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Editorial - Gaza and Sudan: Flashpoints for World War
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- 08 June 2024 1036 hits
Within a span of two weeks, Israel used made-in-USA bombs to strike the Tal as-Sultan refugee camp near Rafah, bombing and burning to death at least 45 displaced workers in yet another genocidal atrocity in Gaza; 134 people died in a single hospital in the Darfur region of Sudan. They were casualties of a yearlong, imperialist-fueled civil war and another looming genocide. From the Israeli Defense Forces’ state terror to the brutal battle between rival generals in Sudan, the future of our class without communism is bleak.
With U.S. imperialism in steep decline, Hamas nationalists and dueling gangsters in Sudan are seeking to partner with capitalist rulers in Iran, China, and Russia. The resurgence of the civil war in Sudan and the ongoing bloodbath in Gaza are drawing the U.S. into more direct confrontation with their imperialist competition, all on the backs of Black and Brown workers. These conflicts reflect the world situation in this period, a time of dangerous instability, rising fascism, and inevitable world war. The world’s working class has only two options: to lie down and die for this deadly system, or to organize and fight for an internationalist, worker-led red army–for communist revolution.
Middle East: U.S bosses losing control
According to a 2019 United Nations report, the Levant Basin in the eastern Mediterranean Sea contains 122 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and 1.7 billion barrels of recoverable oil, with an estimated total value of $524 billion (UN Conference on Trade and Development, 2019). Much of these resources lie beneath or off the coast of the Gaza Strip. Long before Israel’s most recent siege of racist slaughter and ethnic cleansing, the Zionist regime’s occupation and blockade of Gaza “prevented the Palestinian people from exercising any control over their own fossil fuel resources, denying them much-needed fiscal and export revenues and leaving the Palestinian economy on the verge of collapse” (Al Jazeera, 6/21/21).
Given the economic stakes and the reality on the ground, where Gaza is physically devastated and Jewish settlers in the West Bank are killing and pillaging Muslim and Brown workers with impunity, a two-state solution between Israel and Palestine seems impossible. Israel’s capitalist rulers will attempt to hold on to these territories by any means necessary–including mass extermination and forced migration, the final solutions to Israel’s Palestine “problem.”
Meanwhile, the U.S. and regional power Saudi Arabia are nearing an agreement to develop Saudi Arabia’s nuclear program, a point of leverage against imperialist rivals of the U.S.: “Supporters of the arrangement maintain that it will enhance regional security by bolstering the U.S.-led alliance in the Middle East against Iran, checking the rising influence of China in the Arab world, and facilitating the normalization of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia” (Foreign Policy, 5/29). The nationalist misleaders who run Hamas, along with Hezbollah and the Houthis, are all funded by Iran. Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel stalled the pending nuclear deal. But even if it’s revived, the U.S. will be relying on de facto Saudi ruler Mohammed bin Salman, a loose cannon who jails prime ministers and murders journalists. Between Salman and the reckless and defiant war criminal Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s prime minister, the U.S. bosses are straining to keep their junior partners in check.
For the world’s working class, the only solution is to smash the capitalist ruling class with a militant, internationalist revolution led by workers, students, and soldiers. Students and workers who expose capitalist universities for their complicity in genocide are leading the way. And as workers in Rafah and Sudan ration food to share and help each other survive, they show how we must practice communist principles even under the most dire conditions. Workers of the world unite to turn the bosses' imperialist wars into class wars to smash the bosses.
Sudan–flash point for wider war
U.S. weakness is emboldening Iran to strike back. As Saudi, Israeli, and U.S. bosses align, so are Sudanese and Iranian bosses. Although Sudan’s army officially cut joint military ties in 2016, workers there recently spotted Iranian drones. With Sudan strategically positioned on the Red Sea, it fits into Iran’s plan for geopolitical control over the Middle East. “From the other side of the Red Sea, Yemen's Houthis, armed in part by Iran, have launched attacks in support of Hamas in Gaza” (Reuters, 4/10).
Iran isn’t the only power planting a stake in Africa. Just as imperialist competition for land, markets, and labor in Africa was central to the world wars of the 1900s, Sudan’s current civil war reflects today’s inter-imperialist rivalry. Chinese bosses are funneling billions in loans for infrastructure development that will draw the continent more tightly into their global capitalist network. Currently pending is an agreement between Ugandan officials and the Chinese firm Sinohydro to develop a $180 million power transmission line from Uganda to energy-starved South Sudan (Reuters, 4/14). Although Russia, a major oil exporter, has no need for Sudanese oil, they are a longstanding security partner and are keen to set up a naval base in Port Sudan on the Red Sea (AP News, 2/11/2023). While Russia and China claim to be joined at the hip in opposition to the U.S. and NATO in Ukraine, their interests–and those of the Iranian capitalists–may clash in Sudan. China’s calls for “peacekeeping: and “stability” are muffled by the drumbeats of war.
Build the communist “red line of history”
Workers around the world–from Paris to Israel, from New York to Lebanon–have risen up in protest against the mass murder in Rafah, demanding an end to Israel’s slaughter and occupation. Smaller protests have surfaced in cities like Philadelphia, linking the Sudan genocide to the struggles of workers in Gaza. But calls for “divestment” by universities or support for the “resistance” and ceasefires reveal the basic limits of reforms under capitalism. Genocide Joe Biden’s lying proclamations aside, there is no “red line” for the bosses’ profit-driven greed. With revolutionary communist leadership, workers must demand the overthrow of the capitalist system, drawing a “red line of history” that our class can celebrate and develop for generations to come.
With internationalist communism as our guide, we must be inspired by the courage of the workers in Gaza to seize every opportunity to build international workers' power, freed from the nationalism that divides us. From Israel and Palestine to Sudan and beyond, we can smash the imperialists and the nationalists and their murderous plans! إلى أعلى، إلى أعلى، مع العمال Up! Up! Up with the workers! Join the Progressive Labor Party!
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‘Conference for Palestine’: capitalism and liberation are incompatible
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- 08 June 2024 837 hits
Detroit MI, May 24—The People’s Conference for Palestine presented a tremendous opportunity for members and friends of Progressive Labor Party to engage in sharp political action and discussion centered around U.S. imperialism, the bosses’ use of nationalism to divide and weaken the working class, the misleadership of the conference organizers, the tremendous potential for a new society embodied by solidarity encampments, and the need for communist revolution to sweep away the old society.
People’s Conference: ruling class ideas on display
The message of the conference was clear: “Freedom” for Palestinians means a Palestinian ruling class replacing Zionist occupiers. There was constant glorification of South Africa, Algeria and other post-colonial countries, with zero recognition that inequality and racism still stalk the working class of these countries. In discussions our group was clear that simply replacing one set of bosses for another isn’t the answer. As a comrade put it, “capitalism and liberation are incompatible.”
The bankrupt politics and hypocrisy at work in the conference were made crystal clear when we were attacked for distributing CHALLENGE and our conference leaflet. The organizers went so far as to threaten to call the cops if we continued distributing. This development made it clear that organizers demanded adherence to the conference’s politics of pro-Hamas nationalism. The emptiness of their slogans of working-class solidarity were put on full display.
Finally, the last day of the conference coincided with the barbaric incineration of 45 Gazan refugees by the fascist Israeli army. The rhetoric was full of outrage, but there was no action. Our small group attempted to get attendees to visit the nearby encampment at Wayne State University, not more than 10 minutes away by car, for a rally, but the conference organizers did nothing.
Gotta be in it to win it
The trip was only possible because we’ve immersed ourselves in the class struggle on our campuses. On our local campuses, we’ve formed and given political leadership to our Common Ground anti-racist clubs which has exposed dozens and dozens of students to our political ideas. These clubs have been the vehicle for sharpening the class struggle on campus, where we’ve taken on racist administrators and exposed their anti-student policies.
We also met students by throwing ourselves (if unevenly) into the encampments in New York. Unlike the fake left leadership of the conference, these encampments gave us a real glimpse at the power of the multi-racial working class. Without a politician or boss in sight, students organized their mini-societies: food, housing, education, security, healthcare, sanitation - it was all organized collectively. We were there, contributing to these efforts, all the while struggling against identity politics and nationalism and for a disciplined and internationalist outlook. The encampments, mostly led by women workers and students, allowed us to meet some of the fiercest fighters against U.S. imperialism, Zionism and capitalism.
They were willing to risk arrest, suspension and expulsion to fight for Gaza and the international working class.
Importantly, the encampments also forced the liberal bosses to strip away their masks and show their fascist essence as they welcomed the kkkops to attack and brutalize students and workers.
The efforts we made to be a part of the class struggle are entirely responsible for us being able to bring a group to the conference in Detroit. The lesson could not be clearer: only by committing ourselves to participating in the class struggle and to being involved wherever workers or students are in motion is the ONLY way we can build a party that is capable of launching a revolution for communism.
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60 Years of CHALLENGE, your international communist paper
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- 08 June 2024 596 hits
The following story has been reprinted from Wally Linder’s book Life of Labor and Love.
In June 1964, the Progressive Labor Movement decided to print an eight-page weekly newspaper; CHALLENGE was born. Our search for a printer led us to an outfit in Trenton, N.J. After laying down a deposit, the printer looked at the first issue and told us that would be the last one he’d print. We called up the Harris offset press manufacturer and asked for a list of newspaper printers to whom it had sold web offset presses. That’s how we found the Sun Publishing Co., located in the Chinese community on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. We showed our first issue to the owner, Mr. Chan, and he agreed to print our newspaper. His wife and kids helped with various tasks. Milt Rosen, PLM chairperson, and I packed the papers into boxes for pick-up.
CHALLENGE’ing and rebelling against the rulers from day 1
As it happened, later that month the Harlem rebellion erupted, during which the rebels were holding the front page of CHALLENGE as their flag while marching. This prompted the NYPD Red Squad to visit Mr. Chan and warn him that if he continued to print our paper he would be in for trouble. Chan told them he was within his rights to print any newspaper brought to him. “What about freedom of the press?” he shot back at the cops’ threat. He was not about to abandon his only account. Years later, when Mr. Chan retired, our search for another printer led us to Brooklyn and Ballan Printing, a company that printed many small community and campus papers—and a huge number of pornographic ones that had sprung up since the 1960s. (The Mafia, in collusion with the owners, had coerced the workers into a local union it controlled.) But neither the owners nor the Mafia counted on the workers’ rebelliousness. The workers read our paper and saw the various exposés we wrote about the lousy working conditions that profit-hungry bosses were pushing on workers throughout the country.
CHALLENGE’ing and exposing rulers lies from the very start
When we went to pick up the paper, the workers showed us the horrible condition of what passed for their bathroom and asked us to write about it. Our editor Luis Castro wrote an exposé for the next issue, which the workers read with enthusiastic approval. When the bosses saw the article, they went wild. They told us it was all lies and one-sided and challenged us to print their side, “the truth.” We told them that there was only one “truth,” the “workers’ truth,” which made them even crazier. From then on, they scrutinized every issue. Soon afterwards, the owners renovated the bathroom into a halfway decent condition. The workers attributed that improvement to the article we had written. When a pre-May Day issue came out, we printed the words of the workers’ anthem, “The Internationale.” When we went to pick up that issue, a pressman suddenly leapt up the two flights of stairs to the top of the huge web press and in a clear, loud voice began singing “The Internationale.” As the strains of the final words, “the International working class shall be the human race,” drifted across the pressroom, the workers spontaneously burst into applause. We never found out how this worker knew the song’s melody, but news of the performance soon traveled to the far reaches of Brooklyn. We are now in our 55th year of publishing CHALLENGE, and have never missed an issue.
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May 1 March: To smash genocide, build and organize with PLP
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- 08 June 2024 534 hits
Amidst the ongoing genocide and starvation of Palestinians in Gaza, 80 members and staff from the immigrant community organization in which Progressive Labor Party (PLP) members participate turned out for the pro-Palestinian May Day rally on May 1 in New York City. PLP members and friends rallied with the organization with hugs and chanting together. The Party played a key role in the process of getting the turnout and spirit of the group. We distributed 500 PLP leaflets (titled, “From all the rivers to all the seas, communism will set us free”) inviting people to the PLP May Day march on May 4 in Brooklyn. A group of young staff came on May 4. Two are regularly reading CHALLENGE and want to get to know us better.
Organizing against genocide
PLP members have been working in this organization and surrounding community for more than 20 years. One comrade was an ESL teacher there for 10 years. We have recruited a number of workers to PLP and maintain a regular study group in the community. Since Oct 7 when Hamas killed 1,200 Israelis and the Zionists began the slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza, comrades there have been in action. On Oct 10 we distributed 2,000 leaflets in the organization and the community. The title of the leaflet was: Israel-Hamas war means, Workers of the World Unite - Fight Back, Join the International Progressive Labor Party!
We spoke at the Workers’ Committee of the organization about the war, genocide, oil, imperialist rivalry and the history of Israel and Palestine. Despite the lack of response then, the resistance against the directors of the Workers Committee invited comrades to organize a forum in December at the time and place of their meeting. 50 workers attended the forum presented in Spanish and English. A supervisor made an attempt to take over the forum, but she failed. The Party’s ideas and speeches were applauded. Workers endorsed a rally in the community. CHALLENGE was widely distributed in the process.
A group of the organization’s staff, members of a United Auto Workers (UAW) local, were motivated by our comrades’ work to start a mass campaign to present five demands to the organizations’ directors/bosses. The demands included an immediate and long-term ceasefire in Gaza, support for the divest movement and the no vote movement and political education for staff and members. Staff got 40 signatures and comrades got 20 worker/member signatures demanding a meeting with the bosses. The meeting turned out to be a call during which staff and comrades spoke well and sharply. Somewhat taken aback, the directors agreed to a statement on social media and political education. In response to the divest, no vote movements, one of the directors said, “We’re not doing anything wrong, and we can invest in Israel as we see fit and we (that is the loyal liberals) have to re-elect Biden.” A real “education” for members and staff of the organization.
Bosses’ ideas poison for fightback
While there were some useful points in the political education webinar, nationalism and a total lack of class analysis was on display. There was no mention of the rivalry of the world’s imperialists for control of oil, shipping routes, commerce, and control of the working class. We must destroy capitalism and imperialism everywhere and forever. Communism is the only solution! That is the Party’s job, and we mustn’t shy away from the struggle!
The result of the long-term organizing and protesting was the directors’ decision to mobilize for the May Day rally on May 1st. Three workers and five young staffers joined other comrades and friends at PLP’s May Day march on May 4. One worker joined and 2 others have gotten closer. Building a mass party is always our goal and we have a long way to go! In conclusion, this is an example of building the Party in this period of sharpening war, racism, and fascism. Let’s do it!
MADISON COUNTY, KY, April 22 - Today members of the Progressive Labor Party joined the Madison County Tenants Union to rally for the repeal of HB5, Kentucky’s new “Safer Kentucky” Act that makes us all unsafe! The law criminalizes homeless workers by making it illegal to camp on public property. It will increase incarceration and prison labor which only benefits the bosses. It also authorizes violent attacks by business and property owners on people camping on their property, and gives the green light to vigilantes to use “deadly physical force” against anyone who they think is trying to “dispossess” them of their property. These are all classic ways for the bosses to build a fascist movement.
We marched to the office of the Republican state senators behind this law, chanting and singing our union songs. Their response? They locked the door on us! We continued with speeches and testimonials outside, and shoved our scroll of over a thousand signatures in between the locked doors. This rally shook up the political bosses and was featured on the bosses’ news media. We were able to spend some time strengthening our ties with other tenant union members. We shared a CHALLENGE newspaper with them, leading to discussions about the need to overthrow this entire fascist capitalist system!
Going beyond tenant organizing
And to overthrow capitalism we have to go beyond fighting the local racists in Kentucky. We have to organize against Genocide Joe Biden who is continuing Trump’s racist attacks on migrants, escalating his predecessor Obama’s racist attacks on migrants. We have to become part of a worldwide movement against imperialism and the looming world war. The bosses want to blame migrants for problems created by capitalism. And they also want workers to kill each other in wars that can only benefit these profiteering capitalists. Let’s join the worldwide fight for a world run by the world’s workers. That’s communism. Join the Progressive Labor Party
