Middle East

The supporters of In Defence of Marxism circle, denounce the arrest of members in the leadership of Abnaa el-Balad movement (the Sons of the country). We call upon all those who genuinely seek to defend the very basic democratic rights in this country, and first of all the Communist party, its youth movement and Hadash (the Democratic Front for Peace and Equality), by taking the lead for organizing united front actions in defence of Abnaa el-Balad.

The situation in Iraq and the whole of the Middle East is far from being stabilised. The very fact that there is an army of occupation right in the heart of the region has opened up a completely new scenario. But is not just in the Middle East that the occupation of Iraq is having widespread repercussions. In the USA and the UK, the two countries that are occupying Iraq, the situation is getting worse for their respective governments.

How the Israeli banking system profits from low paid workers in Israel who end up deeper and deeper in debt.

Vicki Knafo, a single mother,  recently walked all the way to Jerusalem from her home in Mitzpeh Ramon, a poor town in Southern Israel, to protest against the government's welfare cuts. Her case has become a symbol of determined struggle against the government's austerity measures and has highlighted the plight of many working class people in Israel.

The Road Map for "peace" in the Middle East emerged as part of the shift in the world situation after the September 11 terrorist attacks. The war on Afghanistan and afterwards the war and occupation of Iraq created the conditions in which US imperialism, aided by British imperialism and with the silence of the European Union, was able to intervene in the development of the historic conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Arab people.

The student protests that began in Iran on June 9, have revealed how little support is left for the Islamic regime among not only the students and the workers, but also large layers of the middle classes. In spite of the harsh clampdown of the regime, it is clear that it is dieing. It is no longer a question of "if", but rather of "when" it will fall.

As the US discusses the future of Iraq with its friends and allies from all over the world, the opposition movement to US occupation is growing and within this the old Communist traditions are once again beginning to take root. It is not just Islamic fundamentalism that is growing in post-war Iraq.

An interesting insight into the terrible psychological damage the Palestinian-Israeli conflicting is having on the children who are growing up in the region.

When President Bush stated on May 1 that combat operations had ended in Iraq, for most of the American people it seemed the war was over. It is not. The behaviour of the US forces is looking increasingly like that in Vietnam. Villages and towns are raided, where every one is considered an enemy and a potential target for besieged troops in a foreign and hostile country.

The Zionists have always tried to block any attempts at Arab-Jewish workers' unity. However during the decades leading up to the formation of the state of Israel there were many examples of Arab and Jewish workers coming together in mixed workplaces and even attempts to build joint unions. Thus history denies the myth that no such unity is possible. What is true is that the nationalists on both sides (Jewish and Arab) did everything to thwart such moves.

Yossi Schwartz continues his outline of the history of labour struggles in Palestine in the first half of the 20th century, underlining the instinctive move towards unity on the part of both Jewish and Arab workers and the constant manoeuvring on the part of the Zionist leaders (with a mirror image among the Arab nationalists) to break down this unity.

Millions of Jews died tragically in the Nazi extermination camps. But little is know of the manoeuvres that were taking place around this question in Britain and the US, in particular on the part of the Zionist lobby. Rather than take measures that may have saved large numbers of German and Eastern European Jews the Zionists were only prepared to accept measures that would facilitate emigration of Jews to Palestine. Yossi Schwarz in Israel unveils what really happened and also underlines the despicable role of US and British imperialism at the time.

After two and a half years of a desperate uprising in which 2,500 Palestinians and more than 700 Israelis have been killed, the Palestinian capitalists and petit bourgeois are crawling on their stomachs before the US and Israeli rulers. Once again history has proven  that the methods of  individual terror are leading only to defeat.

The Israeli Labour Party (Avodah in Hebrew) has been in long-term decline. A. Kramer, in Israel, looks at the background and the reasons behind this decline and points out that opportunities are opening up for a genuine left force in Israeli society.