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       Reclaim and honor Rev. Dr. King Jr. by resisting war and racism

       A call to action on the Dr. King Jr. birthday week

STOP WAR ON IRAN 

BALTIMORE MARCH TO WASHINGTON D.C.: Jan 18 

Money for jobs, education, health care & people’s needs

In 1967 on April 4, Rev. Dr. King Jr., passionately spoke out against the Vietnam war. 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.

If war is to be declared in our name, let it be a war on racism, police terror, low wages, homelessness and poverty. End anti-immigrant violence, sexism and LGBTQ2S bigotry. Close the detention camps.

FEED THE PEOPLE, NOT THE PENTAGON

• This April 700,000 people will lose food stamps; millions will get fewer benefits.  In Baltimore, 22.2% of people, many of them children, go to bed hungry. The loss of food stamps (SNAP benefits) will mean that many small grocery stores will have to close their doors. But not the Pentagon! This year the military got a $130 billion increase. In addition, social security disability will be cut.

EDUCATION AND HEALTH CARE

• The children of Baltimore, DC and everywhere need clean lead-free drinking water, more and better paid teachers, books and decent schools. Redirect the billions for war to save our youth and pay for free universal health care for all.

LOW WAGES & WORKERS RIGHTS

• Close to half of the workers in the U.S. are poor!  53 million workers between the ages of 18 to 64 — 44% of all workers — qualify as low-wage. This amounts to a median income of $18,000 per year. Amazon and Walmart refuse to respect workers rights to unionize. Amazon even threatened to fire workers who spoke out against climate change.

PENTAGON, THE WORLD’S BIGGEST POLLUTER, SHUT IT DOWN

• Indigenous people courageously protected the Amazon rainforest from fires and destruction. Now Australia is engulfed in flames threatening the existence of an entire continent and killing millions of animals. Jakarta, Indonesia home to 30 million people is literally sinking, destroyed by flood waters. The capitalist climate crisis threatens the entire planet. The Pentagon with it’s 800+ military bases and endless wars is one of the world’s biggest polluters.

WAR BREEDS REPRESSION 

• Police departments across this country are militarized, increasing racism and repression. Globally the US is number one in mass incarceration. Yet the problems of drug addiction, despair and violence continue. Instead of investing in the community, Johns Hopkins has hired a private armed police force.

ONLY THE PEOPLE CAN STOP THE WAR!  

The people of Baltimore are Marching on the Dr. King Jr. weekend. We invite you to join us. If you cannot come to Baltimore, and we expect that many can’t, please hold solidarity actions in your city, town, school or work place.

Now is the time to reclaim and honor Rev. Dr. King Jr. by resisting war and racism.

ENDORSE THE CALL

Endorsers: Peoples Power Assembly; Rev. CD Witherspoon; Rev. Annie Chambers, Douglas Homes Community Leader; Youth Against War and Racism; Black Alliance for Peace, Baltimore; ICE Out of Baltimore; Prisoners Solidarity Committee; The Marlyn Barnes Family; Baltimore Peace Action; CODE Pink; Union del Barrio; Puerto Rican Alliance; Popular Resistance; Union of Progressive Iranians; UNAC, United National Antiwar Coalition; Harvard Boulevard Block Club of South Central Los Angeles; Harriet Tubman Center for Social Justice; Plymouth Congregational United Church of Christ; Peoples Alliance, Bay Area; Bail Out the People Movement, Wisconsin; Women in Struggle/Mujeres en Lucha; Solidarity with Novorossiya & Antifascists in Ukraine; Stand with Okinawa NY; International Concerned Family & Friends of Mumia Abu-Jamal; Socialist Unity Party/Partido de Socialismo Unido; Struggle – La Lucha;  Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet, LA Province; Jennicet Gutierrez; Phil Wilayto, editor, The Virginia Defender; William Camarada, Comité de Solidaridad con Venezuela Alberto Lovera NYC; D19: Partido Libre USA Canada; Baltimore City Green Party; Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network; Familia: TQLM; Malaya Movement, Baltimore; San Diego County Central Committee of the Peace and Freedom Party of California; Communist Party of USA – Baltimore Club; U.S. Peace Council; Freedom Road Socialist Organization; Ujima People’s Progress Party; New Orleans Workers Group (list in formation)

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The vicious assassination-by-drone of Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani and Iraqi Popular Mobilization Forces deputy leader Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis on Jan. 2 was denounced by Iran, Iraq and people worldwide as an act of war. The murders, ordered by U.S. President Donald Trump, came two days after hundreds of Iraqi protesters besieged the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad in response to a Dec. 29 Pentagon missile attack on Iraqi Hezbollah members and civilians.

Trump and the Big Oil/fracking interests that dominate his administration have been gunning for war with Iran since Day One, first of all by pulling the U.S. out of the so-called Iran nuclear deal, an international agreement that Tehran hoped could shake off U.S.-imposed sanctions. Iran has provided major military, economic and political assistance to Syria in its struggle against U.S.-backed terrorists. Last year, Trump unleashed the Turkish dictatorship on eastern Syria while claiming control of Syria’s oil fields on behalf of U.S. monopolies’ profits. 

In solidarity with the righteous protest at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, the Answer Coalition and Code Pink Women for Peace and Popular Resistance called for a day of action on Saturday, Jan. 4. It was fortunate that they did, as it gave organizers across the country and the world an anchor for emergency actions in cities large and small when the U.S. escalated its undeclared war on Iran with the assassinations.

Dozens of national and local organizations, including Struggle-La Lucha newspaper and the Socialist Unity Party/Partido de Socialismo Unido, joined in the emergency mobilization, and the number of cities holding actions on the weekend of Jan. 4-5 swelled to over 80. The days of action took on an international scope as well, with anti-war protests held from fire-ravaged Australia to snowy Canada.

At least a thousand people came out to fog-shrouded Times Square in New York City to loudly chant, “No justice! No peace! U.S. out of the Middle East!” and marched down Broadway to the Herald Square shopping district. 

Speaking for Struggle-La Lucha, Bill Dores called to “bring all U.S. troops home now.” He talked about Gen. Soleimani’s role in leading the regional fight against ISIS and other ultraright, U.S.-linked forces that have ravaged Syria and other countries. Other speakers represented the Answer Coalition, the International Action Center, The People’s Forum, Refuse Fascism, New York Boricua Resistance, BAYAN USA and the International League of Peoples’ Struggle.

The weather was quite a contrast in Los Angeles, but there, too, a thousand people took to the streets to denounce Trump’s provocation and U.S. war, sanctions and occupation. 

“We find it really important for us to show solidarity for brothers and sisters in Iran and Iraq fighting for their sovereignty,” said Viva Vargas of BAYAN Southern California. “We see the U.S. war machine also waging war in the Philippines. They have sent over $193 million U.S. tax dollars to fund the killings, to fund the heightened oppression of all our progressive forces, the drones and bombs that cause the displacement of various Indigenous communities.”

Money for food, not war

“The people are facing major cuts to food stamps and disability benefits,” declared Lee Patterson of the Baltimore Peoples Power Assembly. “In April, Trump plans to drop 700,000 people from the SNAP food program and millions more will have their benefits reduced. Here in Baltimore city, over 22 percent of people already go to bed facing hunger.

“But who’s not facing cuts? The Pentagon, that’s who!” Patterson said. “Both the Republicans and Democrats in Congress voted to give the war machine a $130-billion increase this year to wage more racist wars and spread more pollution with its 800 bases around the world.”

Dozens of protesters lined a major thoroughfare in downtown Baltimore. They covered a whole block, holding signs and banners in protest of the Trump regime’s latest acts of war targeting Iran, Iraq and Syria. “No bombs! No war! We need health care for the poor!” they chanted.

Among the groups participating were the Socialist Unity Party, Baltimore Peace Action, Youth Against War & Racism, Women in Black and the Communist Party USA-Baltimore. 

Winter chill didn’t stop an impressive turnout against war in Minneapolis. As Meredith Aby-Keirstead of the Anti-War Committee told Struggle-La Lucha, “We had over 700 people come out to say no to continued war in Iraq and a new war in Iran. Some people came from as far away as North Dakota.

“It was impressive to see so many people fired up to protest when the mainstream media have been beating the drums of war for days, assuring all of us that this was a legitimate attack and not an assassination,” she added.

In San Diego, a spontaneous march followed a rally that featured speakers from Anakbayan San Diego, Unión del Barrio, the Party for Socialism and Liberation, the Democratic Socialists of America and the Peace & Freedom Party. “We marched up several blocks and onto the I-5 Freeway overpass, where we hung the lead banner over a railing, making it visible to passing motorists,” said Carl Muhammad of the Socialist Unity Party. “We received a lot of support from the motorists passing below.”

A demonstration in Detroit’s Campus Martius Park, organized by the Michigan Emergency Committee Against War and Injustice (MECAWI), swelled to hundreds before marching. Representatives of Al Awda, the Palestine Right of Return Coalition, traveled from Cleveland to attend. Other speakers represented Geopolitics Alert and the Communist Workers League.

Palestinian American Congressperson Rashida Tlaib also spoke, condemning Trump’s act of war in violation of the War Powers Act. “Congress should have been consulted,” Tlaib said. “More importantly, we want to emphasize, there are more people out here that want peace, that do not support war.”

New faces join the struggle

Everywhere organizers and police alike were surprised at the strong turnout after many years of small anti-war actions. Activists noted many new faces, especially young people, who came out to their first protests to say “No war on Iran.”

In St. Louis, 150 protesters marched through downtown and held a “Rally Against War With Iran” at the Thomas F. Eagleton Federal Courthouse. Local media reported that “Anti-war protesters swarmed downtown Iowa City” at an event organized by Veterans for Peace. Speakers exposed the fact that the U.S. has already spent tens of billions of dollars on “endless wars” in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Anti-war protesters clashed with right-wing goons in Pittsburgh and Boise. One hundred demonstrators in Atlanta chanted, “Trump says more war! We say no more!” declaring that the government needs to focus on helping people struggle against homelessness and exorbitant hospital bills, not more war in the Middle East.

Hadi Jawad, executive director of the Dallas Peace and Justice Center, reminded a local protest there that “we opposed the Iraq War back in 2003. We opposed the war in the early ’90s during Iraq One. We also opposed the bombing of Iraq in the 1980s. This is the freaking fifth decade — the fifth decade — of bombing the people of Iraq. Not only did we destroy Iraq, but the fires that we set in Iraq inflamed the entire Middle East.”

Activists erupted in chants of “Never again!”

More than fifty people participated in an anti-war protest in Norfolk, Va., reported jubilant activist John Long. “We caught the cops by surprise and took Granby Street!”

Up to 1,000 marched on the Trump Towers in Chicago, while even larger numbers–perhaps up to 2,000–took to the streets of San Francisco and Washington, D.C., where they rallied outside the White House. 

One hundred people came out to march and rally in New Orleans. “We in the New Orleans Workers Group called the demonstration in solidarity with Iranians, Iraqis and others attacked by U.S. imperialism,” Gregory Williamson told SLL. “I was impressed by the broad agreement that imperialist war is bad for the people of the world, including workers here. The crowd was made up of many races, nationalities and age groups.” The Peoples Defense League of South Louisiana and the Democratic Socialists of America were among the groups that came out.

At the rally, Gavrielle Gemma, a leader of the national movement against the first Gulf War in 1990-1991, said, “We cannot stop imperialist war unless we organize the workers to be against it. We cannot be afraid to say that we are for the workers, that it is the bosses who are for war, and this is a rich white man’s war that doesn’t benefit the workers of any nationality.”

From New Haven, Conn.–where Norm Clement denounced the assassination of Soleimani  as “an act of war and a war crime”–to Sasscer Park in Southern California’s Orange County, and everywhere inbetween, a new movement is taking shape for the hard fight to stop Trump’s war against Iran — and shut down U.S. imperialism everywhere!

Jefferson Azevedo, David Card, Cheryl LaBash and Carl Muhammad contributed to this report.

Alto a la guerra de Estados Unidos contra Irán

Estados Unidos fuera del Medio Oriente

Dinero para empleos, salud y educación.

El régimen de Trump lanzó un ataque furtivo y cobarde contra dos países con los que Estados Unidos no está en guerra. Los asesinatos del general iraní Qassem Soleimani y el iraquí Abu Mahdi Mohandas están calculados para desatar más guerra y destrucción en toda la región. Siguen al asesinato de 25 soldados iraquíes por la Fuerza Aérea de los EUA cuatro días antes.

Estos asesinatos son crímenes contra la paz, el mayor crimen de guerra según el derecho internacional. Son una versión global de Cointelpro, el programa secreto del gobierno de EUA que asesinó a decenas de líderes negrxs, latinxs e indígenas en las décadas de 1960 y 1970.

Nuevos informes dicen que los marines estadounidenses están “arrestando” (traducción: secuestrando) legisladores iraquíes elegidos. El régimen colonizador racista de Israel está colaborando con la Casa Blanca y el Pentágono para intensificar esta guerra.

Soliemani lideró la lucha contra ISIS

“El acto estadounidense de terrorismo internacional, atacando y asesinando al general Soleimani, quien dirigió la fuerza más efectiva que lucha contra Daesh (ISIS), al-Nusrah, al-Qaida y otros, es una escalada extremadamente peligrosa e insensata”, dijo el canciller iraní Irán Javad Zarif en Twitter. “Estados Unidos será el responsable por todas las consecuencias de su aventura canallesca”.

En juego enormes ganancias e inversiones

¿Quién podría querer tal cosa? Los intereses energéticos que dominan la Casa Blanca de Trump, y los bancos que los financian. La carrera política del secretario de estado Mike Pompeo fue pagada por Koch Industries, un gran beneficiario del fracking. La industria energética ha llegado a depender de la guerra en el oeste de Asia y el norte de África, ricos en petróleo. Ahora están en crisis, como lo atestiguan los titulares en The Wall Street Journal (WSJ):

“Los productores de energía se enfrentan a una gran pérdida después de la bonanza del petróleo de esquisto”, escribió el WSJ el 1 de enero.

“La factura se debe a la guerra de precios de la industria del esquisto con la OPEP, y las compañías de petróleo y gas de América del Norte tendrán más de $200 mil millones de deuda con vencimiento en los próximos cuatro años”, comienza el siguiente artículo.

“Los precios del petróleo caerán a pesar de los recortes de la OPEP, predicen los bancos “, escribió el WSJ el 23 de diciembre.

“Los gigantes de la energía confrontan el exceso con oleadas de desvalorizaciones”, informó un titular del 20 de diciembre de WSJ.

En un artículo del 15 de diciembre titulado, “La desaceleración del esquisto tiene costo económico”, el WSJ citó al economista del Banco de la Reserva Federal Michael Plante: “El momento de auge terminó, a menos que los precios del petróleo suban significativamente”.

“Los fabricantes se enfrentan a una nueva amenaza por la caída del fracking”, decía un titular del 15 de diciembre.

Sin embargo, el WSJ del 26 de diciembre informaba “los grandes inversores muestran amor por los campos de gas que otros evitan”. Entre los que compran campos no rentables está el aliado de Trump y propietario de los Dallas Cowboys, Jerry Jones. Más importante aún, ExxonMobil y Chevron anunciaron importantes inversiones en la Cuenca Pérmica a principios de este año, a pesar de la caída de los precios. “La próxima era de perforación de esquisto es probable que sea liderada por las principales compañías petroleras”, comentó el WSJ.

El exceso de energía mundial también pone en peligro las ganancias que los bancos estadounidenses esperan obtener de la oferta pública de Saudi ARAMCO, la compañía petrolera más grande del mundo, y los planes estadounidense-israelíes para comercializar en Europa el gas robado de los palestinos. Miles de millones de dólares en ganancias e inversiones están en juego.

Las guerras de EUA contra Irak, Libia y Siria trajeron enormes ganancias a las empresas estadounidenses, especialmente a las de energía. Hicieron posible el auge del fracking, en el que los principales bancos y corporaciones vertieron cientos de miles de millones de dólares. Pero era una burbuja, y esa burbuja ha colapsado. El régimen de Trump está apostando a que una guerra importante pueda traerlo de vuelta.

Guerra contra Irán es guerra contra la clase trabajadora aquí

La guerra con Irán puede enriquecer aún más a los banqueros y multimillonarios, pero solo traerá un desastre a las comunidades oprimidas y de clase trabajadora aquí. El Dr. Martin Luther King dijo: “Las bombas que caen en Vietnam explotan aquí”. Lo mismo se aplica a las bombas y misiles que Estados Unidos arroja sobre Asia occidental y el norte de África.

El presupuesto militar de $758 mil millones viene a expensas de nuestros cupones de alimentos, nuestras escuelas, hospitales, viviendas, bibliotecas y sistemas de tránsito. ¿Por qué no podemos tener atención médica y universidad gratuitas como tantos otros países? ¿Dónde está el dinero para proporcionar agua potable a Flint, Newark y otras ciudades de EUA? ¿Dónde está el dinero para reparar los daños causados ​​por huracanes en Puerto Rico?

También pagaremos el costo de esta guerra en el puesto de gasolina y en el costo del combustible para calefacción este invierno.

La guerra también está destinada a salvar y fortalecer la industria del fracking, que está envenenando a las comunidades nativas y rurales en los EUA además de causar cáncer. También es una fuente importante de metano que afecta el clima.

Medios monopolistas convergen en torno a la guerra

Los medios corporativos han criticado a Trump por perjudicar la intervención estadounidense en Ucrania. Pero se regodean con los asesinatos selectivos completamente ilegales del régimen de Trump.

Algunos políticos demócratas han criticado insípidamente esta peligrosa escalada. A Nancy Pelosi le preocupa que Trump no lo haya pasado por el Congreso. ¿Pero actuarán ahora para detener esta guerra? ¿Acusarán a Trump por crímenes contra la paz y violar la Ley de Poderes de Guerra? ¿Sacarán ahora todas las tropas, barcos, aviones y activos militares estadounidenses de la región?

El pueblo debe intervenir

No podemos confiar en los políticos burgueses. ¡Necesitamos una acción de masas urgente en las calles y en los lugares de trabajo para detener esta guerra!

¡Manos fuera de Irán! ¡Estados Unidos fuera de Asia occidental y el norte de África! ¡No más guerras por ganancias del monopolio petrolero! ¡Todas las tropas, barcos y aviones estadounidenses a casa ahora! ¡Alto a las sanciones ya! ¡Alto a toda ayuda al estado racista de Israel! ¡Dinero para escuelas, salud y viviendas, no para el Pentágono y la CIA!

The Trump regime has launched a cowardly sneak attack on two countries with which the U.S. is not at war. The murders of Iran’s Gen. Qassem Soleimani and Iraq’s Abu Mahdi Mohandas are calculated to unleash more war and destruction across the entire region. It follows the murder of 25 Iraqi soldiers by the U.S. Air Force four days earlier.

These murders are crimes against peace, the highest war crime under international law. They are a global version of Cointelpro, the U.S. government secret program which murdered dozens of Black, Latinx and Indigenous leaders in the 1960s and 1970s.

New reports say U.S. Marines are “arresting” (translation: kidnapping) elected Iraqi legislators. The racist settler regime of Israel is collaborating with the White House and Pentagon in escalating this war. 

Soliemani led fight against ISIS

”The U.S. act of international terrorism, targeting and assassinating Gen. Soleimani–who led the most effective force fighting Daesh (ISIS), al-Nusrah, al-Qaida, et al.–is extremely dangerous and a foolish escalation,” said Iran’s Foreign Minister Javad Zarif on Twitter.  “The U.S. bears responsibility for all consequences of its rogue adventurism.”

Huge profits and investments at stake

Who could want such a thing? The energy interests that dominate the Trump White House, and the banks that fund them want it most of all. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s political career was paid for by Koch Industries, a major fracking profiteer. Big Energy has come to depend on war in oil-rich West Asia and North Africa. Now they are in a crisis, as headlines in The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) attest:

“Energy Producers Face Big Tab After Shale Oil Bonanza,” the WSJ wrote on Jan. 1.

“The bill is coming due for the shale industry’s price war with OPEC, with North American oil-and-gas companies having more than $200 billion of debt maturing over the next four years,” begins the article that follows.

“Oil Prices to Slide Despite OPEC Cuts, Banks Predict,” the WSJ wrote on Dec. 23. 

“Energy Giants Confront Glut With Wave of Write-Downs,” reported a Dec. 20 WSJ headline. 

In a Dec. 15 article headlined, “Shale Slowdown Takes Economic Toll,“ the WSJ quoted Federal Reserve Bank economist Michael Plante: “The boom time is done at this point, unless oil prices go up significantly.” 

“Manufacturers Face New Threat From Fracking Slump,” read a Dec. 15 headline. 

Nonetheless, “Big Investors Showing Love to Gas Fields Others Shun,” the WSJ reported on Dec. 26. Among those buying up unprofitable fields is Trump ally and Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones. More important, ExxonMobil and Chevron announced major investments in the Permian Basin earlier this year, despite falling prices. “The next era of shale drilling is likely to be led by the major oil companies,” the WSJ commented. 

The global energy glut also imperils the profits that U.S. banks hope to make off the public offering of Saudi ARAMCO, the world’s biggest oil company, and U.S.-Israeli plans to market stolen Palestinian gas in Europe. Trillions of dollars in profits and investments are at stake. 

The U.S. wars against Iraq, Libya and Syria brought huge profits to Corporate America, especially energy firms. They made possible the fracking boom, into which major banks and corporations poured hundreds of billions of dollars. But it was a bubble, and that bubble has collapsed. The Trump regime is betting that a major war can bring it back.

War on Iran is war on the working class here

War with Iran may further enrich bankers and billionaires, but it will only bring disaster to working-class and oppressed communities here. Dr. Martin Luther King said, “The bombs that fall in Vietnam explode here.” The same is true of the bombs and missiles the U.S. drops on West Asia and North Africa. 

The $758 billion military budget comes at the expense of our food stamps, our schools, hospitals, housing, libraries and transit systems. Why can’t we have free medical care and college like so many other countries? Where is the money to provide clean drinking water to Flint, Newark and other U.S. cities? Where is the money to repair hurricane damage in Puerto Rico? 

We will also pay the cost of this war at the gas pump and in the cost of heating oil this winter. 

The war is also meant to save and strengthen the fracking industry, which is poisoning Native and rural communities across the U.S. and is a major cause of cancer. It is also a major source of climate-changing methane. 

Monopoly media rally around war 

The corporate media have roasted Trump for impairing U.S. intervention in Ukraine. But they are gloating over the Trump regime’s completely illegal targeted assassinations.

Some Democrat politicians have offered milquetoast criticism of this dangerous escalation. Nancy Pelosi is concerned that Trump went around Congress. But will they act now to stop this war? Will they impeach Trump for crimes against peace and violating the War Powers Act? Will they get all U.S. troops, ships, planes and military assets out of the region now? 

The people must intervene

We cannot rely on bourgeois politicians. We need urgent mass action in the streets and in the workplace to stop this war!  

Hands off Iran! U.S. out of West Asia and North Africa! No more wars for oil monopoly profits! Bring all U.S. troops, ships and planes home now! End sanctions now! End all aid to the racist state of Israel! Money for schools, health care and housing, not the Pentagon and the CIA!

U.S. out of Iraq and the Middle East!
NO to war! NO to sanctions on Iran!

Money for jobs, health care and education!
No Pentagon war for Big Oil profits!

[embeddoc url=”https://struggle-la-lucha.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/leafletJan3.pdf” download=”all” viewer=”google”]

The assassination of Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, deputy leader of the Iraqi Popular Mobilization Forces, ordered by U.S. President Donald Trump, was a declaration of war against the people of Iran, Iraq and all of the Middle East. 

Trump and the Pentagon have ordered 750 more U.S. troops to be sent to the Middle East and possibly 3,000 more, on top of the 5,200 U.S. troops already stationed in Iraq. This followed major protests by the Iraqi people in response to the Pentagon’s aerial assault that killed scores of innocent civilians.

The new air assaults have ignited nationwide resistance by the Iraqi people, who want to reclaim their full sovereignty and do not want Iraq to be used in a U.S. war on Iran. 

Corporate media and congressional leaders have backed Trump’s cowardly and illegal tactics. Democratic and Republican leaders alike have joined in promoting the Big Lie that Iran is a terrorist state, which aims to trick poor and working people into supporting yet another war for Wall Street and Big Oil profits.

Whose war? Big Oil and fracking companies

More than a million Iraqi people have died during the past 28 years as a result of the U.S. occupation, bombings and sanctions. Tens of thousands of GIs have also been killed or badly wounded.

Why? To control the flow of oil and guarantee profits for the trillion-dollar oil and fracking corporations! 

Meanwhile, workers at home are facing major cuts to food stamps and disability benefits. In April of this year, 700,000 people will be dropped from SNAP benefits and millions will get fewer benefits. 

As one example, in Baltimore city, 22.2 percent of people already go to bed hungry. In rural areas that have suffered from low wages and no wages, the loss of food stamps will mean that many small grocery stores will have to close their doors.

But not the Pentagon! This year the world’s biggest polluter got a $130 billion increase.  

Shut down the Pentagon and 800+ overseas military bases

We are just weeks away from celebrating the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. It was Dr. King who proclaimed that the bombs dropped on Vietnam were like bombs dropped on cities at home.

If we are to declare war, then let it be a war on racism, police terror, anti-immigrant bigotry and violence, low wages and poverty. The best people’s defense is to shut down the Pentagon. 

Don’t be silent this coming year. Join us in the fight to end U.S. wars and for a socialist future.

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine strongly condemns the U.S. assassination of General Qassem Soleimani, commander of the Quds Force in the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, deputy leader of the Popular Mobilization Forces in Iraq. The Front views this assassination on Iraqi soil as a qualitative shift in the U.S. aggression and the war that it is fighting, together with the Zionist entity, in various forms against the people of the region and the resistance forces in it.

The Front emphasized that the infiltration and occupation of more than one Arab country, the latest of which was this aggression and occupation that took place in Iraq, calls for a coordinated, comprehensive and continuous response from the resistance forces and all patriotic forces against U.S. imperialism and the Zionist entity.

The Front sends its sincere condolences to the Iranian people and leadership on the martyrdom of Major General Qassem Soleimani. The Palestinian people will not forget his proactive and prominent role in embodying the position of the Islamic Republic of Iran by supporting the Palestinian people’s just struggle against the Zionist entity, supporting the resistance forces and develping their capabilities.

Source: PFLP

Presentation given at U.S. Hands Off Iran webinar sponsored by Struggle-La Lucha on July 14, 2019.

The news headline says the president is announcing new sanctions. What is a sanction? College sport fans have heard about NCAA sanctioning teams for a gambling scandal, costing the team a vacated win or forfeited game. The casual observer might think a sanction isn’t such a big deal then.

It is a big deal though. Sanctions are economic warfare.  

Iran, Venezuela and Cuba are countries we may think of first, but what about Zimbabwe, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea or Syria and the many other  “sanctioned” countries? Let me point out that not one of them is an imperialist government or former colonial ruler. 

Where is the sanction on the U.S. for its crimes against humanity right now on the U.S. southern border? Where is the sanction on Israel for its snipers killing and intentionally maiming protesting Palestinians, the genocide and land theft perpetrated on the Palestinian people? 

No, whether unilaterally imposed by the U.S. or rubber stamped by the United Nations, international sanctions are very different from a college basketball game. 

Sanctions–like trade wars, the “anti-terror” campaign, targeted drone assassinations–are used by the U.S. as a lower-cost, lower-risk action to try to force another country to give in to imperialist demands. No U.S. body bags to arouse public anger while using economic rules to inflict hardships.  

Sanctions cost lives

A stunning example of the cost of sanctions is Iraq from 1991 until the U.S. invasion in 2003–twelve years of  brutal sanctions followed by the U.S. invasion and occupation. Sanctions included denying Iraq the famous “dual-use” items, like chlorine, which prevented Iraq from treating its water.

Infamously, Madeleine Albright, secretary of state under Bill Clinton and later UN ambassador, told Leslie Stahl on 60 Minutes that the death of 500,000 children from U.S. sanctions was “worth it.” She since has tried to absolve herself and the government she represented by saying food and medicine were allowed. But what about clean water and infrastructure like hospitals?

And so it is today. We have only to look at Venezuela, where the corporate news agencies like Reuters and the Associated Press (according to Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting) ignored or rather refused to publish a study reporting 40,000 Venezuelan deaths in 2017 and 2018 due to the U.S. sanctions. 

Every year in a report to the UN, Cuba details the cost to the Cuban people of the U.S. blockade in effect since 1960 against their country. On Nov. 6, for the 27th consecutive time, the UN General Assembly will speak for the world to tell the U.S. to end the blockade — a blockade called the longest genocide. 

It is intentional harm. Why do we say this? On April 6, 1960, an internal State Department memo admits it was impossible to construct a credible opposition to the Cuban Revolution. The memo lays out what the U.S. government later put into effect: 

“The only foreseeable means of alienating internal support is through disenchantment and disaffection based on economic dissatisfaction and hardship.

“If the above are accepted or cannot be successfully countered, it follows that every possible means should be undertaken promptly to weaken the economic life of Cuba. If such a policy is adopted, it should be the result of a positive decision which would call forth a line of action which, while as adroit and inconspicuous as possible, makes the greatest inroads in denying money and supplies to Cuba, to decrease monetary and real wages, to bring about hunger, desperation and overthrow of government.”

According to the Council on Foreign Relations, the second longest sanctions are against Iran.

In 1973, this strategy worked in Chile, overthrowing the elected socialist government of Salvador Allende. And we see the dirty hands of U.S. imperialism in Honduras, where a coup 10 years ago replaced a democratically elected popular government with a repressive dictatorship. And as a result, many Hondurans are seeking asylum in the U.S.  

So what gives the U.S. the right?

The point I am trying to make here is that sanctions are more than a U.S. policy imposed sometimes with a kinder/gentler face and at another time with a crude and bellicose personality.

Sanctions are part of an economic system agreed to by world imperialist and former colonial powers after World War II. It was established in hopes of controlling the competition between countries for advantages in exploiting the people of the world and their resources, especially oil. These are the root capitalist rivalries that led to the massive human sacrifice and destruction of productive capabilities in both World War I and World War II.

An international conference at Bretton Woods in New Hampshire established the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund and the proposal for the United Nations. It also agreed to unrestricted trade between countries.

The U.S. dollar was set as the reserve currency for international buying and selling. This means that international trade must come through U.S. banking institutions, enhanced in our times with digital monitoring. Billions of dollars in fines have been levied against European banks by the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Asset Controls for violating sanctions. Circumventing the sanctions is labeled “money laundering,” again a characterization that is publicly palatable.  

U.S. government agencies have imposed fines totaling $1.34 billion on the French bank Société Générale (SG) for transactions that violated sanctions on Cuba and other countries. The Miami Herald of Nov. 20, 2018, wrote:

“The more that the Trump administration weaponizes the DOT (OFAC) and DOJ, the less likely will be governments to engage with Cuba as the risk of exposure will be greater than the benefit to engagement with Cuba.” 

Such are “smart” sanctions that reportedly do not hurt the people–the risk of trade with a sanctioned country is greater than the benefit. 

This French bank has also been sued under Title III of Helms Burton in a new extraterritorial action against a U.S. ally.

Global economic decline and capitalist contraction intensify these economic conflicts, of which sanctions are a part.

Internationally, it mirrors the struggles we face daily inside the U.S. When a bank forecloses on a home or apartment building, what recourse do working people have? 

Only in the case of the U.S. mining Nicaragua’s harbors has an international judgement ever been won against the U.S. But it could not be enforced because the U.S. blocked it in the UN Security Council. 

We rejoice as the MOVE family is released from prison, but see the prison-for-profit, racist, repressive system continue. 

There is a global war of capitalism against the working class and oppressed people of the world. 

So, as we fight the attacks on our migrant and immigrant neighbors and to free the detained children and working-class families held so shamefully and cruelly on the border, as we say no war on Iran and Venezuela and end the blockade of Cuba, it is important to remember how much we are connected and our struggles are connected. 

By uniting our struggles, we can win. 

Presentation given at U.S. Hands Off Iran webinar sponsored by Struggle-La Lucha on July 14, 2019.

I was part of a U.S. anti-war delegation that arrived in Tehran on Oct. 9, 2010, to increase solidarity with the people of Iran, defend Iran’s sovereignty and stop the accelerated U.S. push for war against Iran.

An independent Iranian nongovernmental organization invited us. It is made up of the largest student organizations in Iran in order to build anti-imperialist solidarity with Latin American countries. It is aptly named House of Latin America or HOLA, which is Spanish for “hello.” 

Some of HOLA’s activities have been to organize solidarity trips to Nicaragua and Venezuela and hosting a visit to Iran by the Young Communist League of Cuba.

HOLA coordinators Amir Tareshi and Hamid Shahrabi spoke about the challenges to building solidarity with the progressive movement in the U.S. By standing the truth on its head, they said, the U.S. has given the impression that the Iranian government is dedicated to terrorism and corruption. Doesn’t that sound like what’s going on today?

They continued by saying that the great desire of the government and every person in Iran is for peace.

After a powerful revolutionary upsurge led by Islamic forces overthrew the U.S.-installed shah in 1979, the new regime nationalized its oil. With the use of this revenue, they were able to counter the many years of corruption fed primarily by U.S. and British hegemony in Iran. 

The imperialists stole Iran’s wealth while the puppet shah and his hangers-on siphoned off enough to allow for their luxurious lifestyle. Once freed of imperialist control, Iran was able to dramatically increase health and education nationally using this revenue.

Rather than pay reparations for the 26 years of damage done to Iran’s development due to U.S. dictatorship over the people of Iran before 1979, the U.S. instead imposes sanctions against the Iranian economy to continue that devastation against its people.

We hear about the contradictions and backward ideologies emphasized in the corporate media about every other country except our own when they become targets of U.S. imperialism. But without other facts a false picture is drawn.

I’d like to introduce some other facts kept from our ears about Iran:

At the time of our trip, we discovered that more than 65 percent of Iran’s university students are women, as are more than a third of the doctors. At the time of the 1979 Revolution, 90 percent of rural women were illiterate; even in towns the figure was 45 percent. So, in a little over 30 years tremendous strides were made in regards to educational opportunities for women. Now large numbers of increasingly well-educated women have been entering the workforce.

Iran’s comprehensive social protection system is equally impressive. The resources allocated towards domestic necessities do not end at the Iranian border. More than $8 billion went to aid Lebanon in rebuilding efforts following its defeat of an Israeli invasion.

Iran’s international solidarity efforts

The funds went directly to grassroots organizations like Hezbollah that built homes and repaired infrastructure destroyed by U.S.-supplied bombs during Israeli bombing raids in the 2006 war against Lebanon.

With regard to the flooding in Pakistan, the Iranian news agency Fars reports that early in October 2010, $100 million was allocated for the reconstruction of the flood-hit areas in Pakistan. Add to that the construction of medical centers by Iran’s Red Crescent Society. 

Iran was among the first three countries which rushed to Pakistan’s aid after floods devastated large parts of the country, while at the same time the U.S. was busy spending taxpayer money to kill Pakistani soldiers and civilians from the air with expensive, high-tech drones and helicopters.

Because Iran combines this type of solidarity in the region with the increasingly mutually beneficial cooperation with the socialist government in Cuba and progressive governments like Venezuela, Bolivia and others, Washington sees Iran as a threat against the imperialist aims of U.S. banks, the military-industrial complex and Big Oil and calls it “terrorist.”

In fact, the accusation of fomenting terrorism and terrorists is absurd when you consider the U.S. wars in Libya, Iraq, Syria and Yemen have all been contingent on cooperation with ISIS and al-Qaida forces, first created as a result of U.S. war on Iraq, with it’s foundations coming from the U.S. war on Afghanistan in 1979, where the Mujuhadeen were propped up with billions of U.S. dollars.

In fact, just a few weeks ago, top generals from Iraq announced the holding of joint military exercises with Iran due to its successful assistance in keeping al-Qaida, the Nusra Front and ISIS forces from taking over Iraq and Syria.

U.S. interference exacerbates contradictions

The central point driven home very effectively by HOLA members was that Iran has become Western imperialism’s primary target. They stressed that the primary work of the anti-war movements, especially those in the U.S., should be to build solidarity with the defense of Iran and its right to self-determination, defending Iran from a U.S. or U.S.-sponsored attack. 

They acknowledged that there were, as in all countries, backward ideologies and the need for even more progressive economic and social policies. 

But, U.S. interference, they insisted, would only exacerbate those contradictions and that the solidarity movement must allow the Iranian people to work out the internal contradictions within Iran themselves.

They pointed out how the program for using nuclear power for peaceful energy was started under the shah with U.S. support after reports that Iran’s oil will be depleted in 10 years. But after the 1979 revolution, Washington began opposing everything Iran did.

Imperialism’s attacks against Iran had already begun back in 2010. HOLA activist Shahrabi told the delegation that over the decades of prior hostility, the U.S. and Israel were responsible for the death of 16,300 Iranian civilians.

If we are truly in solidarity with the Iranian people we must:

1) Lift economic sanctions against Iran;

2) Recognize the right of Iran to develop and use nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, and their right to defend themselves against U.S. imperialism by any means; and

3) Stop all military threats against Iran.

End U.S. sanctions from Iran to Venezuela, Cuba, Zimbabwe and People’s Korea

Stop the war on workers from Iran to the world’s im/migrants and refugees

“I was the CIA director. We lied, we cheated, we stole. … We had entire training courses.” That’s what Trump regime Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told students at Texas A&M University on April 15.

On June 14, Pompeo told reporters that “Iran is responsible for the attacks that occurred in the Gulf of Oman today.” On June 16, he told Fox News, “There’s no doubt. The intelligence community has lots of data, lots of evidence.” He didn’t give any.

Embarrassed by the lies of U.S. officials about the supposedly ever increasing threats coming from Iran, a senior British commander of the Combined Joint Task Force, which the U.S. leads in its military operations in Iraq, felt compelled to state in an interview in the Guardian on May 14 that he had no evidence of any escalation of the war threat from Iran, directly contradicting the U.S.

This – like countless prior war drives promoted by the U.S. government, from both Democratic and Republican presidents – is built on lies, and a repeat of the current period of endless wars, starting against Afghanistan and Iraq.

The cost of war in Iraq alone is staggering and, including all U.S. wars since 2001, the figure tops $6 trillion.  Seven thousand U.S. soldiers have died and 600,000 were injured in Iraq and Afghanistan. But this pales in comparison to the lives lost by Iraqis, especially children. The best estimates now put the cost of war in Iraq since 2003 to 2.4 million lives lost, with at least 500,000 of them being children. Add to that the worldwide refugee crisis resulting from Bush’s war in Iraq and Obama’s wars in Libya and Syria.

You don’t need an economics degree to understand and see the cost of these wars in terms of poverty, homelessness, and lack of suitable health care, especially for children.

War breeds migrant crisis — and more concentration camps

In June, a physician visiting a detention center on the southern border of the U.S. compared it to a “torture facility.” And the number of children dying in these facilities continues to rise. 

Today’s migrant and refugee crisis is a direct result of U.S. wars, a crisis catapulting as a result of U.S.-led wars and coups from Iraq to Libya, Honduras and Syria. The privatized detention centers — like the privatized jail industry in the U.S. — are making record profits derived from overcrowded and underserved facilities that reflect a history of concentration camps and genocide.

A war with Iran, by all measures, would make things much worse. According to former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, “If you think the war in Iraq was hard, an attack on Iran would, in my opinion, be a catastrophe.” According to a 2013 study by the American Federation of Scientists, a new war on Iran would likely cost up to $2 trillion. That’s just within three months. Just imagine how those dollars translate into blood and misery and more concentration camps.

Already, the U.S. military is the single greatest producer of greenhouse gases in the world. This would increase that manyfold – a real threat to our very existence. 

Both Trump’s administration and the Democrats – who often justify the pretext for war, then support it – are motivated by their corporate sponsors, especially the oil monopolies. They see these wars as opportunities to increase their profits and use them as justifications to encourage further cutbacks to vital social services. 

After the Great Depression and up until 1973, the share of wealth of the 1% vs. the 99% was decreasing. Since then, that trend has reversed, allowing the pay of CEOs to increase up to 271 times greater than that of the average worker. The spending on war is a big business and a great contributor to stealing the wealth created by the workers for the sake of profits soaked in the blood of children.

Iran – a country whose development was hijacked for 26 years by the U.S. installment of the Shah of Iran until the revolution of 1979 — is surrounded by U.S. bases. No such threat to the U.S. exists.  And in regards to terrorism, it is Iran that has been fighting the spawn of U.S. wars, from ISIS to al-Qaida, instead of supporting them as the U.S. and Saudi Arabia do in Syria and Yemen. 

Endless war is how the ruling class in this country deals with a system that does not work – a system facing a global crisis of overproduction caused by the private ownership of the means of production, by bosses who care about nothing but ever increasing profits. But, as the profits increase, especially through war, so does the looming and greater economic crisis around the corner.

The war threat is real, and it’s coming from these shores. Trump states that he can unilaterally declare war on Iran with no congressional approval. We know that Congress serves at the pleasure of it’s corporate sponsors, so any real fightback against war will depend on the determined and loud voices of the people, demanding money for jobs, education, housing and health care – not war.

Here in the U.S., we play a crucial role in standing up to the war profiteers. We need to take action. Taking our opposition to war to the streets is crucial. We should follow the example of the workers who walked off their jobs after Wayfair refused to stop selling furniture to Immigration and Customs Enforcement for their concentration camps. Call on your family, friends and coworkers to put a halt to the war industry however they can.

U.S. imperialism— Hands off Iran!