As Halloween approaches, the dead have begun rising from their graves.
One such ghoulish-looking creature making a reappearance into the world of the living is former UK prime minister Tony Blair, who will reportedly serve on Donald Trump’s so-called ‘Board of Peace’.
This committee, according to Trump’s 20-step ‘peace’ plan, will “oversee” a “transitional regime” for the Gaza strip if and when a ceasefire takes place.
We must ask: what on earth qualifies Blair – whose invasion of Iraq led to over 1 million excess Iraqi deaths – to have anything to do with a peace transition in the Middle East? This is like sending Satan to put out the fires of Hell.
The idea that it’s possible for the Palestinian people themselves to govern their own society is clearly unthinkable to the western imperialists.
Unsurprisingly, this appointment has led to outrage.
“After everything he’s done, all the death and destruction this guy was responsible for, the blood on his hands – he’s now going to come in and save the Palestinians? This is a disgusting parody,” said Amjad Salehi, a Palestinian Iraqi living in Baghdad.
“He needs to go away and leave us alone. We don’t want him here, he is not good for the Arabs.”
Hussein Al-Alak, editor of Iraq Solidarity News, told The Communist that “without a doubt, Blair’s actions in Iraq in 2003 set the scene for the rise of ISIS, which in 2014 displaced over one million Iraqi children, and resulted in the genocide of Iraq’s Yazidi and Christian communities. This man can certainly play no role bringing peace to the Middle East”.
US power play
So what is it that really qualifies Blair for this role on Trump’s board? Well, when it comes to dutifully serving the interests of US imperialism, if anything his track record makes him overqualified.
This clearly exposes the hollowness of Trump’s ‘peace’ plan. He has no interest in the lives and wellbeing of the people of Gaza. The ‘peace’ plan contains multiple points about the economic redevelopment of Gaza, and the role that US imperialism will play in this.
This is transparently an attempt by Trump to strengthen US power in the region.
This fiasco highlights the bankruptcy of the ‘two-state solution’ in general.
What kind of sham ‘independence’ will this tiny, smouldering strip of land have now that the Zionists have laid it to waste?
What kind of sham ‘self-determination’ will the Gazan people have at the hands of a “technocratic” (read: western-friendly) “transitional” government, with “supervision” from the same “international community” which turned a blind eye while they were slaughtered?
So long as the Zionist Israeli state exists, Palestinian self-determination is an empty phrase.
The solution lies not in the bloodstained hands of crooks like Tony Blair, but in the hands of the poor and working masses of the Middle East, and the world working class.
