What would you say if the surgeon general of a state – the chief public health officer – advocated using leeches in medical treatment, denied the effectiveness of vaccines, and ignored a measles outbreak? You would expect that official to be dismissed and prosecuted for medical negligence.

Yet in the state of Florida, U.S., Surgeon General Joseph Lapado has done the above. Measles has spread throughout the community, and he has advised schoolchildren with measles to still attend school. Quackery is steadily replacing evidence-based medicine, and the public provision of health is being eroded. Lapado’s pseudoscientific approach has resulted in an entirely preventable tragedy.

Lapado is a political protege of the ultrarightist Florida governor and pseudoscience peddler Ron DeSantis. The latter has a long track record of attacking publicly provisioned health care and education services. He has agitated for book bans, particularly on those books that explore the history of racism and inequality in the United States. After denying the reality of COVID-19, he has peddled Wuhan lab leak conspiracy theories regarding its origins.

When public officials are abdicating their responsibility to uphold and enforce public health measures, then those officials should be held to account. In Australia, I can rely on the tap water for drinking and washing – there is no danger that I will be infected by cholera. The latter is a waterborne disease, and there is strict water filtration and testing systems in place for the water supply in Sydney. Cholera has been basically wiped out.

On that basis, can health officials declare that the battle against cholera is over, and abolish the water filtration procedures needed to maintain the drinking water’s hygienic condition? Can we now stop funding the medical research, stop teaching and research into virology and pathology needed to contain and eliminate cholera? Should we now declare the time has come to ‘stop living in fear’ of cholera, and just get back to normal?

The example above is meant to convey a basic point; water quality is one of the outcomes provided by public and community governance. A healthier population means increased participation in the economic system, less disease means a better quality of life and improved community welfare.

Defunding and abolishing the publicly funded provision of health care – and its eventual privatization – is a long-term goal of the conservative Right. Its political allies in this regard are the libertarian ultrarightist forces.

What has all this got to do with the Left? Numerous left-wing writers and activists – the term left wing being a broad brushstroke – have moved into the rabbit hole of COVID denial MAGA ultrarightism. Glenn Greenwald, Matt Taibbi, among many others, have descended into a contrarian position from the libertarian ultraright. It is no exaggeration to call it a fascist contrarianism.

Robert F Kennedy Jr. a long term environmental lawyer and activist, has metamorphosed into a MAGA supporting far right political figure. Starting with the respectable-sounding position of vaccine hesitancy, RFK has moved decisively to the far right.

His journey is indicative of a widespread phenomenon – leftists who move right wards on an anti scientific trajectory. They remain contrarians – fascist contrarians, ultra-libertarian opponents of publicly funded services, such as health care and education.

Starting with anti-vaccine tropes, RFK Jr has gradually moved into far-right and fascistic circles, expanding the swamp of anti-lockdown zealotry. It is not wrong to ask questions about vaccines. Doctors, nurses, paramedics, medical students, anyone studying the workings of the human immune system – all these people ask about vaccines.

Am I suggesting that we shout at people who are vaccine-hesitant, pounding the table with our fists? No, of course not. When vaccination programs, as RFK Jr has done, are smeared as methods of social control or falsely accused of causing autism, then that is the first step down into the dead end of ultrarightist contrarianism.

RFK Jr, upheld as a rival Democrat candidate to U.S. President Joe Biden, is rallying disaffected Democrat voters. From anti-vaxxer positions, RFK has gone on to recycle fictitious and slanderously false allegations that the COVID-19 virus is an ethnically targeted bioweapon. Avoiding Chinese and Jewish communities, the COVID-19 virus satisfies the political agenda of Jewish elites by reducing the numbers of Anglo Americans, RFK Jr asserted.

While subsequently backtracking from this antisemitic and preposition claim, he has done his level best to assist the MAGA Republican side. RFK Jr has enthusiastically embraced the so-called free market as a solution to ecological and health issues in the community. His seemingly progressive stance masks a deeply conservative agenda. Promoting market solutions and attacking government expenditure on health care and the environment is music to the ears of the billionaires.

Speaking of billionaires, RFK Jr recently appointed Silicon Valley lawyer the ultrawealthy Nicole Shanahan as his running mate. A devotee of libertarian fantasies in the free market, Shanahan is a believer in the necrotic futurist vision of tech industry entrepreneurs.

Jeet Heer states that RFK Jr made a direct comparison between Shanahan’s business acumen and that of his entrepreneurial grandfather, Joseph P Kennedy. The latter’s corrupt business dealings, ties to gangsterism, antisemitism, and fascist sympathies were ignored.

RFK Jr’s opposition to the misnamed ‘big pharma’ – which should accurately be called corporate pharma – does not stem from his motivation to make medicine cheaper for working people but from his recycling of antivaccine misinformation. A politician who is putatively anti war, he has never actually opposed any of the imperialist wars waged by the United States.

His candidacy is a serious misdirection of outrage and is more in line with the ouroboros – the serpent that eats its own tail.

Source

On March 30, the South Korean Coast Guard forcibly seized the 3,000-ton cargo ship De Yi. The stateless ship had left North Korea’s western port of Nampo and was headed to Vladivostok, Russia. 

After a scheduled stop in Shandong, China, the trip necessitated sailing around the southern end of the Korean peninsula and up the eastern coast to Vladivostok. South Korea claims the ship was probably carrying coal and violating UN sanctions against North Korea. 

The ship’s Chinese captain and crew refused to allow the South Korean military to search the hull. 

For 75 years, the U.S. military has occupied South Korea; there are currently some 30,000 troops stationed there on 73 bases, the third biggest U.S. military occupation in the world. The South Korean military is under the virtual command of the U.S., and any actions such as seizing a ship are generally considered to be done at the direction of the U.S.

The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, or DPRK as North Korea is officially known, is one of the most sanctioned countries in the world. Certain UN sanctions were worsened in 2017 but will now lapse on April 30. There was a UN resolution to extend them, but the Russian ambassador to the UN vetoed it. 

Over the decades, the U.S. State Department has been the prime motivator of multinational trade sanctions, pressuring allies to join the effort to starve North Korea and force them to become a pliant neocolony.

The U.S. first imposed sanctions during the 1950-53 Korean War after murdering millions of Koreans and a months-long bombing campaign that destroyed practically every building in major cities. By the end of the war, the capital city of Pyongyang looked very much like Gaza does today, with death and debris as far as the eye can see. 

The U.S. refused to sign a peace treaty at the war’s close and still does. With U.S. nuclear weapons having been stationed in South Korea for years, and tens of thousands of troops still present there, as well as nuclear warheads within striking distance from the air and by sea, U.S. imperialism is more than a military menace – it is an existential threat to North Korea. 

During the 1990s, the U.S. and its allies falsely accused the DPRK of developing a nuclear weapons program in secret. They were really trying to build nuclear power plants to make up for their inability to import fuel oil for heat due to the sanctions. North Koreans were suffering during long, cold winters. 

The secrecy accusation is part of a constant refrain from the U.S. propaganda machine. However, in 2006, President Kim Jong Il announced that they had turned the U.S. lies into reality. The DPRK had successfully conducted its first nuclear weapons test. 

North Korea has had a decades-long policy of “military first.” That means that even at great cost and despite difficult conditions under the U.S. sanctions regime, the Korean people agreed that defense was the top priority. That policy and Kim Jong Il’s decision may be the only reason North Korea still exists as a sovereign and socialist country. 

After the first nuclear weapons test by North Korea, the White House pushed successfully for even more severe sanctions at the UN. Russia’s veto at the UN gave North Korea relief from at least some of the sanctions that have made life so difficult for millions of Korean people. 

The imperialist war against the people of Korea has been uninterrupted and severe ever since the Korean People’s Army liberated the north under the leadership of the great revolutionary Kim Il Sung and the Communist Party of Korea. 

The U.S. has its fingerprints all over this cargo ship seizure. Korea JoongAng Daily reported that “the United States is believed to have provided the South Korean government with circumstantial evidence of suspected sanctions violations.” ‘Circumstantial’ and ‘suspected’ are the key words. By prodding South Korea into seizing the ship, the White House is signaling that its campaign to destroy the DPRK will not let up one bit. 

Korean people of both the north and the south want the country reunified. It was the U.S. that divided the country, drawing a line at the 38th parallel, dividing parents from children and siblings from each other for 75 years and counting. Right-wing South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol has turned back some of the progress in relations made over the last two decades or more. He is steering South Korea closer to the U.S. and has imposed his own unilateral sanctions on the DPRK, adding to the punishment doled out by the U.S. and other imperialists. 

This isn’t what the people of South Korea want. When the Japanese empire fell at the close of World War II, and the U.S. moved to take over Japan’s colonies, the U.S. spent years trying to crush a people’s movement in the south that resisted the division of Korea. 

In 1945, Syngman Rhee — who had lived in the U.S. since 1904 and was a U.S. citizen  — arrived in U.S.-occupied South Korea aboard General Douglas MacArthur’s personal plane. In 1948, under the direction of the CIA (then named OSS), Rhee was imposed as president through a rigged election. There was mass opposition to which Rhee responded with police-state repression, jailing over 300,000 and killing tens of thousands by 1950.

As this article is being composed, millions of South Koreans are remembering the great uprising on the island of Jeju in April 1948, a response to the sham election; nearly every police headquarters was destroyed, and a division of Syngman Rhee’s army mutinied. 

Some of them fought their way north and joined in the development of socialism in North Korea. Many more strikes, rebellions, student walkouts, and other militant actions like the takeover of Gwangju in 1980 – sometimes referred to as the “2nd Paris Commune” — characterize the South Korean people’s righteous struggle. 

Many South Koreans were killed over the years, but the struggle for self-determination lives on.

The U.S. media portrays North Korea as an isolated nation. That is another falsehood. Right now, North Korea is celebrating the “China-DPRK Friendship Year.’ Zhao Leji, the Chairman of China’s National People’s Congress, is leading a delegation to Pyongyang to mark the occasion. Zhao is also the third highest-ranking official in all of China and is meeting with his North Korean counterpart, Choe Ryong-hae. It is also noteworthy that the DPRK has been very vocal about its solidarity and support for the people of Gaza, as they have over the decades with Nicaragua, Iran, Venezuela, Cuba, and others. North Korea is an important ally and friend of the global struggle against U.S. imperialism!

Down with the U.S. empire, and long live the struggling people of North Korea! Korea is One!

Hundreds of demonstrators took part in a protest against the presence of foreign forces in Niger, including the armed forces of the United States, which has a military base in the north of the country.

This article contains no spoilers for any of Liu Cixin’s works or their adaptations.

The Three-Body Problem (三体), a science fiction novel released in 2006, counts as perhaps the major cultural ‘crossover’ success of China in the last decade. This was true even before the release of the new Netflix television adaptation of the book, released on the 21st of March 2024, and produced and written for the screen by Game of Thrones show creators David Benioff and D. B. Weiss alongside Alexander Woo.

That the creators of arguably the largest television ‘phenomenon’ of recent years saw fit to choose Three-Body as their next project is testament to the cultural impact of this work within China and, increasingly, in the wider world. All the more interesting since the author Liu Cixin, a cultural icon in the PRC, refuses to repudiate his country’s revolutionary history, including its current governing party, the Communist Party of China. As such, he cannot easily be co-opted as a ‘dissident’, and those seeking to market and adapt his works in the West find themselves in the awkward position of having to promote an author who is proud of his country’s achievements and is able to critically engage with the historical path of the Chinese revolution in a productive way, avoiding what Xi Jinping refers to as “historical nihilism.”^[1]

This article will look at the original book series, as well as a Chinese-made (Tencent) adaptation from 2023, and compare them with the recently released US-made (Netflix) adaptation. It will assess the relative merits of each version, different audience reactions to these series, as well as some wider considerations of the differences between contemporary Western and Chinese science fiction.

Three-Body Problem was published in China in 2006. The book is the first of a trilogy, with subsequent volumes titled The Dark Forest (黑暗森林) and Death’s End (死神永生), with the trilogy collectively known as Remembrance of Earth’s Past (地球往事). It achieved broad commercial and critical success domestically, with Liu’s works accounting for 2/3rds of the Chinese science fiction market and abroad, with translations into more than 20 languages. In English, the first volume of the trilogy, translated by Ken Liu, received the coveted Hugo Award for ‘Best Novel’ in 2015, the first non-English speaking writer to do so. Liu Cixin’s dominance of modern Chinese science fiction can also be seen in the enormous domestic (and moderate international) success of film adaptations of his Wandering Earth novel, with China selecting the second installment in this film series as its submission for this year’s Oscars.

The plot of the Remembrance of Earth’s Past series is difficult to summarise, especially when trying not to spoil anything. In general, the action initially takes place in a near-contemporary era with the deaths by suicide of various theoretical and applied physicists around the world, many of them leaving cryptic notes suggesting something along the lines of “Physics doesn’t exist.” The first book also jumps back to Mao-era China and follows Ye Wenjie, herself a gifted physicist, during the Cultural Revolution and subsequent work at a radio telescope base in Inner Mongolia. In the broadest possible strokes, the series can be considered an ‘alien contact’ story, but it also touches on themes such as ecology and human development, ‘game theory’, the capacity for ideological groups to form depending on external circumstances, global cooperation to overcome multi-generational problems, and high-level physics concepts.

The books were extremely well-received, with many praising their creative and inventive use of scientific concepts, enormously ambitious ‘high-concept’ action sequences, and philosophical themes. Equally, however, some readers critiqued the series, suggesting that these overwhelmingly abstract ‘ideas’ take center stage, to the detriment of any focus on interpersonal drama and character development. As such, for years it was considered that the novels were ‘unfilmable’.

There had been a few abortive attempts at adapting the book series in China, in animation, or even video game form. Eventually, the Chinese company Tencent succeeded and released a 30-episode series in January 2023. This covers the events of the first novel, Three-Body Problem, in exhaustive detail and is considered a highly faithful adaptation, often with dialogue taken straight from the novel. On release, it was praised by fans of the book, with strong performances, excellent cinematography, and impressive special effects, especially for its budget and the fact it was a Chinese television drama. However, there were also some criticisms from both domestic and international audiences, which criticized the show’s irregular pacing, poor performances by non-Chinese actors, and the ‘old-fashioned’ CGI of the ‘video game’ section of the story.

The recent Netflix adaptation of the series is admirable in many respects. Cixin Liu and his main English-language translator, Ken Liu, were producers on the Netflix version, and it clearly finds great inspiration in the wilder ideas and ‘wow’ moments from the series, with mixed results in carrying them over to the screen. For fans of the original series, an immediate issue is the compression of the first book, along with some elements of the second and even third, into just eight episodes. Even with that in mind, the series wastes time trying to manufacture a series of ‘likeable’ characters (this time with less than mixed results).

In the quest for ‘relatability’ (through petty squabbles and contrived romances), the writers sacrifice the authenticity of these supposedly brilliant theoretical physicists. Such poor scriptwriting and ham-fisted characterization inevitably detract from the impact of the visual spectacle. When the series spends time away from the ‘contemporary’ era, in Mao-era China, or in the ‘video game,’ the series is more engaging, but most of the time is spent with an unconvincing group of presumably committee-decided-upon personalities. This group painfully delivers Marvel Studios-style “witty dialogue,” and the rushed nature of the series never allows for their relationships to develop naturally.

In comparing the two adaptations, pacing is a key difference, with the US-made series’ breakneck speed allowing little time for digestion or contemplation of the weighty, mind-bending concepts. Each episode of the Netflix series reportedly cost $20 million, so having fewer episodes is understandable, but the decision to force more events from future books into this first series was perhaps unwise. And it is notable that while the US adaptation looks more ‘expensive’ on screen, it doesn’t necessarily translate into more impact, or better performances, or direction when compared to the Tencent version.

Politically, a difference arises in the various adaptations with regard to the character of Ye Wenjie. Her ‘pessimism’ and ‘misanthropy’ are present in all versions and drive her fateful actions, but the stress placed upon the cause is different. In each version, Ye is affected by negative experiences she and her family experienced during the time of the Cultural Revolution. The Netflix adaptation (perhaps due to time constraints, but equally, it performs a well-worn ideological function) essentially makes this experience her key motivation and draws her entire desire for ‘revenge’ from one act of violence in a ‘struggle session’—in a shocking scene that opens the series, and indeed the first book.

With more room to breathe, the novel and the Tencent series also bring out other elements, primarily witnessing ecological damage, as key motivators for her eventual ‘nihilistic’ attitude toward the human race as a whole.^[2]  Another big difference between the Netflix and other versions is the scope of the action and the participants. Although the Tencent drama suffered from poor acting for its international cast members, it tried to stay loyal to the novels by incorporating a wide variety of international characters and institutions such as the UN—making global-level responses and cooperation a key theme of the work, whereas the Netflix version focussed primarily on London, Oxford, and unnamed British security services.

Reactions to the Netflix adaptation have been mixed: in China, many have praised the strength of the visual effects, and in some cases admired the filmmakers’ clear admiration for the source material. However, some have argued that the series is only a superficial engagement with the books, and have questioned the switching of the primary location from Beijing to London, and of the Chinese characters to Westerners.

Inevitably, orientalist Western reporting of Chinese netizens’ responses has characterized them as reductively “nationalist” and suggested that they are purely driven by animus towards the US (inevitably whipped up by “propaganda”!). For such a cherished series, it will inevitably draw out a wide variety of responses in the enormous and diverse commentariat of online Chinese communities, and it is easy for Western newspapers to cherry-pick comments that suit their narrative. Likewise, they will ignore more nuanced comments, such as those by Zhang Yiwu, a professor at Peking University, who noted, “while there are changes influenced by Western ideology, it does not necessarily mean there’s a deliberate effort to demean China or any specific arrangement of that nature.”^[3] Such a one-sided portrayal of negative comments among Chinese audiences also ignores that the Tencent version also received its fair share of critiques alongside positive comments at its time of release.

In the West, likewise, the series has met with both praise and criticism. While admiring the series’ ambition in seeking to transform this ‘difficult’ story and promote it on the widest possible platform, some notable failures are pointed out. Some stunning special and visual effects and memorable set-pieces are let down by weak characterization, clunky scriptwriting, and labored exposition.

It has been noted that recent Western science fiction, particularly in cinema, is based either on simplified superhero narratives or extremely pessimistic dystopian/post-apocalypse scenarios, and this reflects a spiritual and ideological absence in late capitalist culture.^[4]

Liu Cixin’s works, including the Remembrance of Earth’s Past trilogy, while not blandly utopian by any stretch of the imagination, focus instead on proactive and creative responses to long-standing and seemingly intractable problems affecting the whole of humanity (while climate crisis is a single topic within the book series, the story as a whole can also be seen as a metaphor for humanity’s contradictory responses to the issue). As such, Liu Cixin’s stories are fitting science fiction for China’s ‘New Era’ period of continuing socialist construction, undertaking (and more importantly achieving) its own enormously complex and profound projects of poverty elimination, green transformation, and high-quality development.^[5]

With that in mind, it’s heartening to see this growing appreciation for Liu Cixin’s works, and the range of adaptations of Three-Body Problem will hopefully encourage more people to read the original series (and spur more translations of Chinese science fiction novels). As a tool for people-to-people exchange, adapting popular stories across cultures can foster understanding. Three-Body Problem has the potential to be such a bridge, opening a door to the captivating world of Chinese science fiction for a global audience.

^[1] In a 2013 speech, Uphold and Develop Socialism with Chinese Characteristics, Xi Jinping criticised those in the Communist Party of the Soviet Union who had completely repudiated the historical path of the Stalin era: “to repudiate Lenin, to repudiate Stalin was to wreck chaos in Soviet ideology and engage in historical nihilism. It caused Party organisations at all levels to have barely any function whatsoever.”

^[2] Ye Wenjie, in both the book and the Netflix series, bluntly justifies her actions by stating: “Our civilisation is no longer capable of solving its own problems”, which seems to repudiate Marx’s claim, from A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy, that “Mankind thus inevitably sets itself only such tasks as it is able to solve, since closer examination will always show that the problem itself arises only when the material conditions for its solution are already present or at least in the course of formation.” This Marx quote was used by Xi Jinping in a speech from 1989, collected in Up and Out of Poverty, 2016, Foreign Languages Press.

^[3] https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202403/1309480.shtml

^[4] With the quip attributed to Jameson, “it is easier to imagine the end of the world than to imagine the end of capitalism.”

^[5] Such projects are all the more impressive since they are often achieved ahead of schedule, with for example recent estimates suggesting China will reach peak CO2 emissions this year or next, with “structural decline” from then on, many years ahead of schedule. https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-chinas-emissions-set-to-fall-in-2024-after-record-growth-in-clean-energy/

Source: Friends of Socialist China

The call below was issued in March by the Palestinian General Federation of Trade Unions.

Brothers and Sisters of unions and other labor organizations in the United States of America:

In the midst of pain and blood, in the displacement camps, amidst the rubble and the ruins of our homes, workshops, factories, stores and institutions destroyed by the “Israeli” occupation, using U.S.-made weapons, in the name of the Palestinian General Federation of Trade Unions (PGFTU), we call on you for solidarity.

Instead of celebrating with you on May 1, International Workers’ Day, we are busy shrouding dozens of people who are being killed around the clock in the middle of a genocidal war against our people — in every sense of that word. This has led to the destruction of everything in the Gaza Strip (hospitals, health centers, schools, universities, streets, water purification, sewage and other infrastructure, factories, shops, cultural centers, mosques, churches and even unborn children), none of which were spared by the occupation’s bombs, missiles and shells (including internationally banned weapons, like white phosphorus).

We are living through wholesale slaughter and forced dislocation — ethnic cleansing — committed against us. This devastating war and its catastrophes have forced upon us in the PGFTU in Gaza great responsibilities to collect the broken bodies and even pieces of our people, healing the wounded and trying to ease their pain (without anesthetics, antibiotics or other medicine), dealing with the psychological trauma (especially of the children), while trying to convey the truth of this suffering and the humanitarian and environmental catastrophe to the world.

Since the beginning of the aggression, we in the PGFTU have considered ourselves an integral part of our people — not separated from their reality. We have suffered and lost thousands of members, union offices, facilities and other institutions.

Despite our efforts to provide relief to our people with the limited support we have received and to raise the voice of our people loudly in international forums, we have encountered shocking silence and neglect by the international labor movement. However, we recognize there have been some exceptional examples of unions, clearly demonstrated in leading protests denouncing the Zionist war of genocide being waged on the Gaza Strip.

Dear comrades in the American unions,

Several actions have come to light during the aggression, which must be closely observed and exposed, most notably:

First, U.S. unions need to expose the extent of the war crimes and genocide committed against our people and the biased American position and complicity in enabling the aggression. This must be confronted and continue to be protested to exert pressure against the export of U.S.-made weapons to the occupation. Pressure must be increased on the U.S. administration to abandon these hostile actions against the Palestinian people.

Secondly, there is the Israeli decision to suspend or terminate the contracts of thousands of workers in the Gaza Strip by local, Arab and international institutions in connection with the war of extermination, depriving employees of their rights and compensation. It would have been better for these institutions to strengthen the workers’ economic security by implementing support packages instead of firing them from work. This issue must be at the core of your concerns and struggle.

Third, the international labor movement, including the International Federation of Trade Unions, retreated to verbal positions without taking measures on the ground or pressuring the decision-makers to stop this war of extermination, limiting union activities to conferences and statements and not delving deeply into the need to guarantee humanitarian aid or influencing international public opinion to expose the truth about Zionist crimes and the practices of the allied countries that continue to support Israel.

Among these steps is the struggle to ban the occupation’s trade unions internationally, as they are partners in the war of genocide. In particular, we call on American unions to boycott these unions to protest their complicity in this genocidal war.

Fourth, unions can play an influential role in the United States to provide relief for hundreds of thousands of workers’ families whose homes and workplaces have been destroyed, leaving them to shelter in tents without any work or income. You can contribute to financial projects and relief funds for workers and temporary social security through coordination with the International Trade Union Confederation to alleviate the suffering of thousands of our people.

Dear comrades,

We call on you to be our voice and advocate inside and outside America. What our people are experiencing and what workers and unions in particular are exposed to is the most horrific catastrophe known to humanity in recent decades. We ask that you convey our message and give voice to the suffering of hungry, starving workers and their families — not just to the American people, not just to your unions but to the entire world.

We are a people enduring bombardment, hunger, disease and all forms of suffering, but we are determined to live, to stand firm and to rebuild from this destruction with our blood and many sacrifices.

Thank you for your efforts, and happy new year on International Workers’ Day. We will certainly carry the banner of victory despite the killing and destruction.

From your comrades/trade and professional unions in Gaza

Palestinian General Federation of Trade Unions

Signatory: Basheer Al-Sisi, Member of the General Secretariat of the Palestinian General Federation of Trade Unions – City of Gaza

Afternoon Rally In Philadelphia

RALLY AND MARCH FOR MUMIA ABU-JAMAL
WED APRIL 24, 2024
2 – 4 PM

PHILADELPHIA CITY HALL (south side)

Octavius Catto Statue
1400 John F Kennedy Boulevard
Philadelphia, PA 19107

The French movement for Mumia’s freedom has gathered thousands of petitions in support of Mumia Abu-Jamal. These will be presented to District Attorney Larry Krasner’s office during a rally and march in the City Hall area.

1,000 Supporters From France Call On The Governor Of Pennsylvania And The Prosecutor Of Philadelphia

Founded in 1995, the French collective “Libérons Mumia” brings together about a hundred organizations and public authorities: human rights associations, trade unions, political parties, local and regional collectives, and local authorities.

Resistance News Network report from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.

The Iranian response to the zionist entity is a pivotal event that will establish new rules of engagement in the region.

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine praised the Iranian Revolutionary Guard’s targeting of zionist military sites with dozens of missiles and drones in response to the entity’s aggression against the Iranian consulate in Damascus, describing the Iranian response as a significant pivotal event that will establish new rules of engagement  (https://t.me/PalestineResist/35966) in the region.

The Front confirmed that the legitimate Iranian response broke the prestige of the zionist entity, revealing its fragility and inability to defend itself or restore its deterrence power. At the same time, it confirmed the ability of the Islamic Republic of Iran and the resistance factions to deliver painful strikes to the zionist entity, deepening its internal crisis due to its inability to achieve any of its goals in eliminating the resistance in the Gaza Strip or stopping the strikes directed at it by the resistance in Lebanon, Yemen, and Iraq.

The Front explained that the rush of the American administration and its partners in Britain, France, Germany, and some of their Arab tails (https://t.me/PalestineResist/35971) in the region to use all their defensive weapons to try to protect the zionist entity from the Iranian missiles and drones confirms the involvement of these parties in the zionist crimes in the region, especially in Gaza. It also reveals that this zionist entity has suffered a strategic defeat, has become humiliated and weak, and is unable to protect itself, now imploring its allies to take on this role.

The Front concluded its statement by affirming that the unprecedented Iranian strikes, the first of their kind in history  (https://t.me/PalestineResist/35973) against the zionist entity, represent an important turning point in the battle of the Al-Aqsa Flood and in favor of the resistance factions. The repercussions of this strike will have pressing effects on the zionist entity to stop its genocidal war on the Gaza Strip after the American administration and its allies realized that any escalation in the region would lead to a regional war where their bases and interests will not be safe, nor will the zionist entity be able to defend itself after the collapse of its deterrence power and its humiliating defeat in front of the resistance in Gaza and other fronts.

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine

Central Media Department

April 14, 2024

A group of activists with the Baltimore Peoples Power Assembly shut down the Baltimore City Council’s biweekly meeting in solidarity with the people of Palestine. As the City Council finished its opening presentations and roll call, Reverend Annie Chambers announced that the PPA demanded to be heard regarding the ongoing Zionist genocide in Gaza. 

At that point, four other activists read a statement demanding that the Council end its complicity with genocide and pass a resolution that completely divests the city of Baltimore from the Zionist state and all “Israeli” weapons or technology companies. The demonstrators chanted in support of Palestine until the Council was forced to take a recess. 

The demonstration made clear that these corporate politicians will have no peace until they take action to stand with Gaza. 

Women in Struggle/Mujeres en Lucha is organizing a coast-to-coast tour: Spotlight on Puerto Rico with Berta Joubert-Ceci.

Joubert-Ceci lives in San Juan, Puerto Rico. She was one of the convenors of the 2019 Puerto Rico International Tribunal of Colonial Crimes of the United States.

Berta has a powerful presentation with a slide show that breaks down the current crises faced by the people of Puerto Rico as they fight for sovereignty and justice in their own land. The presentation elucidates the current machinations of U.S. imperialism to maintain control and the flow of profits from Puerto Rico. Joubert-Ceci addresses the conditions and main crises facing the people of Puerto Rico. Who is to blame … and What can we do?

Tuesday, April 16 – 2:30 p.m.

Elmhurst Public Library
88-07 Broadway, Elmhurst, NY 11373