Zarah Sultana and the Politics of Left Distinction

Principle, Accuracy, and Building Left Coalitions

Zarah Sultana MP’s stance on NATO has become both clearer and more uncompromising in recent weeks. Her October 28 X post calling NATO an “imperialist war machine” and arguing for Britain’s immediate withdrawal leaves little room for ambiguity. She pointed to NATO’s roles in Afghanistan and Libya not as isolated blunders but as evidence of systemic dysfunction. She also linked rising military spending to collapsing public services: “Arms dealers profit while our NHS collapses, public services crumble and millions of children grow up in poverty.” Here Sultana ties anti-imperialist politics directly to working-class interests and broader anti-capitalist criticism.

Within Your Party, there is broad support for this NATO stance, though opinions on sending weapons to Ukraine remain divided.

The Your Party Differentiation: Factual Problems

Sultana’s PoliticsJOE interview attempted to set Your Party apart from the Greens, especially on foreign policy. She claimed Your Party rejects diplomatic ties with Israel, unlike the Greens—a comment that provoked immediate pushback. Phil Proudfoot noted the Greens have voted to classify the Israeli military as a terrorist group, back BDS, and support arms embargoes. Owen Jones added that the Greens favor proscribing the IDF and pursue class-based politics.

More fundamentally, both the Scottish Green Party and the Green Party of England and Wales have platforms that go further than Sultana suggested. The Scottish Greens openly describe Zionism as a racist, supremacist ideology, support BDS, and define the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as settler colonialism. The GPEW labels Israel’s claim to be a “Jewish state” as racist, calls its actions apartheid and genocide, and condemns Zionism. Both advocate ending arms exports to Israel and cutting diplomatic ties.

Sultana’s depiction of the Greens as too soft on Israel therefore misrepresents parties with even stronger anti-Zionist positions than those she articulates. As Julian Atkinson observed, using supposed ambiguities as an excuse to avoid collaboration is simply sectarianism—but when the “ambiguities” are factual errors about parties holding stronger anti-Zionist positions, the sectarianism becomes particularly acute.

The Pattern of Inaccuracy

At a Your Party event in Glasgow, Sultana incorrectly claimed the Scottish Greens don’t oppose Zionism, overlooking their explicit support for BDS and criticism of Zionism as racist. Mark Ballard, a Scottish Green, clarified that both Green parties oppose NATO membership, countering any suggestion that they and Your Party differ fundamentally on this issue.

This pattern raises a real challenge for groups like Your Party: Is their anti-imperialist stance grounded in principle or in drawing lines between themselves and others? If the former, then getting facts right about other left groups is essential for credibility. Establishing distinct identity should rest on genuine policy differences, not misstating other parties’ positions. If Sultana and Your Party leaders aren’t accurate about the Greens, it undermines their broader authority.

Assessment: Credibility and Scrupulousness

Anti-imperialist politics carry real weight when paired with intellectual honesty. Sultana’s opposition to NATO and the Israeli government is clear and principled, but credibility suffers when other organizations are mischaracterized. For the Scottish left, making progress depends on open dialogue and honest debate, not factional point-scoring.

Whether Your Party can balance firm, principled positions with careful, accurate analysis will be crucial for building left unity. The stakes are significant: genuine strategic opportunities exist for radical politics in Scotland, but they can only be seized through scrupulous engagement with other left organizations, not through the repeated mischaracterization of their actual positions.

Beyond Sectarian Framings: The Ukraine Question and United Front Strategy

Sultana’s opposition to arms shipments to Ukraine from NATO members represents a genuine disagreement within anti-imperialist circles, not a position equivalent to supporting Russia or Putin. This distinction matters strategically. Sultana explicitly opposes the Russian invasion and condemns Putin’s dictatorship. Her critique of NATO arms provision rests on the argument that Western military aid subordinates Ukraine to imperialist conditionalities and Western strategic interests rather than serving Ukrainian liberation.

This disagreement is real and substantive, but framing those who hold it as “supporters of Putin” or surrogates of the Kremlin is both factually inaccurate and strategically counterproductive. Such framings prevent the common action that remains possible on genuine shared ground. The left cannot build effective united fronts by excluding everyone who disagrees on specific tactical questions about arms transfers while agreeing on opposition to Russian invasion, support for Ukrainian self-determination, and the need to defend Ukrainian workers and social movements.

The more productive strategic question is: On what concrete demands can we organize together? Justine Brabant’s framework, outlined in her Mediapart article “La guerre russe contre l’Ukraine: Un autre soutien à l’Ukraine était possible,” points toward unifying demands that transcend the arms provision debate. These include debt cancellation for Ukraine, protection of Ukrainian labour rights against imposed neoliberal reforms, use of frozen Russian assets and expropriation of oligarchs to fund reconstruction, energy transition away from Russian fossil fuels, accountability for war crimes, and direct solidarity with Ukrainian trade unions and social movements.

These demands offer multiple entry points for organizations and activists who oppose NATO arms provision. Someone opposed to Western military aid can nonetheless advocate for:

• Immediate cancellation of Ukraine’s debt, rejecting the burden of loans disguised as aid

• Protection and expansion of Ukrainian workers’ rights against neoliberal “reforms” imposed alongside Western aid

• Expropriation of Ukrainian and Russian oligarchs to fund reconstruction and social provision

• Energy independence through transition to renewables, reducing reliance on both Russian and Western corporate interests

• Direct “from below” solidarity with Ukrainian grassroots organizations, trade unions, and feminist movements

• Transparency and accountability in how aid is distributed and military spending is used

These are not secondary or decorative demands. They address core questions of Ukrainian national liberation: whether Ukraine can defend itself while maintaining political independence from imperialist subordination; whether reconstruction serves ordinary Ukrainians or corporate interests; whether the war’s conclusion will bring genuine self-determination or imposed division.

For the left to be effective, the strategic choice is clear: Do we organize with people who agree with us on everything except NATO arms provision, focusing on the concrete positive demands we do share? Or do we spend energy excluding them as Kremlin surrogates, thereby fragmenting the left and abandoning potential allies on the very demands that could build broader movements?

This is not about defending or excusing positions we disagree with. Sultana and others may be wrong about the necessity of certain weapons transfers for Ukrainian defence. But being wrong about tactics for supporting Ukraine is not the same as supporting Russia. The left’s historical weakness in building united fronts often stems from treating tactical disagreements as character questions or loyalty tests, thereby fragmenting potential allies over specifics while ignoring common ground on fundamentals.

A mature left politics would acknowledge: We disagree on NATO arms provision. Here are the arguments on both sides. But we can build campaigns together on debt cancellation, workers’ rights protection, oligarch expropriation, and direct aid to Ukrainian grassroots movements. These demands serve Ukrainian liberation while remaining consistent with anti-imperialist principle.