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CounterPunch
February
22, 2003
A Universal No to the War of
Fear
Say Death to
Death
By SUBCOMANDANTE MARCOS
(Communique from the EZLN which was
read during the demonstration in Rome, Italy, on February 15,
2003. It was read by Heidi Giuliani, the mother of activist Carlo,
who was assassinated by the Italian police in Genoa in July of
2001.)
Brothers and Sisters of Rebel Italy:
Greetings from the men, women, children
and old ones of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation. Our
word is made cloud in order to cross the ocean and to reach the
worlds which are in your hearts.
We know that today demonstrations are
being held throughout the world in order to say "No"
to Bush's war against the people of Iraq.
And it must be said like that, because
it is not a war by the North American people, nor is it a war
against Saddam Hussein.
It is a war by money, which is represented
by Senor Bush (perhaps in order to emphasize that he is completely
lacking in intelligence). And it is against humanity, whose fate
is now at stake on the soil of Iraq.
This is the war of fear.
Its objective is not to defeat Hussein
in Iraq. Its goal is not to do away with Al Qaeda. Nor does it
seek to liberate the people of Iraq. It is not justice, nor democracy,
nor liberty which drives this terror. It is fear.
Fear that the entire world will refuse
to accept a policeman which tells it what it should do, how it
should do it and when it should do it. It is fear.
Fear that the world will refuse to be
treated like plunder.
Fear of that human essence which is called
rebellion.
Fear that the millions of human beings
who are mobilizing today throughout the world will be victorious
in raising the cause of peace.
Because the victims of those bombs which
will be launched over Iraqi lands will not only be Iraqi civilians,
children, women, men and old ones, whose deaths will be merely
an accident in the headlong, arbitrary path of he who, from his
side, calls on God as an alibi for destruction and death.
The person leading this stupidity (which
is supported by Berlusconi in Italy, Blair in England and Aznar
in Spain), Senor Bush, used money to buy that power which he
is trying to hurl upon the people of Iraq.
Because it must not be forgotten that
Senor Bush is the head of the self-proclaimed world police, thanks
to a fraud which was so immense that it could only be covered
up by the shadows of the twin towers in New York, and by the
blood of the victims of the terrorist attacks of September 11,
2001.
Neither Hussein nor the Iraqi people
matter to the North American government. What matters to it is
demonstrating that it can commit its crimes in any part of the
world, at any moment, and that it can do so with absolute impunity.
The bombs which are to fall in Iraq seek
also to fall on all the nations of earth. They would also fall
on our hearts, and thus universalize that fear which they carry
within.
This war is against all humanity, against
all honest men and women.
This war seeks that we should know fear,
that we should believe that he who has money and military force
also has right.
This war hopes that we shall shrug our
shoulders, that we shall make cynicism a new religion, that we
shall remain silent, that we shall conform, that we shall resign,
that we shall surrender...that we shall forget...
That we shall forget Carlo Giuliani,
the rebel of Genoa.
For the zapatistas, we are the men who
dream our dead. And today our dead are dreaming a rebel "NO."
For us there is but one dignified word
and one conscientious action in the face of this war. The word
"NO" and the rebel action.
That is why we must say "NO"
to war.
A "NO" without conditions or
excuses.
A "NO" without half measures.
A "NO" untarnished by gray
areas.
A "NO" with all the colors
which paint the world.
A "NO" which is clear, categorical,
resounding, definitive, worldwide.
What is at stake in this war is the relationship
between the powerful and the weak. The powerful is powerful because
he makes us weak. He lives off our work, off our blood. That
is how he grows fat while we languish.
The powerful have invoked God at their
side in this war, so that we will accept their power and our
weakness as something that has been established by divine plan.
But there is no god behind this war other
than the god of money, nor any right other than the desire for
death and destruction.
The only strength of the weak is their
dignity. That is what inspires them to fight in order to resist
the powerful, in order to rebel.
Today there is a "NO" which
shall weaken the powerful and strengthen the weak: the "NO"
to war.
Some might ask whether the word which
has convened so many throughout the world will be capable of
preventing the war or, once it has begun, of stopping it.
But the question is not whether we can
change the murderous march of the powerful. No. The question
we should be asking is: could we live with the shame of not having
done everything possible to prevent and stop this war?
No honest man or woman can remain silent
and indifferent at this moment.
All of us, each one in our own voice,
in our own way, in our own language, by our own action, must
say "NO."
And, if the powerful wish to universalize
fear through death and destruction, we must universalize the
"NO."
Because the "NO" to this war
is also a "NO" to fear, a "NO" to resignation,
a "NO" to surrender, a "NO" to the forgetting,
a "NO" to renouncing our humanness.
It is a "NO" for humanity and
against neoliberalism.
We would hope that this "NO"
would transcend borders, that it would sneak past customs, that
it would overcome differences of language and culture, and that
it would unite the honest and noble part of humanity, which is
also, and it must not be forgotten, the majority.
Because there are negations which unite
and dignify.
Because there are negations which affirm
men and women in the best of themselves, that is, in their dignity.
Today the skies of the world are clouded
over with warplanes, with missiles - which call themselves "intelligent"
merely so that they can conceal the stupidity of those who are
in charge of them, and those who, like Berlusconi, Blair and
Aznar, justify them - with satellites which point out where there
is life and where there will be death.
And the land of the earth is tarnished
with machines of war which would paint the earth with blood and
shame.
The storm comes.
But dawn shall come only if the words
made cloud in order to cross borders is turned into a "NO"
made stone, and they make an opening in the darkness, a crevice
through which tomorrow can slip.
Brothers and sisters of rebel and dignified
Italy:
Please accept this "NO" which
we, the zapatistas, the smallest, are sending you.
Allow our "NO" to unite with
yours and with all the "NO's" which are flourishing
today throughout the earth.
Viva the rebellion which says "NO!"
Death to death!
From the mountains of the Mexican Southeast.
By the Comandancia General of the Clandestine
Revolutionary Indigenous Committee of the Zapatista Army of National
Liberation.
Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos.
Translated by Scott Handleman.
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