The assassination of Hassan Nasrallah: one step forward two steps back

The news of Hassan Nasrallah’s assassination was shocking but not happening in a void. After Gaza, the back-to-back terror incidents happening in Lebanon orchestrated by the Zionist entity were the prelude to some bigger tragedy.

The explosion of pagers on one day and the blasting of multiple electronic gadgets on the other with the assassination of Fouad Shukar, and later the targeted killing of three other senior commanders of Hezbollah, elucidated the Zionists’ terroristic designs and future plains.

Endorsed by the evil empire of the US, akin to the rabid hounds, they were striving to smell the scent of the leader, and finally succeeded in assassinating him, a man of the highest pedestal, not only for Hezbollah but also a symbol of liberation for the oppressed people of the world at large.

Both the Western media and the Zionists are gloating gleefully on his death. Immediately after his speech at the UN Netanyahu ordered to unleash the Biblical scourge on the Amalek. The latest supply of 2000-pound bunker-buster bombs by the US was showered on Beirut, the capital of an independent country not involved in any war. No human, not even angels, could have survived the lethal effects of such a wrath, which killed or perhaps burnt alive five hundred people, including Hassan Nasrallah, immediately.

No one can deny that the assassination of Hassan Nasrallah was a big loss. He, for Finkelstein, was the Islamic Lenin, and what Finkelstein loved most about Lenin was his selflessness. Despite the onslaught of the White forces, the counter-revolutionary mercenaries and the poodles of the US, UK, and France the Soviet Union, lavished with numerous million-pound Starlings in 1917 to topple the first Marxist government, they lost the battle miserably. It was Lenin’s selflessness that electrified the entire USSR in one year. He too was assaulted by a manic reactionary woman, but he survived.

Nasrullah’s assassination coming with American consent was tragic and premature. Nevertheless, the Soviet Union had Stalin as Lenin’s substitute. Taking a leaf from history, Finkelstein doubts the abilities of the substitute of any towering personality, replacing his leader to be equally sagacious and prudent. For him, Stalin was no substitute for Lenin, hence he dismissed him outrightly.

Certainly, he was no Lenin and had his flaws and weaknesses, some as gigantic as recognition of the apartheid entity of Israel but when it came to saving the revolution, he was merciless and instrumental in defeating fascism threatening the entire globe especially when France faced a humiliating defeat and after achieving victory at Dunkirk Hitler refused to conquer Britain, considering it a wastage of time for he wanted to concentrate on his real enemy, the Soviet Union. Stalin, in the meanwhile, had metamorphosed the USSR into an invincible industrial and later during the Cold War a nuclear power.

History spirally moves forward. The assassination of Hassan Nasrallah is tragic, a blow to the cause of the oppressed universally but lest we forget his predecessor Abbas al-Musawi, was also assassinated by the agents of the same settler-colonial state built on lies, running amuck to terrorize the world.

However, what did Zionism get after assassinating Ismail Haniyeh, a moderate Hamas leader, a formidable and uncompromising figure of Yahya Sinwar? What the Zionists are expecting to receive this time from Hezbollah after the assassination of Nasrallah is someone the most radicalized leader of the group, most likely believing in the same tactics of blowing the Israeli civilians’ scalps with nonchalant ease. Eye for an Eye, the tribal justice the Bible preaches.

Zionism is not unfamiliar that an organization existing for nearly half a century, under the most gruelling and precarious circumstances, was not led by a single charismatic person. Akin to Hamas, Hezbollah is a political party and not a rag-tag group like ISIS and Al-Nusra were. The latter groups were the homemade products of the military-industrial complex, thehurriedly assembled guillotines that worked on the snapping fingers of US imperialism.

The formers are spontaneous uprisings resembling the Petrograd movement which extricated the bourgeois ruling class of Russia while Lenin was still in Norway. However, the Soviets were prepared to take up arms and the soldiers refusing to fight the first imperialist war joined their comrades. After frequent uprisings both Hamas and Hezbollah have not only modelled themselves into battle-hardened forces but also the mass political parties.

What does the US-European-Israeli nexus think? Was Hezbollah oblivious to the essential job of building a cadre to fight a long-protracted war not only against an illegitimate settler-colonial entity but also the international metropolitan capital/imperialism? Was the man prepared to take his enemy head-on remained alien to the fact of his mortality/martyrdom and postponed the plan to develop his replacements for some other day? Hezbollah was an established political party and parties Gramsci says are the nomenclature of classes, but it is also true he adds “they are not mechanical and passive expression of their classes, but react energetically upon them to develop, solidify and universalize them”. As the head of the party, anticipating martyrdom Hassan Nasrallah developed, solidified, and universalized both his party and his struggle.

Akin to Hamas Hezbollah is intricately woven into the fabric of Lebanese society. The massive bombardment of Lebanon, the atrocious crimes committed against the coloured humanity treated inferior to the white race, and being considered backward not in the field of technology but culturally as well will only strengthen Hezbollah as the destruction of Gaza has consolidated the control of Hamas on Palestine. All political parties build their organic intellectuals during the struggle and both organizations are no exceptions.

When the resistance faces the biggest imperialist empire of the world directly with meagre resources, not success but survival becomes a primary motive. In their euphoria, the Western media is pointing to the blunders committed by Hezbollah’s leadership. They became complacent, they underestimated the intelligence power of Israel, and some go as far as to say that like Saddat Iran has sold out the leadership of Hezbollah.

An authentic rebuttal to these allegations or charges is hard to present. Iran’s new president was practically beseeching the Western powers for a ceasefire and return to the Iran nuclear deal knowing fully well that the US which cancelled the deal unilaterally has no intentions to negotiate on this intricate matter whether Harris or Trump triumphed in the coming elections.

Under the US sanctions Iran’s economy is reeling. One US $ is worth more than 61000 Tuman. The sanctions have minimized the sale of Irani oil and gas exports. Despite completing the pipeline to Pakistan, the latter scary of US sanctions has failed to fulfill its promise of completing its part of the deal.

The Iranian ruling class is not revolutionary, but a theocratic reactionary one, and the 1979 revolution in the Marxist sense was a tragedy and farce happening at the same time. The ruling class is in power because of the US sanctions. The Iranian people do not want to experience a Western pinkish revolutionary mirage, which would certainly turn them into another Ukraine, changing their economy from bad to worse.

Instead of explaining the reasons for the economic dilemma to the people, the theocracy has decided to push more radical theocracy in the blood vessels of the people consequently bringing Masud Pezeshkian, a liberal into power, a man known to have a soft corner for the West.

However, the newly elected president will soon realize the indifference of the West towards Iran if he hasn’t done so. The deteriorating economic conditions have cleaved the people. Despite being oppressed themselves many have lost their conviction of supporting the oppressed people of Palestine which is unfortunate.

For strategic reasons or otherwise Iran has failed to take any action against the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh that Israel managed successfully. However, as I am writing these lines Iran has responded to the next ordeal with innumerable missiles targeting Tel Aviv.

Finkelstein succinctly emphasizes that when Israel wants to drag someone into war it does so successfully. The US-Israel nexus may start a blitzkrieg against Iran for its response. The danger is real as Israel has already started a ground invasion in Lebanon, a risky proposition for the exhausted Israeli forces unless US marines are not going to be directly involved in the ground offense.

Despite the Iranian limitations, it is the only country that is providing ammunition to Hezbollah in Lebanon, Ansarullah in Yemen, and Syria-Iraqi militia in both countries. Lest we forget the entire axis of resistance is weak, war-torn, and poverty-ridden which has decided to fight with its meagre resources against the imperialist Western might. It is not Israel but the entire global north striving to eliminate the resistance of the global south with its poodles such as Saudia, UAE, Qatar, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Morocco, and Jordan supporting it unconditionally.

History is transitorily repeating itself. It’s tragic but not a farce. From Algeria to Vietnam and from North Korea to Cambodia, Laos, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Afghanistan, Congo, Kenya, Nicaragua to Bolivia and Venezuela the trajectory is the same.

Akin to Gaza, North Korea was turned into rubble. Not a single building survived the US bombing. In Cambodia Kissinger ordered to destroy everything that moved to everything that flew. It wasn’t a victory but a war crime. People who know how to defeat their enemies know how to build their countries. Both Gaza and Lebanon will build themselves again.

Lenin in a different context stated that in struggle we move one step forward and two steps back. The Israeli aggression destroying Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, and Yemen in one day has only pushed the resistance one step back. After committing war crimes its media is celebrating. “Who has the laughter on his side.” Adorno states “has no need of proof”. In his sarcastic response, Brecht added “He who laughs hasn’t heard the bad news”.

The assassination of Hassan Nasrallah has prompted Finkelstein to state “Nasrallah was a really smart guy. And I feel the loss of his death…the world is an emptier place…. He could have gone to mountains where nuclear bombs do not affect but he decided to die with his commanders.”

Nasrallah’s assassination reminds me of the brutal assassination of Rosa Luxemburg a great Marxist theorist and activist and of Karl Liebknecht. She opposed Lenin and even criticized Marx, especially on the thesis of consumption of means of production, yet after the Bolshevik revolution Lenin put her name on the Column of Honour of World Revolutionaries with a Russian couplet in her praise ’Betimes the eagles down swoop and ‘neath the barnyard fowl fly, But barnyard fowl with outspread wings will never soar amid the clouds in the sky.’ The same holds for Hassan Nasrallah, the eagle shot down not in a barn yard but like Rosa on a battlefield.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2024