The shock of the terrorist attack in central Vienna on Monday evening is still very deep in all of us. Our thoughts are with the victims of this cruel attack. Even though not much is known about the attack yet, it is already clear that the assassin(s) used these brutal attacks to kill people who wanted to spend the last evening before the lockdown, as well as employees in the restaurant business and passers-by. The aim was to stir up fear, to divide and to intimidate.
Nurses, paramedics, social workers and others are all affected, workers who, in addition to the massive burdens of the Corona crisis, are now working at full strength to care for the victims and their families. A staff representative of the Vienna Emergency Medical Services said during the night in the broadcast station Zeit im Bild (ZIB): “I call upon all my colleagues to report for duty and to report to their workplaces. I was politically inspired by (former) Mayor Zilk, who said: ‘I guarantee every Viennese an ambulance and a hospital bed’. Now we have COVID-19 and even this terrorist attack on top of that, and this city has grown, but not the number of ambulances.”
The workers’ movement must now find an answer to this attack, to the reactionary groups of right-wing Islamic fundamentalism, to the danger of the weaponisation of racism by the ruling class and right wing and provide a program against terror, racism and division.
Danger from right-wing extremist and Islamic fundamentalist forces
It is not yet clear whether the main target of the attack was the synagogue and if the main motive was anti-Semitism. But we already know that at least one of the attackers was a follower of the “Islamic State”. The terrorist attacks in France in recent weeks have shown us the danger that right-wing Islamic fundamentalism poses to the working class. The hatred and violence emanating from these forces always affects ordinary workers and young people first and foremost. They are most often the target of such attacks. This is also because the rich and powerful live and enjoy their free time separately from the normal population.
In Austria, too, reactionary forces have tried to take the offensive in recent months. This summer when fascist Grey Wolves attacked Kurdish and Turkish leftists and trade unionists at a left-wing center in Vienna’s 10th District, the Ernst-Kirchweger-Haus (EKH), it was leftists and anti-fascists who led the fight against these attacks. At the same time, the conservative political party ÖVP, showing sympathy in the aftermath of yesterday’s events, demanded the closure of the EKH.
Even now it is only the workers’ movement that can find an effective answer to these attacks on an international scale. The ruling class may make grand speeches and demonstrate insincere concern, but in reality it is their governments who through their policies are partly responsible for such attacks. In order to allegedly “defend our values”, the ruling class has already restricted precisely those “values”, such as basic democratic rights, after 9/11. It is to be feared that the government under Chancellor Sebastian Kurz of the conservative ÖVP has similar plans. As the measures for “fighting terror” in France and other countries show, the danger emanating from right-wing Islamic fundamentalists will not diminish with more repression and surveillance. On the contrary, the US-led “war on terror”, the state of emergency in France for years and the increase in racist incitements against migrants and refugees have only aggravated the situation because they have contributed to the division of society. Whoever wants to fight terror must deal with its root causes.
Hypocrisy of the Kurz government and the Ruling Political Parties
The words of Chancellor Kurz, Minister of the Interior Nehammer and Co. after this attack already partly resemble the rhetoric of the French government, which in the past days has spoken of a “war against Islam”. Kurz, as one of the leading politicians of the populist right wing of the bourgeoisie in Europe, is partly responsible for the increasing exclusion of migrant and Muslim sections of the population in Austria and Europe through his racist incitement and politics.
The policies of the Kurz government have already cost thousands of lives in the Mediterranean, in war zones, in deportation custody and in the hospitals during Corona. Racism, exclusion and hatred always plays into the hands of reactionary forces like ISIS. In the recent local elections in Vienna, the conservative ÖVP, the far-right FPÖ and other parties again deliberately campaigned for more deportations, isolation and exclusion by fomenting racism. At the same time, the federal government cooperates with reactionary regimes such as that in Turkey or Saudi Arabia and exports weapons that are used in the bloody wars in the Middle East. And this government now wants to be seen as the defender of a “free society” against reactionary Islam? This hypocrisy must be exposed!
What is particularly repugnant is that Kurz & Co. will do anything to use the attack for their own purposes. The Austrian ruling class wants to distract from their policies of racism and austerity, which are particularly noticeable during the Corona crisis, and speaks of “national unity” against the “external enemy”. We have seen this talk of “national unity” most recently at the beginning of the Corona crisis. We are told that we are all sitting in the same boat, but our daily experience shows how little that is true.
Right now, the workers’ movement and the trade unions must not give in to this pressure. They must not relent with the necessary criticism of the measures of the federal government: the lack of hospital beds, the offsetting of the costs of the crisis on to the working class and the coming repressive reactions in response to this terrorist attack. The reference of the staff representative of the Vienna Emergency Medical Services to the lack of resources was not only understandable, but necessary. The union must not accept that such criticisms were omitted in later reporting.
We must prepare ourselves for attempts to increase state repression and surveillance under the pretext of “internal security”. The politicians who are now thanking the nurses, paramedics and other emergency services are also the ones responsible for the disastrous working conditions of these workers, such as insufficient equipment and funding. The same people who will now call for and allocate more money to the police have not provided any additional funds for the health service in the last months and are thereby also responsible for more deaths due to Corona.
The Causes of Terrorism
It is the wars, the arms exports and the agitation of the European and US governments that have made right-wing Islamic fundamentalism widespread in the first place. The people fleeing Iraq, Syria and other countries are fleeing from the very terror and terrorist regimes that have arisen as a result of these wars. Regardless of who the perpetrators were, it is essential to take the ground from under terror.
For years, groups such as ISIS have been counting on migrants and Muslims in Europe being systematically discriminated against. The journalist Karim El-Gawhary made this clear in a Facebook post: “In a 2015 manifesto in the IS online magazine Dabiq, a dynamic was described that the militant Islamists want to exploit for their own purposes. The idea was relatively simple. With every Islamist attack in Europe and the West, the anti-Islamic mood grows. The result would be polarization and, as it was called at the time, ‘the elimination of the grey zone’, as coexistence between Muslims and non-Muslims becomes redefined. With the exclusion of Muslims in the West, it would be easier to drive them into the arms of the militant Islamists and their ideology and they would be easy to recruit”.
If racism in Austria increases as a result of the attacks and is deliberately stirred up by aspects of current politics, then the perpetrators will have achieved their goal. They know very well that such attacks are weaponized in a racist way and that this in turn plays into their hands. The increase of racism, but also increasing social problems due to the global crisis of the capitalist system lead to the fact that reactionary forces of different kinds can present themselves as saviors and thereby recruit for their ideologies. Poverty, unemployment, social hardship and a lack of prospects have led to right-wing radicalization in Austria, especially among a generation that is completely cut off and excluded. Islamic fundamentalism is one side of this coin, Austrian right-wing extremism the other.
It is a fact that the vast majority of all Muslims have as little to do with terrorism as the vast majority of Christians have nothing to do with the perpetrators in Christchurch. But it says something about the racist climate when many Muslims feel compelled to distance themselves explicitly from such acts, which is not often done by followers of other religions in whose name terror is committed. Right-wing extremist terror, no matter whether it is fascist or Islamic fundamentalist terror, must be fought by the workers’ movement. To this end, a left-wing alternative is needed to channel the anger against this system, so that these reactionary forces no longer have a base to spread themselves.
What is now needed is an effective program against terror, hatred, agitation and racism: more money for social welfare, jobs, higher wages, education and health; a fight against all forms of racism, sexism and discrimination; an end to the war policies and arms exports of European and U.S. imperialism; and a left and trade union offensive for working class unity.
More money is needed for youth centers and similar care facilities, because they can be places that break the social isolation of young people, especially during the Corona crisis. Billions are needed for investment in schools and educational institutions, more staff, more teachers and social workers. There is an urgent need to expand and fully fund emergency services and the health sector, and more personnel. It is unacceptable that these services are already stretched to their limits in “normal times”, but they need sufficient resources to be able to guarantee care without problems in crisis situations. Stop exporting arms and cooperating with the supporters of fundamentalist terror in Turkey, Saudi Arabia, etc. Stop all military cooperation with NATO and with other belligerent countries. We need an economy and a society that offers, especially for young people, a real future worth living.
Build Solidarity!
It is precisely in these hours that the overwhelming solidarity of the working class can be felt: the two young men who, at the risk of their own lives, rescued two injured people and which was barely reported in the bourgeois media, perhaps because they are Muslims, countless people who offered their homes as shelters, workers of emergency services and volunteers who were ready within a very short time, and many more examples.
We have seen similar shows of solidarity after the right-wing extremist terrorist attacks in Germany, in the USA and elsewhere. With their commitment, sympathy and solidarity, people have shown that their ability to stand together must and can be stronger than terror and hate. This must be our starting point. Instead of national mourning for the purpose of “national solidarity” in the interest of the ruling class, we need a decisive reaction from the workers’ movement and trade unions.
It would be a meaningful first step if leftists, anti-fascists and trade unions called for a rally against terrorism, racism and bigotry and its causes. Similarly, the unions could organize short strike actions to send a strong signal for the unity of the working class regardless of national origin, race or religion. A trade union action plan would help denounce the true perpetrators and causes of such atrocities.
Capitalism is in its deepest crisis worldwide and costs human lives every day. This year has brutally shown the true face of this rotten system to us all. This system has no future: it produces pandemics, terror, war, hatred and misery. This capitalist barbarism must be internationally fought with determination by us, the working class, and with the perspective of a socialist alternative.
