On October 7, Operation al-Aqsa Flood began, marking a new wave of Palestinian resistance to Zionism. Zionism is the belief that Jewish people are a nation, and not a religion. Not only is this theory plainly false, it need only be said that this was a core tenet of the Nazi race-nation theory to show how harmful it is politically. In opposition to the theory and practice of Zionism, hundreds of millions of people around the world of all religions, backgrounds, and nationalities have demonstrated for a united and free Palestine. More American workers, and the national minorities in particular, are realizing they have a lot in common with the Palestinian people. They see that the compulsory deductions from their pay go directly to US imperialism, including arming the state of Israel, and that this state’s sole purpose is expropriating land from people in the Middle East. The basis for collaboration between the Palestinian people and American workers is clear, we are both directly harmed by US imperialist capitalism and the policy of endless arms production for Israel. However, there is one group of Americans which is decidedly not in favor of such solidarity. In fact, this group approves of the state of Israel and defends its “right to” genocide the Palestinian population, and allies itself with politicians that divert money to Israel and persecute opposition to Zionism. This group is the state union bureaucrats and their lackeys.

How have the various US state unions reacted to this new wave of Palestinian resistance and the Israeli retaliation against the Palestinian people? The International Brotherhood of Teamsters has basically ignored it, instead opting to endorse Democrat Adam Schiff on October 10, after the Israeli counterattack began to take the shape of outright ethnic cleansing. The National Education Association (NEA) president promoted the Education International statement saying, “Education International previously denounced the terrorist attack launched by Hamas against Israeli civilians. To break the cycle of violence, Education International emphasized the necessity for the international community to unite in a resolute denouncement of all forms [!] of violence.” The American Federation of Teachers (AFT) is affiliated to the Public Services International, which covers 40 million workers in total, and which said, “The 31st Congress of Public Services International expresses its deepest condolences and solidarity to all those civilians who have suffered losses and injuries in Israel and Palestine. Hamas’s brutal attacks on Israel, which have resulted in over one thousand people dead, the taking hostages and the using of them as human shields, are terrorist actions meant to brutally impact on civilians. The reaction of Israel to collectively punish the population of Gaza for the actions of Hamas resulting in the indiscriminate killing of civilian Palestinians cannot be justified either. The denial of water, electricity, medical supplies and humanitarian assistance by Israel to the people of Gaza who have already had to endure a 16-year blockade is a fundamental breach of international law and may [!] constitute a war crime.”

On October 17, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) released a statement saying, “SEIU believes that all Israelis and Palestinians deserve safety, freedom from violence, and the opportunity to thrive. Our union includes many who have family members, Israeli and Palestinian, who have been impacted by the recent violence. We stand against antisemitism, Islamophobia, racism and hate in all its forms around the world. SEIU unequivocally condemns the horrific terrorist attack by Hamas that took place on October 7th, and all violence against innocent civilians, no matter their background. We are also deeply troubled by the emerging humanitarian crisis in Gaza. We join other organizations calling for an end to attacks on civilians, immediate humanitarian aid to the people of Gaza, the safe return of hostages, and long-term solutions that will bring safety, peace and justice to the people of the region.”

The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), which provides all sorts of logistical support to the state unions, said that, “We unequivocally condemn the killing of all civilians. It is imperative for international human rights law [those written by and enforced by the US and its proxies] to be respected. […] NYC DSA’s #NotOnOurDime campaign—led by DSA member & NY Assemblymember Zohran Mamdani—provides an effective [?] model for pressuring elected officials to stop providing financial support to the Israeli state.” And a week later the DSA said, “We call on every member of Congress to demand an immediate ceasefire and to vote against providing military aid to the Israeli state.” The fact that this opportunity already came and went, and DSA reps failed to vote against military aid to Israel, is simply ignored.

Similar statements can be found all throughout the various publications and social media outlets of the “official” labor movement. As for the “official” opposition, Labor Notes promoted a call for ceasefire which reads, “We, members of the American labor movement, mourn the loss of life in Israel and Palestine. We express our solidarity with all workers and our common desire for peace in Palestine and Israel, and we call on President Joe Biden and Congress to push for an immediate ceasefire and end to the siege of Gaza. We cannot bomb our way to peace. We also condemn any hate crimes against Muslims, Jews, or anyone else. In issuing this call, U.S. unions are joining the efforts of 13 Congressmembers [!] and others who are calling for an immediate ceasefire. The basic rights of people must be restored. Water, fuel, food, and other humanitarian aid must be allowed into Gaza, power must be restored, and foreign nationals and Palestinians requiring medical care must be allowed out of Gaza. The Israeli hostages taken by Hamas must be immediately released. Both Hamas and Israel must adhere to standards of international law and Geneva Convention rules of warfare concerning the welfare and security of civilians. There must be a ceasefire in Gaza. The cycle of violence must stop so that negotiations for an enduring peace proceed. The U.S. must act. We call on President Biden to immediately call for a ceasefire.”

The pattern is clear. The right-wing of the state unions is actively aiding Zionism by simply ignoring the crimes being carried out and openly promoting the politicians who fund and arm it. The left-wing of the state unions is lamenting the situation altogether, and impotently (by way of “calling on” Biden to “call for” a ceasefire) hoping the situation improves. The fact that nobody in the orbit of the state unions has come out in favor of what has been the default and majority progressive position for decades including among trade unions in other countries—a “one state” free and united Palestine that encompasses all of modern-day Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank—is not accidental. It is an existential fact of the state unions that they act as a transmission belt between the workers and the American bourgeois dictatorship. They are responsible for bringing the workers closer to the state economically and politically. They keep the workers within the limits set by the regulatory agencies (mainly the NLRB), and they are also responsible for bringing the state to the workers, that is, manufacturing consent to its policies. In the context of Palestine, this means rallying support for the colonial government in Palestine and covering up the ghettoization and liquidation of the Arab population. Is it not clear that all the talk about “democracy”, “peace”, and an endlessly delayed and undermined “two state solution” is a coverup for brutal repression of the Arab people and imperialist war? The issue is Israel itself, which is only able to exist at the expense of the Palestinian people and with the aid of the various Western countries that arm it. The “two state solution” is a liberal cop-out, basically identical with the justification of South African apartheid, which also created formally independent rump states known as “Bantustans”. The state unions, which are unanimously “against violence” and in favor of “two states”, are trying to cover up the fact that one of these states is actively oppressing the Palestinian people and anyone in the surrounding countries their weaponry reaches, and that the US government that they so adamantly promote as “progressive” and “pro-union” is directly responsible.

The centrism of the labor bureaucrats is explained by the fact that they are directly involved in the government and the Democratic Party and therefore cannot break with US foreign policy, which Israel plays a key role in. Israel is the United States’ forward operating base in the Middle East. Palestine has been a colony for over a century now, with Israel merely being the most recent in a long line of extreme reactionary puppet states. (Recall that before Israel, it was the British Mandate, and before that, the Ottoman empire.) The fact that the “left” of the state labor movement is in favor of a two-state solution shows that even the “left” has reconciled itself to the existence of Israel, to American imperialism, and to its colonial policy in the Middle East and elsewhere.

Consider the following: in the 2020 election cycle, the NEA spent $48 million dollars almost solely on the Democratic Party, the AFT another $18 million, AFSCME $13 million, the AFL-CIO $4 million, and the IBT $6 million. This demonstrates a high level of loyalty to the Democratic party and the massive state apparatus the Democrats oversee. And, for its part, the state is deeply involved in these unions. The state sets up regulatory agencies around them, mainly the NLRB, and it infiltrates them through its security apparatus while inviting open collaboration through the bureaucracy. For instance, Biden appointed IBT president Sean O’Brien to his “Advisory Committee for Trade Policy and Negotiations” and before that, Trump appointed then-IBT president James P. Hoffa to his “Great American Economic Revival Industry Group” for labor, alongside the AFL-CIO’s then-leader Richard Trumka. (The GEARIG also included representatives from Lockheed Martin, Northrop-Grumman, and Raytheon.) The notoriously pro-imperialist AFL-CIO ran the “American Institute for the Development of Free Trade Unions” and before that the “Free Trade Union Committee” with CIA funding to hinder the growth of left-wing unions. In April 2023, the SEIU and NEA endorsed Biden for reelection before it was even clear he would be the Democratic nominee. The AFT’s Randi Weingarten was a candidate for Secretary of Education in the Biden cabinet. The statements the state unions have put out in favor of Biden and the Democrats, even after their support for Israel turned into open support for ethnically cleansing Palestinians, are too numerous to put here.

Given these facts, it would seem inevitable that the American state unions would go in for Zionism. From the point of view of the state unions, it is a simple exchange: uphold the government’s political line, prevent work stoppages and funnel dues money to politicians, and get favors and cushy jobs in return. But from the point of view of labor, the state unions are simply the government’s enforcers. This means when a strike is imminent and deemed to be unacceptable, such as the situation of the rail workers in 2022, it is the job of the state unions to enforce the contract the company and government agree on. Which is exactly what dozens of establishment unions have done for decades. This also means that when an imperialist war is on the agenda, they are going to make sure the workers fall in line. Whether this is done by openly promoting the war, such as the IBT and the AFL-CIO with the Iraq War, or by skirting the issue as the NEA and AFT are doing right now, is a tactical problem for them. The job of the real representatives of the workers is to expose these maneuvers, which only serve to split the American workers from their international allies and put them on the path of isolation and self-destruction. The real representatives of the workers are those organizing labor for the purposes of linking up with their allies and striking actual blows against American imperialism. “Unity”, the slogan of opportunism in the labor movement, must be exposed as a cover for unity with the bourgeoisie and disunity with the workers and oppressed nations.

If you want to be an ally of Palestine and the oppressed nations, you must break ties with the state sponsored labor movement and the Democratic Party. The October 10 statement from the White House that, “We stand with Israel,” leaves no room for ambiguity and it is not an accident that the state unions, who from day one until now have been “all in” for Biden, are now failing to oppose Zionism. It is impossible to take seriously the “double dippers”, the people who see popular protests against Israel and see the increase in the state unions’ assets and want to take a bite from both. It is exactly this opportunist policy that currently dominates the labor movement and the reformists that cling to it like barnacles. Organized labor will not advance one step until the influence of such opportunism is completely wiped out. As Lenin said in Imperialism and the Split in Socialism, “On the one hand, there is the tendency of the bourgeoisie and the opportunists to convert a handful of very rich and privileged nations into ‘eternal’ parasites on the body of the rest of mankind, to ‘rest on the laurels’ of the exploitation of Negroes, Indians, etc., keeping them in subjection with the aid of the excellent weapons of extermination provided by modern militarism. On the other hand, there is the tendency of the masses, who are more oppressed than before and who bear the whole brunt of imperialist wars, to cast off this yoke and to overthrow the bourgeoisie. It is in the struggle between these two tendencies that the history of the labor movement will now inevitably develop.”

Sources

Education International statement https://www.ei-ie.org/en/item/28104:education-international-calls-for-an-immediate-stop-to-the-disproportionate-and-indistinct-retaliation-in-gaza

Teamsters Endorse Adam Schteamster orga2023/10/teamstersgendorse.adam/schiffiforasenate/lestine.html

PSI Statement https://www.teachhumanrights.com/psi-the-war-in-israel-and-palestine.html

Ceasefire statement promoted by Labor Notes on Twitter https://secure.everyaction.com/w1qW7B3pek2rTtv9ny5bqw2

DSA statement from October 7: https://www.dsausa.org/statements/end-the-violence-end-the-occupation-free-palestine/

DSA statement from October 14: https://www.dsausa.org/statements/no-money-for-massacres/

Open secrets on labor spending https://www.opensecrets.org/industries/indus.php?ind=P

AFT statement https://twitter.com/AFTunion/status/1715013823139098899

SEIU statement https://www.seiu.org/2023/10/seiu-statement-on-terrorist-attack-on-israel-and-crisis-in-gaza