NAZARETH — Despite a sweeping downpour and muddy, flooded roads, several thousand workers from Nazareth, and other places in Palestine, marched with red flags to mark May Day. As usual, the rally was conducted one day earlier, on Saturday, in order to allow more workers to participate (the weekend under Israeli law is only Saturday, not Sunday.) The workers brought red flags, drums and a lot of enthusiasm, and defied the harsh weather to commemorate May Day.

The May Day rally here was organized and led by the revisionist Israeli “Communist” Party, which has a strong presence in this city and many supporters there. They raised very mild slogans, in some cases nationalist Palestinian ones and in other cases reformist ones, except for two radical slogans — “Smash Fascism” and “People  Arise in Revolt!”

A group of PL’ers attended this rally. Despite the fact that most participants were I”C”P supporters, members and “Communist” Youth members, our materials were received with interest; one demonstrator even came to the rally wearing a PLP t-shirt he bought earlier.

Despite the reformist and nationalist slogans, this was a very powerful rally. It showed the strength of the working class to stand firm despite harsh conditions and raise the red flag. We are looking forward for more activity throughout the year and raising the red flag again next May Day in Jerusalem and Nazareth.