A continuación, compartimos la Declaración final del “Encuentro Mundial Contra el Imperialismo” realizado en Caracas entre el 22 y el  24 de enero de 2020, en el que participaron 403 delegados internacionales y 2.096 delegados nacionales del Gran Polo Patriótico, del Congreso de los Pueblos y de organizaciones y movimientos sociales que acompañan la Revolución Bolivariana.

Las delegaciones de los Partidos Políticos y Movimientos Sociales, reunidos en la ciudad de Caracas, capital de la República Bolivariana de Venezuela, con motivo del “Encuentro Mundial Contra el Imperialismo”, luego de las deliberaciones efectuadas hemos llegado a las siguientes conclusiones:

El futuro de la humanidad está en grave peligro. La paz en el planeta se encuentra seriamente amenazada como resultado de la política de agresiones militares de los EE.UU y sus aliados, así como de la mortal carrera armamentista que sólo le reporta dividendos a las grandes corporaciones de la industria militar. La guerra es el mecanismo predilecto del expansionismo imperial, en especial, del estadounidense y eso lo observamos dramáticamente en los más recientes conflictos regionales que han afectado gravemente a los pueblos de Siria, Yemen, Irak, Libia, Afganistán y a toda la región.

Asimismo, la especie humana sufre los estragos ocasionados por la voracidad de un modelo económico que en su despliegue suicida destruye la naturaleza por la insaciable obsesión de maximizar ganancias. Esa es precisamente la lógica del sistema capitalista, la cual ya no sólo compromete su funcionamiento sino que también pone en peligro de extinción de la humanidad.

El modelo neoliberal que instrumenta la globalización de las grandes corporaciones bajo la dominación de los Estados imperialistas, le ha impreso a la economía mundial una gran fragilidad. Las crisis son más recurrentes y los grandes especuladores financieros dominan el planeta. En la distribución de la riqueza generada se ha impuesto un parámetro de desigualdades, injusticias y exclusión que afecta a una creciente parte de la población mundial.

Los flagelos de la pobreza y la miseria afectan a millardos de personas como nunca antes en la historia de la humanidad. Sin dudas, el desarrollo del capitalismo engendra fenómenos insostenibles, desde el punto de vista social, político y ético.

A esto se le agrega una crisis ética derivada del modo de vida imperante de las economías de mercado, donde se sepultan las culturas nacionales y los valores humanos, en función de imponer la sociedad de consumo. El culto a los antivalores del capitalismo contribuye potenciar la crisis de la condición humana generada en el actual modelo de convivencia.

El imperialismo está en crisis y esto lo hace mucho más agresivo, peligroso y destructivo. Ante el ocaso del mundo unipolar, el imperialismo estadounidense implementa una estrategia de dominación global. La apuesta geopolítica de la Casa Blanca frente a la resistencia de los pueblos y la irrupción de potencias emergentes, ha sido defender su hegemonía, mediante una política neocolonial orientada a apropiarse de los recursos naturales, en especial de los recursos energéticos, controlar los mercados y dominar políticamente a las naciones.

Para preservar el injusto orden mundial actual, el imperialismo violenta el derecho internacional público, ha convertido al mundo en un gran teatro de operaciones militares, desarrolla medidas coercitivas unilaterales, impone leyes de carácter extraterritorial, ataca el multilateralismo, vulnera la soberanía de las naciones y suprime la autodeterminación de los pueblos. En su arrogante concepción, sus fronteras llegan hasta donde se extienden sus intereses expansionistas.

En consonancia con esta política, el imperialismo recurre a la intervención militar, a la desestabilización política de los gobiernos, a las guerras y al bloqueo económico. Su planeación estratégica concibe a la OTAN como el brazo militar global del neoliberalismo. Adicionalmente, en el marco de su Doctrina de la Guerra No Convencional, acciones terroristas, el uso de paramilitares, la judicialización de liderazgos antiimperialistas y el asesinato selectivo, son algunas de las acciones más emblemáticas de una política genocida, que coloca en peligro a la humanidad.

Tales prácticas han sido “legitimadas” a través de la industria cultural del capitalismo, las grandes trasnacionales de la comunicación y el uso de las redes sociales. Igualmente, el uso de la “Big Data” se ha constituido en una formidable arma para modificar el comportamiento de la población e incidir en sus decisiones políticas.

En el intento de imponer el “pensamiento único”, los poderosos del mundo manipulan las creencias religiosas, tratan de justificar las actuales relaciones de poder en detrimento de la democracia, la imposición del libre mercado, el racismo de estirpe eurocéntrica, la segregación de las minorías, la opresión de género, el carácter eugenésico del modelo educativo global, entre muchos otros factores, que se ajustan perfectamente a los requerimientos de la dictadura del capital.

El capitalismo neoliberal afianza la explotación de la clase trabajadora, oprime aún más a la mujer en función de maximizar la ganancia de las grandes trasnacionales, arrebata el futuro a la juventud y desdibuja la identidad de los pueblos originarios. Esto evidencia que la solución a los grandes problemas del mundo actual demanda un nuevo modelo de convivencia humana.

En ese contexto, el mundo multicéntrico y pluripolar emerge con mayor fuerza. El fortalecimiento político y económico de potencias como Rusia y China, junto al de otras naciones, le hacen un contrapeso cada vez más serio al poder del imperialismo estadounidense. Evidentemente, la heroica resistencia en el Medio Oriente, las luchas de los pueblos de América Latina y el Caribe, han contenido y hecho retroceder los planes del imperialismo.

Más aún, las experiencias de los gobiernos progresistas en el mundo ya se perfila como una alternativa frente al neoliberalismo. Ejemplo de ello es la Revolución Bolivariana, que se proyecta como un referente antiimperialista con una enorme fortaleza popular en el marco de la poderosa unión cívico-militar y sobre la base del ideario del Libertador Simón Bolívar y del Comandante Hugo Chávez.

Esto ha provocado el brutal ataque del imperialismo estadounidense contra el pueblo venezolano, que ha derrochado dignidad y amor por la patria, ratificando su rumbo hacia el socialismo en numerosos procesos electorales que refrendan la vigorosa democracia participativa existente en este país. Duras jornadas de lucha popular han derrotado las amenazas de intervención militar estadounidense, intentos de golpe de Estado y focos de violencia terrorista.

Este ejemplo de lucha junto al de Nicaragua y Cuba, así como los recientes avances en Argentina y México, ha permitido el fortalecimiento de fuerzas antiimperialistas y conllevará a reforzar los nuevos mecanismos de integración regional (CELAC, ALBA-TPC, PETROCARIBE, etc.). Aunque en Honduras, Paraguay, Brasil, Ecuador, El Salvador y Bolivia se ha reposicionado el neocolonialismo en el marco de la nueva edición de la Doctrina Monroe, las luchas populares continúan.

En el resto del mundo también los pueblos resisten, se sublevan y los gobiernos populares ejercen su soberanía. La unidad antiimperialista es un objetivo estratégico impostergable.

En este contexto, el “Encuentro Mundial contra el Imperialismo”, declara:

• Exhortamos a los pueblos del mundo a luchar por la vida, la preservación de la naturaleza y contra condiciones estructurales que generan el cambio climático. Igualmente, exigimos a las naciones desarrolladas a trabajar decididamente para evitar la destrucción del planeta y especialmente a los EE.UU a superar su postura primitiva que pretende desconocer el terrible daño que se ocasiona a la naturaleza con el actual modelo productivo basado en la acumulación del capital.

• Acompañamos la demanda de construir un orden internacional más justo, que coloque en primer plano los intereses de los pueblos y permita desarrollar políticas de inclusión y de justicia social para superar las gigantescas desigualdades sociales y económicas que imperan entre las naciones del mundo.

• Convocamos a los ciudadanos del mundo a defender la paz, la soberanía de los pueblos y acompañar las legítimas luchas por el progreso socioeconómico sobre la base de una amplia plataforma de lucha unitaria en contra del enemigo común, el imperialismo estadounidense.

• Repudiamos la implementación de las ilegales medidas coercitivas unilaterales por parte de las potencias imperialistas, ya que son políticas criminales que afectan a los pueblos. Especialmente, condenamos la política genocida de bloqueo económico que se aplica contra las naciones del mundo que ejercen su soberanía.

• Rechazamos la militarización de Nuestra América y especialmente, la presencia de las bases militares de Estados Unidos en América Latina y el Caribe.

• Condenamos de la forma más enérgica la invasión militar y demás agresiones cometidas por el imperialismo contra los pueblos del Medio Oriente. Especialmente, repudiamos la violación de la soberanía de Siria e Irak, las agresiones a la República Islámica de Irán, así como el vil asesinato del Comandante Qasem Soleimani, mártir de los pueblos del mundo que luchan por la libertad.

• Exigimos respeto a la soberanía de Venezuela, Cuba y Nicaragua así como apoyamos los esfuerzos de Nicolás Maduro Moros, Presidente Constitucional de la República Bolivariana de Venezuela, por mantener la paz.

• Denunciamos el intento orquestado por la Casa Blanca de censurar a las empresas multiestatales TeleSur e HispanTV. Esto se constituye en una afrenta a la libertad de expresión de los pueblos.

• Condenamos el golpe de Estado, orquestado desde Washington, en contra del presidente Evo Morales Ayma. Repudiamos la cruenta represión y el racismo contra el pueblo del Estado Plurinacional de Bolivia.

Igualmente, el “Encuentro Mundial contra el Imperialismo”, acuerda:

• Construir una Plataforma Unitaria Mundial organizada por continentes, regiones, subregiones y países en función de enfrentar al imperialismo. Dicha estructura organizativa será conformada en atención a las peculiaridades de cada territorio.

• Realizar durante el año 2020 “Encuentros Continentales Contra el Imperialismo” a los fines de conformar las plataformas unitarias continentales, regionales y sub-regionales articuladas entorno a un plan de lucha común contra el imperialismo.

• Convocar al “II Encuentro Mundial Contra el Imperialismo” a realizarse en Caracas, capital de la República Bolivariana de Venezuela, a los fines de definir el nombre de la Plataforma Unitaria Mundial, así como la articulación de las diferentes plataformas continentales y regionales en un plan común mundial que hermane las luchas de los pueblos.

Por último, el “Encuentro Mundial Contra el Imperialismo” acuerda hacer suya la Agenda de Lucha adoptada en el “I Encuentro Internacional de Trabajadores y Trabajadoras en Solidaridad con la Revolución Bolivariana”, refrendada por el “I Congreso Internacional de Mujeres”, por el “Congreso Internacional de Comunas, Movimientos Sociales y del Poder Popular”, por el “I Encuentro Internacional de Pueblos Indígenas”, por el “Congreso Internacional de Afrodescendientes” y el “Congreso Internacional de Comunicación”, celebrados en la República Bolivariana de Venezuela durante el año 2019, agenda que incluye lo siguiente:

1. Realizar una jornada internacional de movilización en apoyo a la Revolución Bolivariana y contra el neoliberalismo el 27 de febrero del año 2020. (Conmemoración de los 31 años de la primera insurrección en Carcas contra el neoliberalismo)

2. Convocar una movilización mundial por la paz en Venezuela, en Nuestra América y contra los planes de guerra del gobierno de Estados Unidos para el mes de abril de 2020.

3. Desarrollar una jornada internacional de repudio a la Doctrina Monroe, contra el Bloqueo y demás Medidas Coercitivas Unilaterales para el día 28 de junio de 2020.

4. Crear hasta el próximo Encuentro una Comisión Coordinadora de las delegaciones presentes en el “I Encuentro Mundial Contra el Imperialismo” a los fines de cumplir el presente plan.

Aprobado en la Ciudad de Caracas, Cuna del Libertador Simón Bolívar y Capital de la República Bolivariana de Venezuela a los 24 días del mes de Enero de 2020.

Fuente: Alba Ciudad

The biggest education system in the US—California’s—is about to make an incredibly consequential decision:

Will it institute a Ethnic Studies curriculum that uplifts the stories of all communities of color or reject one that includes Arab Americans—bending to the desires of pro-Israel groups who simply don’t agree?

Under tremendous pressure, the fate of Arab Americans in our textbooks is currently being decided upon by our state electeds. But if we act now—making our demands for inclusion and justice clear—we can still save Ethnic Studies in our state and set a historic precedent for the country.

Go to: https://act.newmode.net/action/mpower-change/support-arab-youth-save-ethnic-studies?sp_ref=617802505.392.203165.t.0.2

January 28 — Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network joins our voice with that of Palestinians and all people of conscience around the world in rejecting and condemning Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu’s racist, colonialist, so-called “Deal of the Century.” This “deal” blatantly enshrines settler colonialism and Zionism without even a facade of concern for allegedly universal principles of justice, sovereignty, self-determination and international law from which Palestinians are systematically excluded. 

While we are entirely certain of the utter failure of this “war plan” for occupied Palestine (it is certainly not any form of plan for peace) when confronted with the unified rejection of the Palestinian and Arab peoples and all supporters of justice around the world, we also emphasize the urgency of escalating our struggle to confront Zionism and imperialism and bring about their defeat. This must mean expanding our campaigns for boycott, divestment and sanctions with material effect; defending Palestinian resistance; and advancing the demand for freedom for Palestinian political prisoners.

From Balfour to Trump

It is no surprise that this has been labeled the “Deal of the Century” – after all, it has been for just over 100 years that Palestinians have been fighting back against colonization in their homeland. The division of the Arab world under the Sykes-Picot agreement and British colonialism in Palestine led directly to the Balfour declaration, in which a British lord granted land that was not his – and was, in fact, the land of the indigenous Palestinian people – to the European colonialist Zionist movement. Palestinians were dismissively referenced as nothing more than the “existing non-Jewish communities.” 

Today, Trump once again speaks with the perspective of an imperial lord, doling out land and property that is not his in the interests of imperial power and its partner, Zionist colonialism. For over a century, however, Balfour’s plan and its disastrous consequences, backed as they have been by imperial power, military might and capitalist billions, have failed on the rocky shoals of Palestinian existence and resistance, steadfast in all forms, from intifada until intifada, with a revolutionary vision of liberation that propels the struggle to continue for victory against all the forces of reaction, racism and repression. 

Electioneering with Palestinian blood

Of course, the show in the White House today – attended by a slew of notorious, right-wing Zionists, including billionaire political donor Sheldon Adelson, sitting in the front row after bankrolling Trump’s campaign, and genocide promoter Brooke Goldstein of the Lawfare Project, responsible for repeated frivolous lawsuits targeting professors, students and people of conscience who speak about Palestine – was also a campaign moment for its ultra-right hosts, Trump and Netanyahu. The fact that this colonial celebration was also backed by fellow Israeli politician Benjamin Gantz highlights the fact that Zionist political competition is only over how to manage the theft of Palestinian land and the taking of Palestinian lives, rather than over the nature of the state itself. Netanyahu was indicted for corruption today, while Trump is under impeachment and facing growing popular demands for real change, like Medicare for All, free public education and ending endless wars, that imperil his re-election campaign. 

The distraction from these failing politicians’ electoral crises, however, threatens a very real price for the millions of Palestinians who are threatened by their edicts as they seek to legitimize the ongoing apartheid, land confiscation, home demolitions, mass incarceration, extrajudicial execution, siege on Gaza, denial of refugees’ right to return, ethnic cleansing in Jerusalem and many more ongoing war crimes and crimes against humanity. This international electoral sideshow is not simply a display for the cameras; it is built on a foundation of Palestinian blood.

The colonial alliance: Imperialism, Zionism, Arab reaction

The announcement of the “deal” once again laid bare that Palestinians continue to face the same enemy camp that they have confronted from the earliest days of the struggle: imperialism, Zionism and Arab reaction, with Zionism taking the form of both the Israeli settler-colonial project itself and the Zionist movement that backs it with political and economic support and alliances with Western imperialist powers. Trump and Netanyahu boasted of the presence of the ambassadors of Bahrain, Oman and the UAE at the press conference, the latest reflection of the involvement of these reactionary regimes and their kings and princes not only in slaughtering the people of Yemen but in wholeheartedly siding with their imperialist sponsors to attack the Palestinian cause, at the heart of any movement for Arab liberation. 

Of course, U.S. imperialism is the leading force of terror and destruction in the world. All of the numerous references to “fighting terrorism” in Trump and Netanyahu’s speeches are, in fact, demands for utter surrender from not only the Palestinian people, but the people of the world, who they demand be forbidden from fighting back against the powerful states that confiscate their land, resources and wealth. The vision of this “plan” is not restricted to Palestine alone, but aims to serve as a blueprint for imperialist domination of the region and ongoing Zionist regional hegemony, even as those face a growing crisis as popular and political forces resist and overcome reactionary invasions, sanctions and other attacks.

Apartheid as a solution

The so-called “deal of the century” promotes the annexation of illegal Israeli colonial settlements, the confiscation of the fertile land of the Jordan Valley, complete denial of sovereignty over the skies and the seas for the indigenous people of Palestine and the construction of a complex network of tunnels and roads under complete Israeli security control for Palestinians to move back and forth between their isolated Bantustans. The “recognition of Israel as a Jewish state” is nothing more than a demand for official recognition of racism, permanent inequality for Palestinians and justification for ethnic cleansing. It views Jerusalem as a mosque for “Muslims to visit” rather than a thriving Palestinian and Arab city under occupation. It demands “demilitarized” Palestinians, while the Israeli military, backed by U.S. military aid of $3.8 billion annually and serving as one of the largest U.S. proxy forces in the region, continues its domination. 

Trump’s deal is a blueprint for apartheid as a solution and, in many ways, a reflection of the current reality in Palestine. It underlines once more the failure of the so-called “peace process” and the dead-end of the “two-state solution.” In reality, the best response to Trump, Netanyahu and the Zionist-imperialist regime in Palestine is the decolonization and total liberation of Palestine from the river to the sea, the dismantling of the Zionist colony and the construction of a truly just future.

A vision for capitalist exploitation

Imperialism is a capitalist project, and this is incredibly clear in the lengthy document establishing Trump’s vision for how exactly this particular form of apartheid should be financed and constructed in order to make Palestinian labor and resources most friendly to the exploitation of Zionist and international capital. It repeatedly demands of its envisioned Palestinian Bantustans that they must be “business-friendly,” welcoming to “multinational corporations” and “foreign direct investment.” They are also ordered to protect “private property” – while the private property of Palestinians confiscated by Zionist forces in the Nakba remains stolen without justice, return or even compensation. Not only is the Trump “plan” an attempt to liquidate Palestinian struggle for national liberation, it is equally an attack on the ongoing Palestinian struggle for social and economic liberation, attempting to stamp out the vision of a Palestinian and Arab socialist future.

It must also be noted that while the plan is an appalling affront to any notion of justice or principles of international law and a blatant attempt to put Palestine on the market block for electoral votes for Trump and Netanyahu personally, it is also not a sharp break from but a continuation of U.S. imperialist policy in Palestine and the region more broadly. The apartheid “map” of bantustans accompanying the so-called “plan” bears a striking resemblance to those that have been promoted time and again through the “peace process,” while more Palestinian land is stolen and lives are taken. The demilitarization of Palestine, denial of sovereignty and self-determination, confiscation of air and water rights, promotion of “land swaps” and the use of “state” as an empty term that carries no meaningful independence or self-determination have all been part of the disastrous Oslo process. 

From Oslo to Trump: End security coordination

The centerpiece of the Trump plan’s demands for Palestinian surrender includes an even more detailed vision of Palestinian agents working on behalf of Israel to criminalize and repress Palestinian resistance. As has been repeatedly observed by Palestinians, the occupier and the colonizer always seeks to create a local entity to carry out the work of the occupier – and then intensifies its further demands for subordination. The Trump-Netanyahu document claims to feign concern for Palestinian judicial independence, while simultaneously demanding intensified repression by specific “counter-terror” courts and prosecutions. The Palestinian Authority has, in fact, degraded Palestinian rights, through political detentions, judicial interference and “cybercrimes” prosecutions – as part and parcel of the Palestinian Authority’s “security coordination” with Israel, a process overseen by U.S. military authorities and developed under U.S. training. As we mark the Weeks of Solidarity with Ahmad Sa’adat, we note that this imprisoned Palestinian leader was kidnapped by Israel from a Palestinian Authority jail, where he was held under a security coordination deal under U.S. and British guards. 

Perhaps the most devastating outcome of the Oslo process has been “security coordination,” under which the PA continues to detain Palestinians and attack the resistance, even while engaging in public political skirmishes with Israeli officials. In order to develop a unified Palestinian resistance to the “Deal of the Century,” there is no more urgent task than bringing an end, once and for all, to PA “security coordination” with Israel and freeing all political prisoners held in PA jails.   

Under attack: Prisoners, refugees, ’48 Palestinians

Palestinian prisoners, a core issue in the liberation struggle for Palestinians, are raised in section 15 of the complete Trump plan, in a dismissive context that seems determined to extract political surrender as a requirement to release even one of the 5,000 Palestinians imprisoned by Israel for their involvement in the liberation struggle. “Each prisoner who is released will be required to sign a pledge to promote within their community the benefits of co-existence between Israelis and Palestinians, and to conduct themselves in a manner that models co-existence. Prisoners who refuse to sign this pledge will remain incarcerated,” the document reads. The model of “co-existence” promoted throughout the document means nothing more than surrender and liquidation of the Palestinian people and the enshrinement of Zionist racism, an unacceptable condition for any Palestinian jailed as a struggler for freedom. 

It specifically excludes “Israeli citizens,” specifically those Palestinians of ’48 imprisoned for their role in fighting for the liberation of their land and people – just as these prisoners face a renewed attack by Naftali Bennett, intended to impose impoverishment and collective punishment on their families as they languish behind bars. This is far from the only disturbing content in Trump’s plan for Palestinians in ’48 – not only does the “recognition of Israel as a Jewish state” exclude these 1.2 million citizens, but its inclusion of “land swaps” for “populated and unpopulated areas” appears to envision a mechanism for the Zionist regime to transfer its unwanted Palestinian population – and their citizenship – to the isolated and subjugated Bantustans it promotes.

The entire Palestinian population – in occupied Jerusalem and the West Bank, besieged Gaza, colonized ’48 and in exile and diaspora in the camps and around the world – are under attack in this plan. The plan’s section on “Refugees” erases the existence of the Nakba, creates a false equivalence between Palestinian refugees and Jewish Arabs (rather than seeing both properly as peoples victimized by Zionism and colonialism) in which they can be exchanged for one another and attempts to obscure by all means the fact that Palestinian refugees remain refugees today, even those who have obtained citizenship elsewhere, excluded from their homeland and their right to return home, because of the systematic Zionist ethnic cleansing of Palestine, the Nakba of 1947-1948. 

Palestinian refugees do need civil and human rights in their countries of refuge, but those will never be accomplished through alliances with the very states and entities perpetrating their ongoing dispossession and exclusion in violation of international law and fundamental principles of justice. Instead, Palestinian refugees need their civil, human, social and economic rights so that they can live their lives and fully participate in the struggle for the liberation of their occupied homeland, from the river to the sea, and in the struggle for the liberation of the entire region from the yoke of reaction and imperialism. 

Confronting the comprehensive attack on Palestinian resistance

Finally, we note that at the core of this so-called “plan” is a comprehensive attack on Palestinian resistance and the Palestinian people’s right to struggle by all means to liberate their occupied homeland and obtain freedom from colonialism. Liberation struggle is recast as “terrorism” by the states responsible for terrorizing the peoples of the world in their drive for complete control over resources and wealth. The Palestinian people have created and built their liberation movements to struggle in all forms, and it is those resistance movements and revolutionary forces that have obtained every victory achieved by the Palestinian people through over 70 years of struggle. 

The demand for Palestinian “demilitarization” amid intense Zionist militarism is nothing more than a demand for surrender and liquidation. The casting of Palestinian resistance organizations as “terror groups” is a malicious smear that is meant to confuse people around the world. Almost every liberation struggle in the world includes armed struggle as part of a comprehensive program of resistance to colonization, from Vietnam, to Algeria, to South Africa, to the fight to end slavery and achieve Black liberation in the U.S. The same is true of the Palestinian resistance. 

If we are to fight back against the agenda expressed in the Trump-Netanyahu “plan,” we must fight back against every attempt to label Palestinian resistance as “terror.” This means fighting to scrap so-called “terror lists” and designations that label Palestinian freedom fighters as terrorists in the U.S., Canada, European Union, Britain and elsewhere. These types of laws serve to repress Palestinian diaspora and solidarity organizing around the world and attempt to isolate those Palestinians who sacrifice the most to defend their land and people from apartheid and colonialism. Over 5,000 Palestinians are imprisoned under the false label of “terror,” while states that justify regime change wars through appeals to “democracy” exclude democratically supported Palestinian leaders by applying the “terror” label.

European complicity in anti-Palestinian repression

Right now, Palestinian grassroots and non-governmental organizations are facing a new European Union policy demanding that they sign agreements that no one associated with any of the Palestinian major political parties are involved with their work and their programs, even at the most public of political levels. Israeli officials like Minister of Strategic Affairs Gilad Erdan (the so-called “anti-BDS minister” – who also runs the Israel Prison Administration) travel the world to smear organizations that fight for Palestinian rights and defend Palestinian prisoners, all with vague allegations of “connections” to major political parties slapped with the bogus “terror” label. If the European Union and other parties claim to want a just alternative to the Trump-Netanyahu surrender demand, they can begin by ending this anti-democratic attack on Palestinian human rights and political expression. 

They can continue further by ending the ongoing attempts to criminalize and repress organizing for the boycott of Israeli apartheid in Germany, Austria and elsewhere in Europe. These repressive attacks violate the rights of Palestinian communities in Europe and of all people concerned for justice to uphold basic human rights principles against apartheid. Today’s announcement made clear to many that Trump and Netanyahu promote apartheid as a solution. For every one of those people, the first response should be clear: Boycott, divestment and sanctions, and the international isolation of Israel.

Toward the liberation of Palestine

The grotesque Netanyahu-Trump spectacle in Washington, D.C., in the end, changes nothing. It provides us with a document of their envisioned blueprint, a reflection of the realities that Palestinians are confronting on a daily basis. Trump and Netanyahu have no authority to alter international law or legitimize colonialism, apartheid and ethnic cleansing, and we are certain that the unified strength and resistance of the Palestinian people will once again bring this “plan” crashing down on the shores of defeat. 

We cannot, however, be silent or ignore this latest attack. The strategic alliance of our enemies is clear: imperialism, Zionism, Arab reactionary forces. Now is the time to build our strategic alliance for a future of freedom and justice from the river to the sea: working together to stand for a vision of the total liberation of Palestine – and, indeed, the liberation of the world. Now is the time to build our movements, strengthen our alliances, and escalate the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement to the international isolation of Israel. It is also perhaps more urgent than ever to defend the Palestinian resistance, whose very right to struggle for freedom is facing a severe and comprehensive attack.

As Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network, we also emphasize the critical importance of escalating campaigns everywhere to free the 5,000 Palestinian political prisoners held in Israeli jails, many subject to severe torture. These are the leaders of the Palestinian liberation movement and the Palestinian people and securing their freedom is essential to the liberation of Palestine.

Just as we stand to confront Trump and Netanyahu, we must also stand with those who defend indigenous sovereignty against U.S., Canadian and Australian settler colonialism, with the Black Liberation movement, with all those in the Arab world who struggle for justice and confront reactionary regimes, with those fighting for justice for migrants and refugees and against racism and oppression in all forms, with workers on the picket lines and organizing for justice,  with Venezuela, Cuba and all of the people in Latin America fighting to defend their land from rapacious imperialism and right-wing coup forces, with the people of the Philippines resisting killings and repression, with the movements on the streets of India defending people’s rights against fascist attacks, with those fighting to bring down the sanctions devastating the people of Iran, with all of the movements, peoples and nations who confront imperialism, exploitation and injustice. 

Every victory for the struggles of the people, every defeat for imperialism is also a victory for Palestine. We will celebrate them together in Jerusalem, the liberated capital of Palestine.

From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free! 

Source: Samidoun

Braving a blizzard, two dozen people marched through Baltimore city’s oppressed neighborhoods for three hours on Jan. 18. They carried signs demanding “Stop food stamp cuts” and a beautiful red banner with the image of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., which read: “Jobs, education and healthcare, not racism and war!”

“We demanded no cuts to food stamps, disability benefits or Medicaid,” explained march organizer Miranda Bachman of the Peoples’ Power Assembly. “Then we caravaned to Washington, D.C., where we were welcomed by representatives of the FMLN of El Salvador for a gathering in solidarity with anti-imperialist movements in Latin America.”

Marchers reported an especially strong response from the community on the issue of cuts to the SNAP food assistance program (food stamps). Up to 15,000 Baltimore residents could lose food assistance under Trump administration rule changes set to take effect in April, in a city where a quarter of the population already faces hunger.

The Peoples’ Power Assembly in Baltimore initiated a call to “Reclaim and honor Dr. King by resisting war and racism” in the wake of U.S. war provocations in the Middle East, including the assassination of Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani while he was on a peace mission to Iraq.

“In 1967 on April 4, Dr. King passionately spoke out against the Vietnam War,” said the call, which was endorsed by many national and local groups. “He exclaimed that the bombs in Vietnam also exploded at home in our decaying cities. These words are just as true today. Donald Trump and the trillion dollar oil and fracking businesses stand to profit from a war on Iran and Iraq while the people of the world suffer.

“In Baltimore, we remember Trump’s hateful racism in describing our city and attacking Congressman Cummings. His insults hurled at our city are comparable to his attempts to demonize the people of Iran and Iraq to justify war for oil profits.

“This is the same white supremacist ideology that justifies the assassination of foreign officials of color and the nearly one million Iraqi children killed by U.S. war. These are war crimes. We will not be fooled by those who would dismiss the humanity of our international family.”

At the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Parade held in Los Angeles on Jan. 20, tens of thousands of spectators and parade participants along MLK Boulevard were welcomed with over a thousand fact sheets against U.S. war and sanctions, and demands for money to fight poverty. 

A large banner hovering over two literature and sign-up tables at the beginning of the march also greeted march participants and spectators. Amplified sound carried the messages of money for food stamps, housing, health care and education, not war on Iran, and for the immediate removal of U.S. troops from Iraq.

This action was part of the national call to reclaim the MLK holiday. Unfortunately, the parade in Los Angeles, like in many cities, uses commercial interests, police and Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) youth contingents to promote values of war and profit that are foreign to King’s message. The grassroots action on Monday was an attempt to refocus toward the struggle for social justice and against the drive for blood for oil profits. 

In this mostly African American parade in South Central L.A., many heads were turned in response to the calls for stopping police killings and bombs against people of color fighting U.S. imperialism. Appeals were made to the ROTC youth to not believe the lies they were being told by recruiters.

In Los Angeles, the Peoples’ Power Assembly, the Socialist Unity Party and Unión del Barrio initiated the event.

Over the past week, the impeachment trial of U.S. President Donald Trump has played out on the floor of the U.S. Senate. The basis of this trial is that Trump allegedly violated “national security interests” by withholding U.S. military aid from the government of Ukraine–a warlike government brought to power by an illegal U.S.-backed coup–until Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky agreed to investigate Democratic Party politician Joe Biden for corruption. 

What matters more than the current impeachment charges are the charges the Democratic Party has not brought against Trump. 

There’s no doubt that Donald Trump is a racist, a capitalist crook and a fraud. However, his impeachment should be based upon issues other than his alleged danger to “U.S. national security interests.” What that phrase really means is “the interests of Wall Street, Big Oil and the military-industrial complex to super exploit the world.”

Instead, Donald Trump should be impeached for caging immigrant children at the U.S.-Mexico border. Instead, Trump should be impeached for his public threats against Minnesota Congresswoman Ilhan Omar. Instead, Trump should be impeached for his admission of sexual assault. And much more.

Why haven’t these issues been raised? Because the Democratic Party still represents the interests of the wealthy. Its leaders want to shut the masses of the people and their urgent needs out of the impeachment process.

If Trump is to be impeached, let it be for racism, xenophobia, sexism and anti-LGBTQ2S bigotry!

Sunday, February 9, 2020 at 5:00 PM – 8:00 PM EST

Socialist Unity Party – Baltimore
2011 N Charles St, Fl 1st, Baltimore, Maryland 21218

To commemorate Black History month we are screening the film “The Murder of Fred Hampton”
Join us for refreshments and discussion.

Description of the film:
Fred Hampton was the leader of the Illinois Chapter of the Black Panther Party. This film depicts his brutal murder by the Chicago police and its subsequent investigation, but also documents his activities in organizing the Chapter, his public speeches, and the programs he founded for children during the last eighteen months of his life.

Doors open at 5 pm
Showing starts at 6 pm

Friday, January 31, 2020 at 9:00 AM – 11:00 AM EST

52 Chambers Street, Front Steps

Students Speak-out: Cops Out of Our Schools & Subways!
Friday, Jan 31, 9-11am
52 Chambers Street, Front Steps

Desegregate and invest in our public schools
Cops and military recruiters out of our schools and subways
Make MTA work for New Yorkers, not for the rich
Free and fully fund CUNY
Disarm, disinvest, and abolish the NYPD

By Network in Defense of Humanity

Our America, January 20, 2020

Compañera Patricia Villegas
President of teleSUR
Caracas, Venezuela

Dear Patricia,

It is difficult to gather together so many elements and of such weak credibility as those used today by the Empire’s lackeys with threats and attempts to silence teleSUR. These efforts only reaffirm the certainty of the value of this station in the battle of the peoples for their right to truth.

How many times have we, as spectators, felt comforted to see that a teleSUR team is in the place where transcendental events are happening for those who have been silenced, for those who have always been excluded, and it reports to us, from within, what is happening. We could not count on how many occasions this was the case, but we can transmit our deep gratitude and respect for such courageous and professional work carried out by the station. Only through teleSUR have we been able to learn about the merciless and lethal action of capitalism, the strength of the resistance of leaders and popular movements, and the events that have opened up real gaps in imperial domination that have marked the history of our peoples.

The arrogance of the powerful does not support the plurality of visions, of cultures, the transparency of information, or respect for the spectator. It does not support an in-depth analysis of the facts and their causes, it does not support the denunciation of the transnationals and their dirty dealings, the criticism of the obscene manipulation of the media and networks related to the system. For them, it is essential to silence this platform, one of the great achievements for the decolonization of Our America that Commander Hugo Chávez promoted.

It has been 16 years since that meeting in Venezuela in December 2004, where some 400 intellectuals from 52 countries met. It was at this meeting that the Network of Intellectuals, Artists and Social Movements in Defense of Humanity (REDH) was formalized and its final document, known as the “Caracas Call,” reads: “Support the establishment of a television station of the South and independent television and radio media at the service of the interests of our peoples.”

Immediately, President Chávez, with his strategic vision, assumed the commitment to create an audiovisual media associated with emancipation.  In this way, the stories of the Network and teleSUR are intertwined in a deep and embryonic way; therefore, safeguarding teleSUR, its philosophy, its ideals, and its work is not just a position, it is also our obligation.

Today we are facing a decadent empire, increasingly desperate as it sees its hegemony weakening in what José Martí rightly called Our America, something it needs to ensure its survival. Let us not underestimate these threats. Let us redouble our efforts and remain alert to prevent them from depriving the peoples of their right to truthful, plural and timely information, which, together with the right to work, health, education and culture, continue to be the most valuable aspirations of humanity today, 20 years into this new century.

Dear Patricia, you are actually being honored in a unique way by having the successful work of the network and your own work as its president among one of the main targets of the Empire. TeleSUR is a child of the battle of ideas and of the fathers of this new continental era: Commanders Fidel Castro Ruz and Hugo Chávez Frías. We will win, without a doubt. We assume its defense without hesitation or half-measures. It is an irreversible commitment of all the comrades who make up the Network in Defense of Humanity and many other similar movements.

As the Venezuelan poet Víctor Valera Mora said: “The sun of the world we will make/those who will live greet you.”

TeleSUR, tell us what else you need from us, and we will be there!

A fraternal and solidarity-filled embrace,

On behalf of the Network in Defense of Humanity, Executive Secretariat

Atilio A. Borón, Argentina
Paula Klachko, Argentina
Stella Calloni, Argentina
Marcos Teruggi, Argentina/Venezuela
Tim Anderson, Australia
Hugo Móldiz, Bolivia
María Nela Prada, Bolivia
Carlos Alberto (Beto) Almeida, Brazil
Marilia Guimaraes, Brazil
Nadia Bambirra, Brazil
Arnold August, Canadá
Florencia Lagos, Chile
Javiera Olivares, Chile
Pablo Sepúlveda Allende, Chile/Venezuela
Dario Salinas Figueredo, Chile/México
Ángel Guerra, Cuba/México
Ariana López, Cuba
Fernando León Jacomino, Cuba
Omar González, Cuba
Irene León, Ecuador
Orlando Pérez, Ecuador
Arantxa Tirado, Spain
Javier Couso, Spain
Alicia Jrapko, U.S.
Hernando Calvo Ospina, France
Camille Chalmers, Haití
Anarella Vélez, Honduras
Gilberto Ríos, Honduras
Luis Hernández Navarro, México
Nayar López, México
Fernando Buen Abad, México/Argentina
Katu Arkonada, Basque Country/México
Ricardo Flecha, Paraguay
Hildebrando Pérez Grande, Perú
Antonio Elías, Uruguay
Gabriela Cultelli, Uruguay
Carmen Bohórquez,   Venezuela
Pasqualina Curcio, Venezuela
Pedro Calzadilla, Venezuela
Sergio Arria, Venezuela/Argentina

Source: In Defense of Humanity