WW News Service Digest #308
1) Activists challenge D.C. no-protest zone
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
2) It's time to unite for Mumia
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
3) Gov't and media harass Mumia supporters
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
4) Crucial phase in Palestinian struggle
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: torstai 16. elokuu 2001 07:00
Subject: [WW] Activists challenge D.C. no-protest zone
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Aug. 23, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
As cops try to stifle dissent
ACTIVISTS CHALLENGE D.C. NO-PROTEST ZONE
Bush, IMF/World Bank targets of fall mobilization
By Sarah Sloan
Washington
Organizers of protests planned for September against the
Bush administration, the International Monetary Fund and the
World Bank told a press conference packed with reporters and
camera crews on Aug. 13 that they will not accept plans
announced by the Washington police to cordon off most of
downtown Washington.
The groups were responding to announcements by D.C. police
and other authorities that they plan to restrict large areas
of the city on Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 29 and 30. The
police had earlier stonewalled on issuing permits to
organizations planning rallies against the Bush
administration and the IMF/World Bank on those days.
With these financial institutions now the focus of a
worldwide movement against poverty, racism and inequality,
the IMF and World Bank had just announced they were
shortening their annual meeting, which had been scheduled to
last six days, to the last two days in September.
The Murrow Room at the National Press Club here overflowed
with 100 reporters and over a score of television cam-eras
as representatives from the International Action Center
(IAC), Latin American Solidarity Conference, Partnership for
Civil Justice, Mobilization for Global Justice, and other
groups reiterated their plans to carry out the
demonstrations.
Charging that the government is "trying to create a Genoa-
style police state in Washington," Brian Becker, a national
co-director of the IAC, added, "We are here to tell D.C.
Police Chief Charles Ramsey, Attorney General John Ashcroft
and President George W. Bush that it is illegal and
unconstitutional to turn the streets of Washington, D.C.,
into the private property of the IMF and World Bank
delegates."
The IAC is calling on tens of thousands of people to
surround the White House on Sept. 29 to "Beat Back the Bush
Attack," and then stay for mass demonstrations the next day
called by the AFL-CIO and others.
Attorney Mara Verheyden-Hilliard of the Partnership for
Civil Justice announced that her group would be filing a
suit in federal court challenging the government's attempts
to suspend democracy and restrict the First Amendment rights
of demonstrators in Washington.
Press conference speakers included IAC co-directors Becker
and Teresa Gutierrez; Director Bob Brown of the Kwame Ture
Work Study Institute & Library; Cherrene Horazuk, Executive
Director, Committee in Solidarity with the People of El
Salvador (CISPES); Marianne Mollman, Executive Director,
Network in Solidarity with the People of Guatemala (NISGUA);
Verheyden-Hilliard; and Matthew Smucker of Mobilization for
Global Justice.
Opening the press conference, IAC youth organizer Mervyn
Marcano explained the general thrust of the protests was
"against the IMF and World Bank imposing poverty and misery
on people of all continents, as well as the reactionary
political program of the Bush administration-both its
domestic and foreign policies. We will protest in opposition
to U.S. intervention in Latin America, especially concerning
Plan Colombia, the FTAA and the bombing of Vieques."
Bob Brown said his group was concerned about "the efforts of
the U.S. and District governments to erode our hard-won
rights to protest and dissent. We remember all the African,
Latino, Indigenous and other oppressed people who have
sacrificed to win these rights. We remember Bull Connor in
Birmingham, Nixon's May Day roundup, Chicago in 1968 and
1996.
"We will assemble and protest on Sept. 29th and 30th in
front of the U.S. Congress, the White House, the IMF and the
World Bank, and no force on earth will stop us," he
concluded
GLOBALIZATION SPREADS POVERTY AT HOME
Teresa Gutierrez of the IAC pointed to the effects of
globalization right here: "Bush is carrying out
globalization inside the United States to maximize profit
for oil companies, mining companies and defense contractors.
Globalization can be seen here in Washington in the shutdown
of D.C. General Hospital and the threats to the UDC, the
district's university.
"Bush is attempting to destroy environmental protections and
trade union rights, privatize Social Security and destroy
public education while spending tens of billions to
militarize outer space in the name of the so-called National
Missile Defense.
"We are coming to Washington because the mobilization of the
people--not just one demonstration but the creation of a new
grassroots mass movement--is the only method to defend
working and poor people from the assaults carried out by
Bush and the banking and corporate elites."
MARCH IN SOLIDARITY WITH LATIN AMERICA
The Latin American Solidarity Conference, which includes
CISPES, NISGUA and more than 40 other groups, is organizing
a mass march on Sept. 29 focusing on U.S. military and
economic intervention in Latin American and the Caribbean.
The LASC march will merge with the "Surround the White
House" demonstration.
CISPES Executive Director Cherrene Horazuk said, "Today, the
police and security agencies in Washington, D.C., are once
again attempting to demonize a movement and violate our
constitutional First Amendment rights. The Latin American
Conference is committed to guaranteeing that they fail in
this effort. We WILL be in Washington in September and we
call on people around the world to join us. We will make our
voices heard, as we join the global movement that proclaims-
Another World is Possible."
NISGUA Executive Director Marianne Mollmann added, "We are
often asked if we are worried about violent demonstrators.
We are here to tell you no. ... We are worried that our
constitutional rights are about to be deliberately
violated."
WORLD BANK/IMF POLICIES MUST GO
Representing the Mobilization for Global Justice, Matt
Smucker said, "We are pleased to see that the World Bank and
the International Monetary Fund are feeling the pressure of
the growing movement against corporate globalization. The
decision to shorten the meeting reflects the growing anxiety
of the World Bank and the IMF over their public image.
"It does not matter to the impoverished people of the world
and our collective global environment whether the World Bank
and IMF meet for six days, five days, two days or not at
all. What matters is the devastating impact of these
institutions' policies."
In response to questions about the exclusion zone announced
by Washington police, IAC co-director Brian Becker
amplified: "It is useful to remember that even at the height
of the Vietnam War, large sections of Washington, D.C., were
never declared off-limits to demonstrators."
He went on to detail violence perpetrated by the police
against demonstrators over the last year-and-a-half,
including preventive detention arrests and summary
punishment of prisoners after demonstrations.
Becker concluded by saying, "We will not accept the police
relegating the demonstrators to a token presence. They have
no right to limit the tens of thousands and perhaps more who
will march because they want change. We will not accept
'protest pits.' Police authorities have no right to
determine where free speech can be exercised and in what
numbers."
The cable network C-Span broadcast the press conference in
full three times, and may re-broadcast. For further
information, see www.beatbackbush.org or www.iacenter.org.
From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: torstai 16. elokuu 2001 07:02
Subject: [WW] It's time to unite for Mumia
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Aug. 23, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
Mumia supports so many struggles--
IT'S TIME TO UNITE FOR MUMIA
By John Parker
As American Indian Movement leader Leonard Peltier once
said, saving the life of Mumia Abu-Jamal is a priority of
the struggle. His statement is more relevant now than ever,
as demonstrators prepare to go to Philadelphia on Aug. 17 to
support this eloquent "voice of the voiceless" on
Pennsylvania's death row.
The imperialist rulers, especially in the U.S., seem to be
running scared, backed into a corner of protests and the
militancy of workers worldwide.
Here in the U.S. they have their eye on the growing movement
against Bush, which bridges the anti-racist struggle with
the anti-globalization movement.
A growing anti-capitalist, pro-union, pro-worker movement
demanding an end to racism, the death penalty, the prison-
industrial complex, and anti-lesbian/gay/ bi/trans bigotry
haunts U.S. imperialism. And, if it threatens U.S.
imperialism, it threatens all imperialist ruling classes.
The most potent ruling class tactic here in the U.S. has
been to try and encourage a separation between the struggle
against racism and the anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist
struggles. They also try to build a wedge between the
lesbian, gay, bi and trans movement and the anti-racist
struggle.
If you want to test this idea, think about the very harsh
treatment given to Black, Latino or Native revolutionaries
in this country. Why? Because they encourage linking
together all those issues critical to forging the kind of
unity it takes to bring down this system of exploitation and
oppression.
Just ask yourself: Why has Leonard Peltier been in jail so
long? Why have Puerto Rican political prisoners spent so
many years in jail? Why did the U.S. government assassinate,
frame up and use extraordinary prison sentences against
members of the Black Panther Party, which addressed the
oppression of gay people and was anti-capitalist?
All these fighters and victims of U.S. repression linked the
struggle against U.S. imperialism with the struggle for
national liberation and against racism.
MUMIA AN INSPIRATION TO MANY MOVEMENTS
Through his writings and speeches heard internationally, on
campuses across the nation and, for a short time, over
National Public Radio airwaves, death-row inmate and former
Black Panther Mumia Abu-Jamal has been a leading voice
against capitalism, U.S. imperialism, racism, and lesbian,
gay, bi and trans oppression. A defender of revolutionary
Cuba, he also put his life on the line supporting union
struggles.
A recent ruling by Pennsylvania Supreme Court Judge William
Yohn against Mumia's right to present new evidence that
would save him from execution makes it clear that the
government wants him dead. This ruling is tied into the
Effective Death Penalty Act, which was signed into law by
former President Bill Clinton and cited by Yohn in his
decision against Mumia.
By forging unity between working people in prison and out,
between Black, Latino, Asian and white workers, gay and
straight, and connecting to the worldwide anti-U.S.
imperialist struggles, Mumia is very dangerous to the
oppressors, and vital to the movements for social justice.
The movement cannot afford to be sidetracked by debates over
legal strategy. That is Mumia's call and his alone. August
17 may be his final appearance in court. That means the time
is now to support and amplify his struggle and tell the
world we will not stand by and allow the killing of our most
decorated soldier in the fight for justice.
We need to continue the fight after Aug. 17. The
International Action Center is bringing the case of Mumia to
the UN Conference on Racism in Durban, South Africa, and is
making Mumia's struggle a major focus of the anti- IMF/World
Bank Sept. 29 demonstration at the White House in
Washington.
However, Aug. 17 in Philadelphia embodies a crucial moment
in the struggle to free Mumia and we all must participate.
Is it possible to save Mumia's life? Maybe we should ask the
Scottsboro Nine.
In 1931 nine Black men were falsely accused of raping a
white woman--a charge that had meant instant death for many
Black people in this country.
The trials of the Scottsboro Nine continued until 1937.
During the first trial, an all-white jury sentenced eight of
the defendants to death. Despite evidence of their innocence
and glaring grounds for mistrial, every trial led to a
conviction. Each of the defendants spent years in jail. But
none were executed.
Why? Mass marches and rallies were held in virtually all
major U.S. cities. Telegrams and letters poured in to the
White House, the Alabama governor's mansion and the courts.
Angry, militant protests targeted U.S. embassies and
consulates throughout Latin America and Europe.
Roy Wright, Andrew Wright, Eugene Williams, Haywood
Patterson, Olen Montgomery, Charlie Weems, Willie Roberson,
Ozie Powell and Clarence Norris were not executed and were
eventually released from prison.
Yes, the struggle is hard and long but we must not lose
sight of the essential issue in Mumia's case--Mumia. We need
him and his revolutionary vision. The strength it will take
to free Mumia will remain with our movement for change and
be a constant and fatal thorn in the side of U.S.
imperialism in particular and capitalist globalization in
general.
From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: torstai 16. elokuu 2001 07:04
Subject: [WW] Gov't and media harass Mumia supporters
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Aug. 23, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
GOV'T AND MEDIA HARASS MUMIA SUPPORTERS
By Betsey Piette
Philadelphia
"All the lies we can fit into print" would be an apt slogan
for the Philadelphia Inquirer, whose latest attack on the
International Concerned Family and Friends of Mumia Abu-
Jamal (ICFFMAJ) over the issue of the group's non-profit
status appears designed to hurt the group financially just
before Abu-Jamal's scheduled Aug. 17 court appearance.
ICFFMAJ spokesperson Pam Africa told Workers World: "This is
a diversion away from the real issue here, which is the
state's attempt to murder Mumia. We are in complete
compliance with every request. They are attempting to
discredit International Concerned Family and Friends of
Mumia Abu-Jamal because we are fighting to win freedom for
Mumia."
On Aug. 5, an Inquirer article by Monica Yant Kinney and
Craig R. McCoy was full of innuendo claiming that the
support group for Mumia Abu-Jamal had not complied with
state requests for financial details, and that the group
refused to open its books for inspection. A similar article
appeared in the New York Times.
Attacks aimed at cutting funds for Mumia's support
However, the Inquirer article contradicted itself in a later
paragraph when it acknowledged that the group provided
financial figures for 1999 when it first applied for and
received tax-exempt status from the IRS, and sought state
recognition as well. The Inquirer reporters also never
explain how they came to have a copy of private
correspondence between the Pennsylvania Bureau of Charitable
Organizations (BCO) and the Abu-Jamal support group.
Tiffany Johnson, a representative of ICFFMAJ, told Workers
World that the group quickly responded to four new requests
outlined in a letter it received from the BCO dated July 9,
2001, weeks before the Inquirer article appeared. "We
understand that BCO regulations require us to make our
reviewed financial statements and tax statements available
for public review," Johnson noted. "But why is it that the
BCO is faxing our private correspondence to the press? And
why didn't the Inquirer report that we complied with the
BCO's requests?"
The Philadelphia Inquirer and the state of Pennsylvania have
been working hand-in-hand to hamper fund-raising on Abu-
Jamal's behalf for over two years. On the day before the
Millions for Mumia rally in April 1999, the Inquirer for the
first time targeted the Black United Fund of Pennsylvania, a
registered charity that had collected donations on behalf of
ICFFMAJ throughout much of the 1990s. Using the pretext that
BUF had failed to renew its state charity registration, the
city of Philadelphia, then under Mayor Ed Rendell, kicked
the fund out of its employees' charity drive.
This public retaliation against BUF for supporting Abu-Jamal
cost the charity $99,000, about a quarter of its annual
income. It was also a direct attack against the African
American community in Philadelphia, which is the primary
beneficiary of BUF's work.
To avoid further attacks against BUF, the ICFFMAJ
incorporated in July 1999. It completed its first fiscal
year on June 30, 2000. State and federal tax laws gave the
ICFFMAJ until mid-November 2000 to file (even without any of
the usual extensions). Yet on Oct. 16, 2000, the ICFFMAJ
received a letter from the Pennsylvania attorney general's
office demanding that it disclose the names and amounts of
all contributions received since 1991. The letter also
demanded that the Abu-Jamal support group turn over all its
receipts to the state within two weeks.
ICFFMAJ countered the state's initial attack with help from
the American Civil Liberties Union, which challenged the
legality of the state's requests. However, when the ICFFMAJ
submitted the required financial statements, the state then
demanded to see all receipts for reported expenses. The
state's demands are without precedent for newly established
non-profit organizations with the designation 501(c)(3).
OFFICE BROKEN INTO, RECORDS STOLEN
"We were in the process of meeting the filing requirements
for our first fiscal year when portions of our records were
stolen from our office in June of 2000," Johnson said. "It's
like a witch hunt," she stated. "As soon as we meet one
request, they come up with another. The Attorney General's
office became involved while we were working to meet the
deadlines for the BCO requirements."
Johnson explained that the Pennsylvania attorney general's
office had also intervened in Abu-Jamal's case in 1995,
prior to his Post Conviction Relief Act hearing. The
Department of Corrections was illegally opening privileged
legal correspondence from Abu-Jamal's attorneys outlining
defense plans for the PCRA hearings, and sending it to the
attorney general's office, after which it mysteriously ended
up in Governor Tom Ridge's office. Abu-Jamal brought a civil
suit against the Department of Corrections in 1995 to expose
this practice. "We're wondering if this is their retaliation
for our catching them in the act of violating Mumia's rights
in 1995," Johnson stated.
"Each time the state and the media attack us, we come back
stronger than ever," Pam Africa told Workers World. "Since
the Inquirer article appeared August 5, our phones have been
ringing off the hook from supporters telling us they'll be
in court with Mumia on Aug. 17."
From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: torstai 16. elokuu 2001 07:07
Subject: [WW] Crucial phase in Palestinian struggle
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Aug. 23, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
As Israel steps up aggression
CRUCIAL PHASE IN PALESTINIAN STRUGGLE
By Fred Goldstein
The new political-military offensive by the government of
Ariel Sharon has revealed the political objectives of the
oppressive strategy of the Israeli right-wing regime that
now governs in Tel Aviv. The strategy of this latest phase
is to strike at key symbols and institutions representing
the Palestinian aspiration to statehood that were
established during the period of the Oslo accords.
The goal of the Sharon regime is to destroy the Palestinian
national movement.
For months after Ariel Sharon's march on the Al Aqsa Mosque
in Jerusalem touched off the new Intifada national uprising,
the Israeli policy was to shoot-to-kill young fighters armed
with rocks and slingshots. At least 550 Palestinians,
including many women, children and elderly bystanders, were
shot to death. Thousands more were wounded and beaten.
ISRAEL ATTEMPTS TO LIQUIDATE
POLITICAL LEADERSHIP
Unable to stop the struggle, the Israelis recently opened
the next phase of assassination: to try to liquidate
Palestinian political leaders and organizers of the
Intifada.
On July 31, they assassinated six militants from Hamas with
a missile attack on their headquarters in Nablus. Two
children were also killed in that attack.
Two days earlier the Israelis had killed six key militants
of Fatah when an Israeli tank fired on a house in the
village of Al Fara in the northern West Bank.
Palestinian officials report that over 50 prominent
Palestinians have been assassinated since the beginning of
the Second Intifida last October.
A new escalation came on Aug. 9 when the Israelis occupied
Orient House, the political headquarters of the Palestinian
Authority where it had conducted diplomatic and political
affairs. Foreign diplomats routinely come and go there.
The Israeli forces took down the Palestinian flag and put up
the Israeli flag. They seized many documents. This attack
was initiated on the pretext of retaliation for the suicide
bombing of a restaurant in downtown Jerusalem.
In addition, the Israelis seized nine other government
buildings in the area. They took over a governor's compound
in the village of Abu Dis, a village under Palestinian civil
authority. They destroyed a police headquarters in Ramallah
with missiles.
On the takeover of Orient House, Minister of Security Uzi
Landau said it "had been challenging Israel's sovereignty
over Jerusalem." (New York Times, Aug. 11)
Two days later the Israeli military sent 10 tanks into
Jenin, the northernmost city in the West Bank. This city is
supposed to be under Palestinian civil and security
authority and is deep in Palestinian-controlled territory.
The Israeli forces destroyed the police station and
temporarily sealed off the governor's quarters before
withdrawing from the area.
The Sharon government is clearly sending the message that it
is prepared to use military force to take back or render
meaningless even the minimal concessions to Palestinian
national rights that were made by the previous Israeli
governments during the Oslo process.
LESS THAN A BANTUSTAN
When the so-called "peace" process collapsed at Camp David
last summer, both sides--the Israeli ruling class and the
Palestinian masses--drew their own conclusions.
The regime of Ehud Barak, with the full backing of the
Clinton administration and Bill Clinton personally, tried
mightily to get Yasir Arafat to sign a humiliating agreement
that would give the Palestinians the trappings of statehood
without any substance. In a recent interview with Arafat,
the Palestinian leader said that Barak offered "less than a
bantustan." (New York Times, July 26)
"They have to control the Jordan Valley, with five early
warning stations there," Arafat continued. "They have to
control the air above, the water aquifers below, the sea and
the borders. They have to divide the West Bank in three
cantons. They keep 10 percent of it for settlements and
roads and their forces. No sovereignty over Haram and
Sharif. And refugees, we didn't have a serious discussion
about." And there were many other onerous provisions in the
"peace" proposal.
Under pressure from the masses and the entire Arab world,
Arafat, after making compromise after compromise for seven
years, would not sign this latest document. So the Israeli
ruling class drew the conclusion that, in the environment of
a militant, mass Palestinian national movement, no
Palestinian leaders would agree to the kind of subordinated,
institutionalized neocolonial domination that is Tel Aviv's
version of a "peace agreement."
And even if they did, they would not be able to impose it on
the Palestinian people.
Sharon's Sept. 29 armed march of 1,000 on the Al Aqsa
Mosque, with the full permission of the Barak government,
was the opening shot in the new struggle to use brute force
to overwhelm the Palestinians.
END OF OSLO ACCORDS
The Palestinians drew their own conclusions from the end of
Oslo. They had suspended the Intifada of 1987 to 1993 during
the Oslo process in the hope of moving towards some form of
genuine self-determination, whose central provision must be
a sovereign state with Jerusalem as its capital. The
collapse of the Camp David talks were caused by Israeli
intransigence over even the most limited measures of genuine
sovereignty.
Of course, many forces in the Palestinian movement were
opposed to the Oslo accord to begin with, on the grounds
that it recognized the legitimacy of the Israeli settler
state; it foreswore the right of armed resistance against
the occupiers; it did not take into account the plight of
millions of Palestinian refugees and their descendants; and
it divided the national movement.
But the decision to negotiate was taken under the
unfavorable conditions of the collapse of the Soviet Union
and the defeat of Iraq by the U.S. in 1991.
Sections of the masses awaited the outcome. They watched for
seven years as their standard of living declined by 25
percent. They watched the Israelis stall, backtrack, evade
and deny. They watched settlers move in to the territories
that were supposed to become sovereign Palestinian land in
Gaza and the West Bank. They watched Jerusalem become ringed
with settlements.
Thus the Second Intifada broke out the day after Sharon's
march on Al Aqsa.
The occupation of Orient House is part of the broad strategy
to overwhelm the Palestinian movement by force, terror and
intimidation. It may be a prelude to even greater Israeli
aggression.
ISRAEL'S OCCUPATION
IS BASED ON TERROR
This blatant move, intended to nullify any hopes of the
Palestinians for self-determination, was explained as
retaliation for the suicide bombing of the Sbarro's
restaurant in downtown Jerusalem. The world movement must
not be taken in by such false pretexts.
The purveyors of terror are first and foremost the Israeli
forces with their F-16s, Apache helicopters, Abrams tanks,
missiles, military electronic technology and all the means
of warfare supplied by the Pentagon, to the tune of $2.5
billion a year.
Terror is a brutal tactic employed by the oppressors who
send a missile into a family's living room in the middle of
the night. Terror is sending F-16s to fire missiles into
Ramallah. Terror is shooting down children and youth in the
streets of the West Bank and Gaza.
If some sections of the Palestinian movement have turned to
terror tactics to retaliate against the massive terror used
against their people, it is the result of their desperate
situation due to the overwhelmingly unfavorable relationship
of forces and lack of conventional military means to
respond.
Whether or not the Israelis will be forced to back away from
their new direction by the U.S. ruling class, or by their
own fear of escalating the struggle, remains to be seen. If
the struggle escalates to the point that Washington and the
multinational corporations feel that their broader interests
in the oil-rich region are threatened, Bush may move away
from his position of "hands off."
The present position of "hands off" is really a way of
telling Sharon that it is okay to do as much damage to the
Palestinian movement as possible, using the full flow of
U.S. military assistance. But Washington reserves the right
to move in to preserve its interests if things get out of
hand.
As for the Israeli ruling class, they have an insoluble
dilemma.
On the one hand, they want to stabilize their regime. On the
other hand, they have always stopped short of agreeing to
any real step toward self-determination for the
Palestinians.
They are afraid of any viable Palestinian state, even a
limited one, because it does not resolve the fundamental
question of the rights of millions of Palestinian refugees
and exiles who need to return to not just a homeland but
their homeland, which is largely under occupation, both
outside and inside the pre-1967 borders of Israel.
Any genuinely viable Palestinian state would have the
support of the entire Palestinian nation and of the Arab
masses. It would grow and become a threat to the very
existence of the exploitative, oppressor settler regime in
its very heart. It would demand the right of return with
full rights.
The only hope for stabilizing relations between the Jewish
people and the Palestinian masses is to get rid of the U.S.-
backed Zionist ruling class and recognize full Palestinian
self-determination.
Young Palestinians by the tens of thousands are willing to
face death to inflict damage on the occupation, either by
demonstrating in the streets or by carrying bombs to targets
inside Israel. This is a very grave sign for the future of
the settler state.
It is also a very dangerous time for the Palestinian people,
who face the prospect of escalated aggression.
ANTI-GLOBALIZATION AND
PALESTINE SELF-DETERMINATION
What is really needed now is for the growing anti-
globalization movement to see that the Palestinian people
fighting in the streets are part of the same struggle
against the multinational corporations that exploit the
oppressed world.
Israel has waged war on the Arab states over and over again
and stands as a military outpost of the U.S., Britain and
the other imperialist powers that the movement opposed so
heroically in Genoa.
What is the Palestinian fight against the Israeli capitalist
ruling class really all about?
It is a struggle of a people trying not to be landless in
their own land. It is a fight not to be reduced to low-paid
day laborers dependent upon the occupiers for work. It is a
fight to regain the homeland brutally taken from them by
force 50 years ago by an unholy alliance of the capitalist
leaders of Zionism with British and then U.S. imperialism.
After World War II Jewish people in Europe were reeling from
the horrors of the Holocaust. The Zionist leaders, seeking
to become a ruling class, trapped the Jewish masses into
becoming part of a Western settler-colonialist enterprise in
the Middle East. The victims were the Palestinian people,
who were expelled from their homes by military force and
have lived in refugee camps for three generations.
In Israel the settlers are not only the people moving into
the West Bank and Gaza. The entire regime in Israel is a
settler regime. It has to be opposed until the Palestinians
get the full right of self-determination, which includes the
right of the Palestinians to their own state and the right
to return to their homeland.
In order to be consistent in the fight against world
capitalist oppression and super-exploitation, the anti-
globalization movement must make solidarity with Palestinian
self-determination and opposition to U.S.-backed Israeli
aggression against the Palestinian people a fundamental part
of its program and its cause.
