Settler Colonialism: ‘It Ends With Us’ In Palestine And Israel

• by: Richard D. Wolff

Richard D. Wolff

01-30-2025 ~ My birth emerged from European capitalism’s fascistic catastrophe in the 1920s–1940s. That catastrophe also produced Israel’s experiment with settler colonialism in Palestine. This article refers to both these incidents to analyze the current Palestine-Israel catastrophe.

My reasons or qualifications to write such an article start with the fact that my maternal grandmother and grandfather were killed at the Nazis’ Mauthausen concentration camp. My father’s sister was killed in Auschwitz. My mother and her sister spent years in different concentration camps. Because of these events, my parents fled Europe and started a family in the United States. Like some other descendants of victims who witnessed such atrocities, I have tried to understand their victimization and the complex effects this had on my life directly and indirectly.

Descendants differ in their responses to what happened. Some turn inward seeking safety in a survival-focused disengagement from the larger world and its history. Some try for comfort by believing that part or all of the world has moved beyond the conditions that produced fascism’s victimizations. Some suffer long-simmering mixtures of impotence, rage, and fear that it will happen again. Among them are those who fight fascism wherever they see it reemerge and also those who perpetrate further cycles of victimization against others. Still others try to work out an understanding by writing articles and books.

Israel tried to operate settler colonialism on the pattern of earlier European settler colonialisms established around the world. That effort linked to me indirectly in a remarkably personal way. Without grasping why, I chose to participate in a program for Harvard and Radcliffe undergraduates that took 20 of us to East Africa in the early 1960s as volunteers for a summer of teaching. I began to learn there what settler colonialism meant. Further studies grew into my doctoral dissertation later at Yale based on research in the records of London’s Colonial Office and the British Museum. My resulting book, The Economics of Colonialism: Britain and Kenya, 1870–1930 (New Haven, Yale University Press, 1974), tried to analyze Kenya’s settler colonialist economy. Read more

A New Military Strategy Of French Neocolonialism In Africa: Reorganizing Under The Cover Retreat

• by: Pavan Kulkarni

01-27-2025 ~ Left parties of West Africa warn that announcements of withdrawal of troops by France-backed regimes in its former African colonies are an attempt to deceive the anti-imperialist movement by hiding its military presence from public view.

In his New Year’s address, Alassane Ouattara, president of Ivory Coast since 2010—when he took power with the aid of French military intervention—announced, “We have decided on the coordinated and organized withdrawal of French forces” from the country.

However, his address didn’t mention terminating the 1961 military agreements with France. These “agreements are at the root of the problem. As long as these agreements exist, France will be able to use them to carry out military maneuvers or intervene at the request of its servants in power in Ivory Coast,” general secretary of the Revolutionary Communist Party of Ivory Coast (PCRCI), Achy Ekissi, told Peoples Dispatch.

The only concrete commitment made by Ouattara in his speech was that “the camp of the 43rd BIMA, the Marine Infantry Battalion of Port-Bouët, will be handed over to the Ivorian Armed Forces as of January 2025.”

Originally known as the 43rd Infantry Regiment, and established in 1914 as a detachment of the French colonial army in Ivory Coast, this battalion served France “during both world wars, the Indochina War, and the Algerian War. In 1978, it was renamed the 43rd BIMA without altering its primary mission: safeguarding imperialist interests, particularly those of France, monitoring neocolonial regimes, and intervening militarily when necessary to uphold the neocolonial order,” PCRCI said in a statement.

Directly under French command, this battalion “is one of the visible faces of French domination in Ivory Coast,” which the former colonial power needs to invisibilize to salvage the last few military footholds it has left in its former colonies in the West African region. Read more

We Have Entered The Era Of ‘Global Boiling’—Marine Wildlife, Ecosystems, And Economies Are Being Devastated

• by: David Hastings

01-27-2025 ~ Marine heat waves are causing record-breaking ocean temperatures that kill animals and impact ocean-based industries.

The ocean absorbs 90 percent of the excess heat generated by burning fossil fuels and deforestation. Climate change caused by greenhouse gas emissions is the primary driver of long-term global warming. Today, humanity is officially in uncharted waters. According to the Copernicus Climate Change Service, in February 2024, the average global sea surface temperature (SST) reached 21.06 degrees Celsius, the highest level ever recorded by the service. The previous record of 20.98 degrees Celsius was set in August 2023.

Overall, 2023 saw record-breaking marine temperatures, and the likely culprit is human-caused climate change. The extraordinarily high sea surface temperatures recorded in 2023 provide a frightening glimpse into the planet’s future. A study by researchers at the University of Reading and Imperial College London, published in March 2024 in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, found that temperatures in the top 100 meters of ocean basins around the world have steadily increased since 1980. The Atlantic basin, in particular, has experienced substantial heat amplification since 2016.

They concluded that extreme sea surface temperatures in the North Atlantic during 2023 “lie at the fringe of the expected mean climate change for a global surface-air temperature warming level (GWL)” of 1.5 degrees Celsius and closer to the average of 3.0 degrees Celsius GWL. If this scenario is attained globally, it would have catastrophic consequences, including the eventual collapse of ice caps. This would lead to an uncontrollable rising sea level that would consume low-lying cities and contaminate water sources with seawater worldwide.

Marine heat waves are also a factor in extreme weather events, as the energy of warm surface water leads to hurricane formation. In August 2023, Hurricane Idalia, sitting over unusually warm surface water in the Gulf of Mexico, intensified quickly. It strengthened from 80 mph winds to a Category 3 storm, gaining 40 mph in less than 24 hours. The warm water was like rocket fuel for the approaching storm. Read more

The Venetian Republic Offers Powerful Lessons To An American One In Need Of Repair

• by: John P. Ruehl

Flag of Republic of Venice (1659-1675)

01-26-2025 ~ The Venetian Republic’s political system, emerging alongside those of other Italian city-states, was founded on collaboration and power distribution. Its rise and decline highlight the importance of adaptability in the face of shifting global political dynamics.

Over more than a thousand years, Venice transformed from a modest refuge into a dominant Mediterranean power. Despite various crises and encircling empires, the Venetian Republic avoided foreign rule, revolution, and collapse.

It developed an adaptable and efficient political system, building on its semi-independence from the 5th century until Napoleon’s conquest in 1797. In an international system dominated by self-proclaimed democratic republics, the longevity and eventual downfall of Venice’s oligarchic republican model provides insights for tailoring governance to contemporary challenges. Its unique political structure inspired founding fathers of the United States, like Alexander Hamilton and John Adams, who looked to Venice’s early system when shaping the republic. By blending Roman legal principles, Byzantine refinements like the Justinian Code (a compilation of Roman laws shaped by Greek traditions that codified and systematized legal practices), and its original innovations, Venice became a symbol of stability, endurance, and independence.

The Origins of Venice and Its Push for Independence
Venetian society was deeply paternalistic, governed by a hereditary elite with limited public participation, and yet it contained many elements of distribution of powers and checks on authority that are ubiquitous today. Geopolitically savvy and culturally diverse, Venice was open to new and foreign influence while preserving its traditions. Venetian diplomat Gasparo Contarini’s 16th-century account, shaped by his family’s central role in Venetian politics, alongside other sources, highlights Venice’s self-proclamation as the Serenissima Repubblica di Venezia—the Most Serene Republic of Venice.

Venice’s origins, according to tradition, trace back to 421 AD, when Roman refugees fleeing invasions in northern Italy established self-governed settlements in the Venetian Lagoon. The Rialto, which became synonymous with Venice, only emerged as the city’s center 400 years later. The collapse of the Western Roman Empire in 476 left northern Italy contested, with instability driving more settlers to the lagoon.

During the 5th and 6th centuries, trade networks and influential families began to shape the region. They reflected a mix of loyalties: pro-Byzantine landowners tied to the mainland coexisted with a rising merchant class seeking autonomy, along with the Frankish factions loyal to Rome. These groups dominated the informal councils, assemblies, and tribune leadership roles that governed early Venetian society.

By the 7th century, Venetian settlers recognized Byzantine authority in exchange for protection and securing vital trade access. Historian John Julius Norwich emphasized the Byzantine’s role in shaping Venice’s identity, alongside its Roman heritage. Read more

Our Ability To Think In Terms Of Numbers Is Universal, Abstract, And Independent From Language

• by: Marjorie Hecht

Frederick L. Coolidge, Ph.D. Photo: UCCS

01-24-2025 ~ Frederick L. Coolidge explains the link between numerosity and language.

Most people learn to count and do basic arithmetic at a young age and don’t give these skills a second thought. But numerosity or numeracy, the ability to think about and use numbers, is more than a basic skill: It is what underlies the human power of abstraction, metaphor, symbolism, and the essence of thought.

The connection of numerosity to language and culture is a fascinating topic. Scientific research has shown that even cultures that only use numbers up to 2 or 3 are able to master using larger numbers when they are taught the language required.

Advanced imaging technologies have enabled scientists to look at areas of the brain cortex connected to particular math skills. The frontoparietal region of the brain has been identified as the location for coordinating goal-directed tasks.

How old human numerosity is, how numbers are connected to language or abstraction, and whether animals have numerosity are subjects of debate in the scientific community. I interviewed Frederick L. Coolidge, a professor of psychology, who specializes in cognitive archaeology and has written broadly on the subject.

Coolidge has taught at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, since 1979 and co-directs its Center for Cognitive Archaeology.

He argues that humans are not the only species to have numerosity, that numerosity does not require language, and that it expresses itself culturally. Read more

Trump’s Vision For A “Golden Age Of America”: Oligarchy Plus Ultranationalism

• by: C.J. Polychroniou

01-23-2025 ~ Parallels between European fascism in the 1930s and Trump’s MAGA vision were on full display this week.

Donald Trump’s inauguration as the 47th president of the United States put on display fascism’s 21st-century iteration — a combination of oligarchic power and ultranationalism unlike anything in recent memory.

It was a shameful spectacle for a country that deems itself to be the world’s greatest democracy and the leader of the so-called free world. Trump was flanked by billionaire tech moguls and far right leaders from Italy, Germany, Argentina, France, the U.K., and other countries around the globe. His inauguration speech promised a “golden age of America” by making the country “greater, stronger, and far more exceptional than ever before.”

It was an inauguration speech dripping with authoritarianism and jingoism in which Trump cast himself as the savior of the country. “Our sovereignty will be reclaimed. Our safety will be restored. The scales of justice will be rebalanced,” he said, and described the leadership of the past four years as incompetent and corrupt, without specifying Joe Biden or other Democrats by name.

The speech left little doubt about its ideological character. Indeed, the political message behind Trump’s return to the White House was best captured by Elon Musk’s Nazi-like salute during the inauguration celebrations (though, in this case, predictably, the Anti-Defamation League rushed immediately to Musk’s defense by downplaying the significance of the gesture). The South African billionaire has appointed himself as leader of the West’s far right movement and has been fomenting fascism since he helped Trump win reelection. For Musk and his ilk, who expect to be the biggest beneficiaries of the new administration’s much anticipated anti-regulation blitz, Trump’s return to office promises a new “Golden Age” of U.S. world dominance and prosperity for the super-rich. Read more