12.10.2023

Part of the western order

Yassamine Mather is not celebrating the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize won by Narges Mohammadi, a liberal but brave human rights activist. She is being cynically used as part of the ideological preparations for a military attack on Iran

Anyone examining the history of the Nobel Peace Prize cannot avoid coming to the conclusion that almost every year the award is granted to someone who espouses ideals compatible with liberal bourgeois perspectives - in other words, views currently endorsed by most western states.

There are rare exceptions, such as Le Duc Tho, a founding member of the Indochinese Communist Party, who was awarded the prize in 1973 alongside the odious Henry Kissinger. However, because there was no peace in South Vietnam Tho politely wrote to the Nobel committee declining to accept the award.

Then there is Nelson Mandela, he was not awarded the peace prize while he was in prison serving a life sentence for terrorist offences (ie, armed struggle), but after he was released in 1993. Mandela was once considered a socialist (a former member of the Central Committee of the South African Communist Party). However, he oversaw a smooth, managed, transition from apartheid and white rule that suited the interests of international imperialism. In other words, Mandela was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize (alongside FW de Klerk, the final apartheid president) as part of the process of ensuring that his government pursued neoliberal economic policies. An economic model which he and the African National Congress adopted led to the enrichment of a small black elite, while dismally failing to address the extreme poverty of the black masses.

Then there is Mordechai Vanunu - the Israeli who was kidnapped by Mossad and spent 18 years in prison, including more than 11 in solitary confinement. He was nominated on a number of occasions by his supporters, but he never made it onto the final list. He did not fit in with the agenda set by the committee. He had been an Israeli nuclear technician and peace advocate, who, driven by his opposition to weapons of mass destruction, exposed details of Israel’s nuclear weapons programme to the British media in 1988. There are, almost needless to say, many, many Vanunus. Julian Assange and Edward Snowden immediately come to mind when it comes to today.

The Nobel committee consciously or unconsciously follows the dominant liberal bourgeois agenda. Hence the long list of high-profile western politicians or dissidents from adversarial nations. There is Sir Austin Chamberlain (1925) and Arthur Henderson (1934) of a declining British imperialism and the US presidents Theodore Roosevelt (1906), Woodrow Wilson (1919), Jimmy Carter (2002) and Barack Obama (2009).

Others were rewarded for service rendered to the hegemon during the Cold War: Anwar Sadat (1978), Lech Walesa (1983), Desmond Tutu (1984), Dalai Lama (1989) and Mikhail Gorbachev (1990). There are the fools and mere puppets too: Betty Williams and Mairead Corrigan of the Peace People in Northern Ireland (1976) were used to undermine the armed struggle conducted by the Provisional IRA.

The selective moral scrutiny in awarding the prize is also notable. While some laureates have been rigorously evaluated for their entire moral and ethical stance, others seem to have been selectively scrutinised or have had particular aspects of their actions overlooked, because their general position potentially aligns with a bourgeois-liberal, pro-western perspective. And let us not forget the fact that notorious warmongers such as Henry Kissinger, Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Rabin were granted the award, making a mockery of the word ‘peace’.

Empowerment

In summary the prize tends to selectively empower certain voices, while silencing others, by granting international platforms to those who may already align with the dominant global narrative. This not only marginalises dissenting voices, but also structurally reinforces existing power dynamics.

The 2023 prize has followed the same principle. The latest recipient, Narges Mohammadi, is an Iranian human rights activist who has been notably vocal in opposing the regime’s policies and actions, particularly regarding political prisoners and capital punishment. Mohammadi has faced persecution, arrest and imprisonment in Iran due to her activism and, unlike other such activists, has refused to go into exile. Indeed, as far as I know, her original political association was with the ‘reformist’ faction within the Islamic Republic. However, like many others in this political grouping, she has moved steadily towards a position of supporting imperialist-led intervention against the regime.

In other words the 2023 Peace Prize has less to do with an imperialist peace and more to do with ideological preparations of some sort of war against Iran, conducted, perhaps, initially by Israel, but later, as Iran and its regional allies retaliate, the United States itself. Though we should not expect a direct invasion (that would be too stupid), there could easily be a sustained attempt to bomb Iran ‘back to the stone age’. Doubtless the bombs will be ‘smart’ but tens of thousands would surely die.

In one of her letters to the European Parliament in 2022-23 Mohammadi wrote that “the people of Iran want a transition from the Islamic Republic of Iran” and that “the stable support of governments in accordance with human rights laws” should mean siding with popular protests in the path of defeating the “religious and misogynistic tyranny” in Iran. She urged:

In making any decision, have the approach of exerting maximum pressure on the government to realise and strengthen the civil society and guarantee human rights ... unfortunately, many governments of the world are indifferent to the rights and wishes of the people, and have focused on securing their economic interests.

It is definitely true that the overwhelming majority of the Iranian people want the overthrow of the Islamic Republic, but how can anyone in the Middle East be naive enough to beg support from the EU parliament? How can anyone in their right mind have illusions in such institutions in the third decade of the 21st century after so many devastating wars and interventions that have left this part of the world as ‘scorched earth’?

What would such intervention imply? Both the EU and the US are in fact extremely opportunist when it comes to policies of increased sanctions against the reactionary rulers of the Islamic Republic. We now know that over the last few months, in order to push the price of oil down for its European allies, the US has turned a blind eye to the massive oil exports from Iran, when it comes to sanctions.

Of course, Narges Mohammadi has never claimed to be anything but a bourgeois liberal, so we cannot blame her for accepting the Nobel Prize. But what is more astonishing is the positive coverage given to the event by sections of the Iranian left in exile. A joint statement signed by the former Marxist group, Rahe Kargar, and the Communist Party of Iran declares:

There is no doubt that the awarding of the Peace Prize to Narges Mohammadi, whatever the motives may have been, reflects the global impact of the decades of struggle of women and girls against religious apartheid, the revolutionary uprising of ‘Women, life, freedom’ and the sacrifices of women and men who died for freedom, equality and democracy in Iran. The issue of thousands of Iranian political prisoners and countless imprisoned activists has once again been in the focus of the world’s public opinion and has helped the global campaign to free Iran’s political prisoners.

You must be really naive or moving steadily to a bourgeois liberal position if you believe such nonsense. Who on the genuine left believes that in a class-divided, war-torn, global situation there is such a thing as “the world’s public opinion”? What they are referring to, but cannot bring themselves to admit, is US-led, pro-western government opinion. Of course, here I am not advocating authoritarian, pro-Russia or pro-China opinion with its own media outlets. However, despite these two horrible alternatives, millions of people are struggling against capitalism, imperialism and exploitation - be it from the US or its nearest rival, China. We should not allow either the pro-western or the pro-authoritarian media to dictate to them what is or is not global “public opinion”.

Awarding the Nobel prize occurred a day before the events now shaking the Middle East, following Hamas’s attack into Israel. Note, Donald Trump, the Republican Party and members of the US top brass see the hand of Iran - at the very least they blame Iran for giving finance, technical support and finally the green light. Secretary of state, Antony Blinken, not wanting further escalation at the moment, had to intervene and categorically deny any involvement by Iran in events in Israel.

Left delusions

However, if the current Israel-Palestine conflict continues to intensify, say with the opening of a northern front from Lebanon, I am sure the bourgeois media will drive the “world’s public opinion” towards support for military intervention against Iran. Under such circumstances I wonder where the likes of Rahe Kargar will be. Of course, we in Hands Off the People of Iran have always maintained that, even in such circumstances, we will remain firmly opposed to both imperialism and the Islamic Republic.

There are, of course, those who openly say that such an intervention will be positive, as, in their opinion, the Iranian working class is not ready for a socialist revolution: it needs a period of bourgeois, liberal rule to develop trade unionism and political organisation. Recent examples of foreign intervention in the region have been such economic, political and human disasters that one can only laugh out loud at such stupidity (Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, etc, just to mention a few examples).

However, Rahe Kargar and the CPI are not in this category, so my honest question to them is: ‘Where do you stand on foreign intervention, as called for by their latest heroine, the Nobel prize winner, be it increased sanctions or war?