished to avoid undermining its careful messaging that only Hamas
weaponises violence against women.
But
according to United Nations legal experts, Palestinian women are suffering the
most degrading forms of abuse at the hands of the Israeli military.
Soldiers
are also believed to have taken photos of female detainees in degrading
circumstances and then uploaded them online
The experts observed that Palestinian women and girls in
detention were reportedly being subjected to “multiple forms of sexual assault,
such as being stripped naked and searched by male Israeli army officers.
"At
least two female Palestinian detainees were reportedly raped while others were
reportedly threatened with rape and sexual violence."
Soldiers
are also believed to have taken photos of female detainees in degrading
circumstances and then uploaded them online.
Palestinian
women and girls in Gaza are also reported by their families to have gone
missing after contact with the Israeli army.
“There
are disturbing reports of at least one female infant forcibly transferred by
the Israeli army into Israel, and of children being separated from their
parents, whose whereabouts remain unknown,” they said.
Beatings,
waterboarding
A
separate report by the UN last week revealed that 21 of its staff -
humanitarian aid workers - had been snatched by Israel. They were then tortured to extract confessions, most likely false, of
involvement in Hamas’ 7 October attack. Their torture included beatings,
waterboarding and threats to family members.
Those
confessions were cited by western allies as the grounds - in fact, the only
known grounds - for cutting off funding to the UN relief agency Unrwa, the last
lifeline for Gaza’s starving population. It was these claims, extracted through
torture, that helped Israel rationalise its imposing of a famine on Gaza.
Palestinian
men rounded up and stripped by Israeli forces in Gaza before being taken to an
undisclosed location (Screengrab/X)
Of the 1,000 detainees subsequently released, 29 were children,
one as young as six, and 80 women. Some were reported to have cancer and
chronic illnesses such as Alzheimer’s.
According
to the UN investigation, Palestinians reported severe punishment beatings,
being caged with attack dogs, and suffering sexual assault. Physical evidence -
such as broken ribs, dislocated shoulders, bite marks, and burns - was still
visible many weeks later.
Executions,
human shields
These
horrors, of course, are not just taking place in cells and interrogation rooms
inside Israel. Gaza is being subjected to astonishing levels of brutality and
sadism from Israeli troops - quite aside from the carpet bombing and enforced
starvation of civilians.
The
Israeli military has used Palestinians as human shields, including one man sent
into a hospital, his hands bound, to announce an Israeli order to evacuate the
premises. Israeli forces executed him on his return.
Those
trying to follow such evacuation orders, waving white flags, have been shot at.
Medical facilities
have been repeatedly invaded by the Israeli military in stark violation of
international law. Those who could not be evacuated, such as premature
babies, have been left to die unattended, even while Israeli soldiers were
occupying the building.
This
week, the BBC interviewed medical staff who reported being tortured, savagely
beaten and having attack dogs set on them inside the Nasser hospital in Khan
Younis after Israeli soldiers stormed it.
One, Dr
Ahmed Abu Sabha, had his hands broken. He told
the BBC: “They put me on a chair and it was like a gallows. I heard sounds
of ropes, so I thought I was going to be executed.”
The BBC
interviewed medical staff who reported being tortured, savagely beaten and
having attack dogs set on them inside the Nasser hospital in Khan Younis
At
another stage, he and other detainees were beaten in the back of a truck, while
only in their underwear. They were taken to a gravel pit, where they were made
to kneel blindfolded. They believed they were about to be executed.
During
his eight days as hostage, Sabha was never questioned.
Dozens
more medics are believed missing, presumed to still be in Israeli
detention.
Photographs
published by the BBC also show patients in the grounds of Nasser hospital in
beds with their hands bound tightly above their heads.
Those who
died were left to decompose by Israeli soldiers. A doctor there, Dr Hatim
Rabaa, told the BBC: “Patients were screaming, ‘Please remove them [the
corpses] from here'. I was telling them, 'It isn't in my hands'."
Other
examples of murderous cruelty are documented daily. Unarmed Palestinians,
including those waving white flags, have been shot dead by Israeli soldiers. Palestinian parents have been executed in cold blood in front of
their children. There have been repeated episodes of Israeli forces gunning down en
masse desperate Palestinians trying to reach aid, as happened yet again
this week. And even Israeli hostages trying to escape their captors have
been killed by the very Israeli soldiers they were trying to surrender
to.
These are
just some of the cases of Israeli sadism and barbarity that have surfaced
briefly in western media coverage, soon to be forgotten.
Wiping
Gaza off the map
The
stomach-turning double standards are impossible to ignore.
The
western establishment media has been chock full of the most lurid allegations
of savagery directed against Hamas, sometimes with little or no supporting
evidence. Claims that Hamas beheaded babies or put them in ovens - emblazoned
on front pages - were later found to be nonsense.
A
makeshift sign reading in Hebrew 'help, 3 hostages' using leftover food
reportedly shown by Israeli hostages before being shot dead by Israeli
soldiers, 17 December 2023 (AFP)
Accusations
against Hamas have been endlessly reheated to paint a picture of a supremely
dangerous and bestial militant group, in turn rationalising the carpet bombing
and starvation of Gaza’s population to “eradicate” it as a terrorist
organisation.
But
equally barbarous atrocities committed by Israel - not in the heat of battle,
but in cold blood - are treated as unfortunate, isolated incidents that cannot
be connected, that paint no picture, that reveal nothing of import about the
military that carried them out.
If Hamas’
crimes were so savage and sadistic they still need to be reported months after
they took place, why does the establishment media never feel the need to
express equal horror and indignation at the acts of cruelty and sadism being
inflicted by Israel on Gaza - not five months ago, but right now?
This is
part of a pattern of behaviour by the western media that leads to only one
possible deduction: Israel’s five-month-long attack on Gaza is not being
reported. Rather, it is being selectively narrated - and for the most obscene
of purposes.
War
on Gaza: Israel's food-queue slaughter cannot go unpunished
Through
consistent and glaring failures in their coverage, establishment media -
including supposedly liberal outlets, from the BBC and CNN to the Guardian and
New York Times - have smoothed the way for Israel to carry out mass slaughter
in Gaza, what the World Court has assessed as plausibly a genocide.
The role
of the media has not been to keep us, their audiences, informed about one of
the greatest crimes in living memory. It has been to buy time for US President
Joe Biden to keep arming his most useful of client states in the oil-rich
Middle East, and to do so without damaging his prospects for re-election in
November’s US presidential vote.
If
Russian President Vladimir Putin was a madman and a barbarous war criminal for invading
Ukraine, as every western media outlet agrees, what does that make Israeli
officials, when every one of them supports far worse atrocities in Gaza,
directed overwhelmingly at civilians?
And more
to the point, what does that make Biden and the US political class for
materially backing Israel to the hilt: sending bombs, vetoing demands for a
ceasefire at the United Nations, and freezing desperately needed aid?
Worrying
about the optics, the president expresses his discomfort, but he carries on helping Israel
regardless.
While
western politicians and commentators worry about some imaginary existential
threat those brief events of five months ago pose to the
nuclear-armed state of Israel, Israel is quite literally wiping Gaza off the
map day by day, quite undisturbed.
Hamas
‘started it’
There
have been two, largely implicit defences for this glaring imbalance in western
priorities. Neither stands up to even the most cursory scrutiny.
One is
the argument that Hamas “started it” - insinuated in the endless claim that, in
destroying Gaza, Israel has been “responding” or “retaliating” to the violence
of 7 October.
This is a
justification for killing tens of thousands of Palestinians and starving two
million more that should never have been let out of the playground. But worse,
it is patent nonsense. Hamas did not initiate anything on 7 October, except for
handing Israel a pretext to wreck Gaza.
Hamas
started nothing on 7 October. It was simply a new, and particularly gruesome
phase in what has been decades of Palestinian resistance to Israel’s
belligerent occupation of Gaza
The
enclave has been under a crushing siege for 17 years, in which its land, sea
and air were patrolled constantly by Israel. Its population was denied the
essentials of life. They had no freedom of movement apart from inside their
cage.
Long
before the current Israeli-induced famine, Israel’s trade restrictions had
ensured high levels of malnutrition among Gaza’s children. Most exhibited too the scars of deep psychological trauma from constant and massive attacks
by Israel on Gaza.
Biden
crows about building a “temporary pier” - weeks or months down the road - to bring aid into Gaza that
is desperately needed now. But there is a reason the enclave lacks a seaport
and airport. Israel bombed the only airport back in 2001, long before
Hamas took charge of Gaza. It has been attacking and killing fishermen trawling
just off Gaza's coast for years.
Israel
has refused to allow Gaza to connect to the world - and break free of Israeli
control - ever since.
Hamas
started nothing on 7 October. It was simply a new, and particularly gruesome
phase in what has been decades of Palestinian resistance to Israel’s
belligerent occupation of Gaza.
Bogus
narrative
The other
implicit defence of western establishments constantly stressing Hamas’
barbarism over Israel’s is that the nature of those atrocities is said to be
categorically different - in the apples and pears sense.
Hamas
supposedly demonstrated a degree of sadism in its killing spree on 7 October
inside Israel that marks it out from Israel’s far larger killing spree in
Gaza.
That has
been the basis for every media interview that requires guests to “condemn” Hamas before they are allowed to express
concern about the slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza. No one is asked to condemn
Israel.
In
Gaza, the hospital was our last place of sanctuary. Then Israel bombed it
It is the
basis too for permitting Israeli spokespeople to claim unchallenged that Israel
targets only Hamas, not civilians, even while some three-quarters of Gaza’s
dead are women and children.
On the
BBC’s evening news at the weekend, presenter Clive Myrie made precisely this
preposterous assertion as he intoned that since 7 October, “Israel launched a
relentless bombing campaign targeting members of Hamas.”
But the
latest revelations of the 27 reported deaths in Israeli torture centres and the
testimonies of beaten medics from Nasser Hospital confirm how bogus this entire
narrative framing by the western media is - one intended to mislead and
misinform audiences.
Israel
claims it is targeting Hamas, but its actions tell an entirely different story.
Famine will kill off the sick and vulnerable long before it does Hamas
fighters.
The truth
is, Israel is not primarily eradicating Hamas. It is eradicating Gaza. Its
crimes are at least as cruel and savage as anything Hamas did on 7 October -
and its atrocities have been carried out on a far larger scale and for far
longer.
Western
establishments and their media have been waging a giant campaign of
misdirection for the past five months, as they have against Palestinians over
previous years and decades. Western publics have been encouraged to look in the
wrong direction.
Until
that changes, the men, women and children of Gaza will continue to pay the
heaviest of prices at the hands of a vengeful, sadistic Israeli military.
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