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Luko wrote: And the colonial settler state can't exist without expanding -- Avnery's dream is an illusion. This is like the slave states in the USA - they could not be satisfied with what they had, but they had to extend slavery to more territories, if they did not want to end slavery once and for all. But while the industrial capital in the USA could live with having slavery in the South, it could not tolerate an expansion of slavery to new territories, since it has to rely on "free" labor, i.e. labor free not only of the chains of medieval fiefdom or of slavery, but free of all means of subsistence other than the labor power to be sold to a capitalist. This for me is the key Luko. Absolutely so. But to be frank I have struggled to understand fully the mechanism that drives the urge to expand. Yet it is simple. If the colonists do not grow in number and territory they will remain an isolated and vulnerable bulkhead. After WW2 when Japan gave Australia an existential scare of the first dimension, the slogan 'populate or perish' took centre stage. Japan gave concrete form to all those fears of the 'yellow peril' coming to destroy the 'great white nation' (i.e. Australia). So after 1945 Australia's population grew threefold.. But the dialectic is remorseless and in the case of Israel the imperative to expand means that one is for ever creating more enemies. Israel's defense perimeter of Arab dictators has now been breached by the Tunisian revolution. Another breach could see the end of it. comradely Gary ________________________________________________ Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com