> You've got pro-capitalist fundamentalist clerics relying on
> extra-parliamentary violence perpetrated by armed gangs, including
> against
> actual leftists, for all practical purposes protecting deeply
> reactionary
> absolutist and/or monarchical regimes.
Which regime and/or organization are you talking about? Saudi Arabia? The southern portion of Lebanon under Hezbollah control? Iran? Saddam's Iraq? The former Taliban regime in Afg? The Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, which is repressed by the government? These are all very different formations, some of whom don't like each other much. It's much too squishy to be a useful term, unless you're an apologist for the U.S. and/or Israel's doctrine of permanent war.
And what about Zionism? The right wing of Zionism uses scripture and talks about "population transfer." Even Benny Morris has defended "ethnic cleansing." And what about our own millennial loons, who crave Holy War to accelerate the end times?
Doug
Taking them in reverse order, of course the Israeli settler movement is substantially fascist.
Lots of people say lots of shit. In general, I think the deployment of armed goons aligned with corporate and/or reactionary state interests in the service of extremist ideology attacking their domestic political adversaries marks an important dividing line. You've got that in Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan. I wouldn't jump to put that label on Hezbollah, since all the ethnic groups in Lebanon had their own militias. I think it applies to the Taliban & Muslim Bro'hood, maybe Hamas.
Naturally there are multiple differences, but you had that w/European fascism. Even within the Nazis, you had that with the SA.
Recognizing some group or regime as unsatisfactory in the extreme does not mean the U.S. or Israel must wage war against them. Obviously.
mbs
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