Israel’s border massacre and human rights hypocrisy http://www.wsws.org/articles/2011/may2011/pers-m17.shtml

The Obama administration’s reaction to Israel’s massacre Sunday of unarmed Palestinian protesters on its borders underscores the hypocrisy of those ascribing “humanitarian” motives to Washington’s predatory policy in the region.Israeli troops opened fire with live ammunition and, in one case, tank fire on Palestinians who demonstrated on Israel’s borders with Syria, Lebanon, the West Bank and Gaza. The demonstrators were directly asserting the “right of return” to their homes and lands. This a right that Israel, backed by Washington, has categorically ruled out, and that the bourgeois nationalist leadership of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) has made clear it is more than willing to bargain away.

The reality is that Washington supports this repression by reactionary Arab regimes and, above all, backs Israel in its systematic violence and oppression against the Palestinian people.The shameless duplicity and hypocrisy of US policy in the Middle East will be on full display in the coming week. Obama delivers a speech Thursday proclaiming his sympathy for the “Arab spring”—and no doubt denouncing the regimes of Gaddafi in Libya and Assad in Syria for their repression.

It is self-evident that where and when Washington decides to invoke concerns over “human rights” is determined not by some universal moral principles, but rather by definite imperialist interests.If a country whose policies are at odds with the geostrategic aims of US imperialism carries out internal repression—as in Libya—it becomes the pretext for imperialist intervention aimed at imposing a regime more subservient to Washington and asserting more direct American control over oil reserves.If another country, one that is aligned with US interests, bloodily suppresses unarmed civilians, as in Bahrain, or, for that matter, Israel, it receives tacit or even explicit support from Washington.