‘I do not know about you, but throughout these months of Israel’s genocide, I felt like I had no fight left in me, no clever arguments to stitch together, no grace to extend & no warmth to provide. I’ve felt suffocated’, writes Paola Salwan Daher. [GETTY]
When she left the German socio-democrat Party in 1919, Clara Zetkin declared: ‘I’ve been fighting for the socialist ideal for almost forty years. I am old and might not have many days left, but in the time left to me during which I can still act, I want to fight wherever there is still life, and not where there is only dissolution and weakness. I don’t want to let my living spirit be buried by a political death.’
The first time I came across this quote by the Communist leader, theorist and organiser of the women’s liberation movement in Germany, was in a compilation of letters and articles written by and about Zetkin, that was edited by French scholar Florence Hervé. The words have since resonated with me. I felt the very cadence of them was teeming with life, and I have been carrying the quote very close to my heart, especially since the start of the genocide in Gaza.
It felt like a mantle of hope and brought focus to my rage as we are forced to bear witness to the seemingly never ending suffering of the Palestinian people, and watch a live-streamed genocide, apartheid, colonisation and their brutal oppression by the Israeli occupying power.
When we can’t breathe
Zetkin lived under the dark shadow of rising Nazism, yet she found the courage to give her last speech at the Reichstag in 1932 while sick, almost blind, and under serious threat from the Nazi party. She passionately advocated for the creation of a united front to fight fascism and Nazism in a room full of SS officers.
Her words are a call to action to refuse the politics of despair, the resignation that comes with being defeated even before the struggle, and the refusal of cynicism.
As Palestinians and the global solidarity movement in most Western countries are being harassed, defamed, threatened, beaten and arrested, simply for opposing Israel’s crimes and calling for justice and liberation, the need to organise, mobilise and most importantly fight the despair, has never felt more urgent. This is especially the case given states in the Global North (and their institutions) seem to have foregone their so-called obligations under international law.
Certainly, in a global context of rising fascism, racism, sexism and ruthless capitalism, it has felt impossible to breathe, as though we would soon be crushed under the sheer weight of the abomination of these violations and systems of oppression.
I do not know about you, but throughout these months of Israel’s genocide, I felt like I had no fight left in me, no clever arguments to stitch together, no grace to extend and no warmth to provide. I’ve felt suffocated. It is in these moments that I had to remind myself of Zetkin’s desire ‘to fight wherever there is life’. That she would fight as long as there was still a shred of life, a person still breathing, somehow, somewhere.
It is quite elegant in its simplicity really: wherever life remains, we shall fight for it to be dignified, protected, and fulfilled. And for us to honour this, we can’t suffocate under the immensity of the task ahead of us, we can’t relinquish our (collective) power, to the mechanics of death that are war, occupation, colonisation, capitalist exploitation and extraction.
In those moments when I was struggling with the inherent difficulties of working in movements and political parties, the famous Gramsci quote also came to my aid: “Pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will”. Alongside Zetkin’s, these important words force us to centre courage, tenacity, persistence, and acceptance. In this case, the only choice left, is perseverance.
The struggle continues
The way that Zetkin united different struggles should also resonate with all those waging a fight against injustice and oppression today.
When faced with sexism and misogyny, including in her own political circles, she answered with even more fierce calls for women’s and girls’ rights and liberation. She centred reproductive rights, including access to abortion and contraception, and for women to be liberated from the shackles of the bourgeois family, asserting her agency and voice despite her male comrades.
Although she was a communist in the first half of the 20th century, all that Zetkin fought against then, remains an issue today. Capitalist wars, colonisation and exploitation still rage on, as do the threats to women’s and girls’ sexual and reproductive rights which are also still a distant future for too many.
Nevertheless, Zetkin’s powerful words remind us that fighting, when carried by the spirit of life, truth, justice and liberation, is hope in action. From the death cult that is this capitalist, neoliberal, racist and sexist global order, we still fight, and therefore, we still make life triumph.
Whatever we do, we must not abdicate even before we have waged the fight. Capitalism wants us defeated: it wants us alone and isolated, fragmented and unable to sustain mobilisation efforts. It banks on it. It hoped that over a year into this horrific genocide, amidst months of students, faculty, and activists being repressed, of public indignation, we would become tired and weary of the fight.
But we’re still fighting for a free Palestine. Just like we’re still fighting for reproductive justice, or for climate justice. We’re fighting, because none of us can be free while others remain oppressed.
Some may be wary of us romanticising social justice struggles: yes, mobilising is hard, yes, the backlash for being part of these efforts is rough, yes, solidarity comes with a price to pay. I don’t think anyone engages in liberation work unaware of how taxing it can be. However, this is precisely why we should romanticise this work, and romance our comrades, and put radical political love at the centre of our struggles. Love is the sustaining element of life, and I want to fight wherever there is still life.
Paola Salwan Daher is a leftist feminist activist from the Lebanese Diaspora and an international law lawyer. She is currently the Senior Director for Collective Action at Women Deliver.
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Opinions expressed in this article remain those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The New Arab, its editorial board or staff.
