Israeli-U.S. bombs destroy majority of Gazan homes
Al Jazeera, 12/31/23–Israel’s relentless bombardment of Gaza for nearly three months has destroyed 70 percent of the homes in the besieged Palestinian enclave, according to the Government Media Office. About 300,000 out of 439,000 homes have been destroyed in Israeli attacks, a Wall Street Journal report said…“The word ‘Gaza’ is going to go down in history along with Dresden [Germany] and other famous cities that have been bombed,” Robert Pape, a political scientist at the University of Chicago… In nearly two months, the offensive has wreaked more destruction than the razing of Syria’s Aleppo between 2012 and 2016, Ukraine’s Mariupol, or, proportionally, the Allied bombing of Germany in World War II… “Gaza is one of the most intense civilian punishment campaigns in history,” said Pape.

DR Congo demands UN remove troops
France24, 12/19/23–Despite a volatile domestic situation, the Congolese government has for months been calling for an "accelerated" withdrawal of UN peacekeepers, from the end of 2023 rather than the end of 2024. It considers the UN force to be ineffective in protecting civilians from the armed groups and militias that have plagued the eastern DRC for three decades. The accusation is similar to that made by other African countries, notably Mali, which has demanded the emergency departure of the UN Minusma mission. In recent months, several Council members, notably the United States, have expressed doubts as to whether Congolese forces are ready to replace Monusco to ensure the security of the population. However, as UN missions cannot operate without the authorization of host countries, the DRC wants to force the Security Council's hand -- though its messaging has been less forceful than Mali's. Even as it complies with the DR Congo's demands, the Council is expected to underline its "concern over the escalation of violence" in the east and "tensions between Rwanda and the DRC,"…The first phase includes the withdrawal of peacekeepers from South Kivu province by the end of April 2024, beginning "before the end of 2023."

U.S.-China imperialists planning for war
Foreign Affairs, 12/12/23–Over the past decade, the prospect of Chinese military aggression in the Indo-Pacific has moved from the realm of the hypothetical to the war rooms of U.S. defense planners…With Taiwan as the assumed flash point, U.S. strategists have offered several theories about how such an attack might play out…First is a…conquest of Taiwan by China…A second path envisions a U.S.-led coalition beating back China’s initial assault on the island…many strategists are concerned about a third, more catastrophic outcome…a direct war between the two great powers leading to uncontrolled escalation…nuclear weapons, thereby triggering Armageddon…Yet there is also a very different possibility, one that is not merely plausible but perhaps likely: a protracted conventional war between China and a U.S.-led coalition. Although such a conflict would be less devastating than nuclear war, it could exact enormous costs on both sides.

Oil war brewing in South America
Associated Press, 12/31/23–A British warship arrived in Guyana on Friday afternoon amid rising tensions from a border dispute between the former British colony and Venezuela…The HMS Trent’s visit led Venezuela to begin military exercises a day earlier in the eastern Caribbean near its border with Guyana as the Venezuelan government presses its claim to a huge swath of its smaller neighbor…The dispute is over Essequibo, a sparsely populated region that is the size of Florida and rich in oil and minerals. Venezuela has long claimed it was cheated out of the territory when Europeans and the U.S. set the border…Venezuela on Thursday began military exercises involving 5,000 troops in the eastern Caribbean, citing the visit by the British patrol ship…Guyana has controlled Essequibo for decades, but Venezuela revived its historical claim to the region earlier this month through a referendum in which voters were asked whether the territory should be turned into a Venezuelan state…Venezuela says it was the victim of a land theft conspiracy in 1899 when Guyana was a British colony and arbitrators from Britain, Russia, and the United States decided the boundary.

BROOKLYN, NY, January 2—The struggle continues two years after winning the fight to integrate two formerly separate sports programs on John Jay’s Campus–one with mostly white and Asian students and another of mostly Black and Brown students. Under capitalism, we are constantly reminded that a win under this system is just the beginning and even as communists we can never let our guard down or coast on reform victories.

For the second year in a row the fall start of sports programs on campus continued to be combined but not integrated–leading to teams filled with mostly white and Asian players. Self-critically, the Progressive Labor Party (PLP) members in the school incorrectly focused on in-house fixes instead of making the struggle more mass and visible to bring together antiracist fighters in the building to fight back against these racist practices.

Inspired by a sharp antiracist flier written by PLP parents and others in 2017 that rocked the racist status quo and forced the Department of Education (DoE) to combine the sports teams, one school’s student government created and distributed hundreds of their fliers demanding that the sports teams on campus be truly integrated and that teams that do not look like the racial makeup of our campus not be allowed to compete. That flier will continue to be passed out in front of the school even as it spreads through students’ social media.
Invigorated by the mostly positive response of their peers, the students plan to convene a forum to attract more students to the fight and to discuss and plan for when their demands are not met.

Capitalism forces our youth to compete against each other, fostering artificial and racist divisions that they will later use to divide white, Black, and Latin workers so that all can be oppressed and exploited for profit. PLP members on campus are committed to building anti-racist and integrated teams on and off the court. Fighting to expand an ever-growing group of multiracial students, parents, and staff to take on the racist attacks capitalism will continue to throw at us, is the only way forward. The struggle continues!

MARYLAND, December 19, 2023—Tonight the fight against Zionist efforts to intimidate teachers who have supported Palestinian workers in Gaza took another step forward.  The teachers have not been content to rely only on grievance procedures and lawyers but have continued to organize and speak up. Over 130 protestors gathered outside the Board of Education tonight in the cold to support the “Solidarity Not Silence” campaign.

Parents, teachers, students, and community members vigorously chanted, “When teachers are under attack, what do we do, stand up, fight back!” and  “Jewish, Arab, Black and white, workers of the world unite.”  After several sharp speeches from teachers, members of the Progressive Labor Party (PLP), Jewish Voice For Peace, and Palestinian students, a group of about 50 marched over to the building where the closed meeting was being held and chanted and pounded on the windows. PLP members distributed nearly 50 CHALLENGEs with articles about this struggle and the fight at the American Public Health Association (CHALLENGE, 1/3).

Anti-Zionist teachers attacked
At least five teachers have now been put on administrative leave since  November 15 in this wealthy county on the border of  Washington DC.  A Takoma Park Middle School teacher was charged with antisemitism because of Facebook posts protesting the massive attacks on Palestinian civilians by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). Another teacher had a tagline on her email that said, “From the river to the sea” and is being attacked for having something “political”  -- a charge that has not been used against others with a variety of political slogans. One of the teachers at the rally said, “I am not surprised at the attack since the ‘progressive ’ community can’t handle this issue - they separate over Israel.” Indeed the county has a reputation for being liberal but last year the council passed a resolution that “anti-Zionism is antisemitism” and this year the U.S. Congress did the same thing. Students at Towson University were disciplined and the organization, CASA, which serves the immigrant population had its funding cut. Obviously “free speech” does not extend to critiques of U.S. imperialism.

Focus on destroying capitalism
PLP members have the responsibility to move the discussion beyond free speech debates. One member summed up our outlook by stating “This is about the economic system of capitalism that depends on the exploitation and misery of the entire human population to survive. This is about the U.S. government’s desperation to control resources such as oil, pipelines, and sea routes in the Middle East. …Hundreds of thousands of workers around the world say no to the continued genocide of the Palestinians. Hamas, the PLO, these misleaders cannot be trusted to end the exploitation and murder of the workers in Palestine. Only an international movement against capitalism can free the workers of the world.” After this everyone joined in the chant: Same Enemy, Same Fight, Workers of the World Unite!

Since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, which killed 1200 mostly civilians and took more than 200 hostages, workers around the world have been focused on the massive, Nazi-like ethnic cleansing being carried out in Gaza by the Israeli fascists and their U.S. imperialist partners. Millions have taken to the streets to oppose this racist genocide that threatens to become a much wider war. As of December 29, about 22,000 Palestinians have been killed, hundreds of thousands injured and more than 1.5 million have been displaced, mostly children.

Bosses kill workers exposing their genocide
Within this mass destruction of an unarmed civilian population, there is another target besides Hamas, a war against journalists and journalism. Of the 1,200 Palestinian journalists and media workers based in Gaza at the start of the war, 95 have been killed. Reporters Without Borders stated, “The Palestinian territory has been subjected to a veritable eradication of journalism.”

Most of the media workers were specifically targeted by the Israeli military. According to information collected by the Palestinian Journalist Syndicate (PJS), at least 84 of the 95 were killed in “surgical” or sniper Israeli attacks that targeted either their homes or the area where they were covering news stories. Some received direct and specific threats to their lives from the Israeli military before they were killed. Hundreds of family members have also been killed in targeted strikes on journalists’ homes.

On October 25, Al Jazeera’s Gaza bureau chief Wael Al-Dahdouh lost his wife, daughter, son, and grandson in an Israeli airstrike on the home where they were sheltering in the Nuseirat refugee camp. Al-Dahdouh remained in Gaza City to continue his coverage of Israeli atrocities, despite threats made against him.

On November 8, a Zionist group published a false report that photojournalist Yasser Qudih and three other photographers had prior knowledge of the October 7 attacks. Reuters published one of Qudih’s photos and categorically denied the false claims. Even though the group withdrew its false accusations, on November 13, four Israeli missiles targeted Qudih’s home in southern Gaza and killed eight of his family members.

On November 22, Al Jazeera reporter Anas Al-Sharif received multiple phone calls from Israeli military officers instructing him to stop reporting and leave northern Gaza and that he was under surveillance. On December 11, an Israeli airstrike targeted his family home in Gaza’s Jabalia refugee camp, killing his 90-year-old father.

On December 6, 2023, Al Jazeera correspondent Momen Al-Sharafi lost 22 family members—including his parents, siblings, their spouses, and nieces and nephews—in an Israeli airstrike on the home in Jabalia refugee camp where they had sought refuge.

Israel has not permitted foreign journalists into Gaza. On December 19, the Foreign Press Association (“FPA”) in Jerusalem, representing about 370 journalists from 130 media outlets in more than 30 countries, filed a petition with the Israeli Supreme Court requesting immediate access to Gaza. Because foreign journalists have not been able to enter Gaza, Palestinian journalists are the world’s only media eyewitnesses to the war crimes being committed by Biden and Netanyahu.  

U.S. reporters against genocide fightback
This war is also being carried out, on a less violent but no less important level, within the U.S. Award-winning New York Times magazine writer Jazmine Hughes was forced to resign from the Times after signing a letter calling for a ceasefire in Gaza. Nine reporters for the Los Angeles Times were suspended for 30 days from the regular beats for also signing a ceasefire letter. This intimidation and retaliation are creating a chilling effect in newsrooms around the country, already battered by mass layoffs, where media workers are afraid to speak out.

Media workers in three major unions are working together to overcome this fear. Workers have attended marches and rallies against the war and are planning a three-union, “Know Your Rights” panel to encourage media workers to speak out. Also, a report is being produced that will document retaliation taken against media workers for opposing Israeli/U.S. genocide in Gaza.

Two of these unions, the NewsGuild-CWA (the largest U.S. union of staff journalists) and the National Writers Union (a union of freelance media workers and authors) contributed $10,000 each to the International Federation of Journalists’ Safety Fund to provide journalists in Gaza and the West Bank with helmets, flak jackets, battery charges and whatever else they need.

As we enter the New Year, the Dark Night of imperialism and growing wars is getting darker. The international working class is shackled by racism, nationalism, and religion without a mass communist movement to lead us. As the night gets darker, our light must burn brighter. Fighting back is winning. In the heat of class struggle our ideas can come to life and create the conditions for building a mass international Progressive Labor Party.