Socialist Worker

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Stop Israel’s war: solidarity with the resistance

George Bush has given Israel the green light to tear Lebanon asunder and to destroy the resistance forces of Hizbollah. By Tuesday, Israeli forces had killed some 400 people, the vast majority civilians, and driven up to one million Lebanese from their homes.

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International Comment Features Reviews What We Think Other

News

Does Israel want peace?

The Middle East crisis stems in part from Israel’s determination to destroy Palestine’s democratically elected Hamas government. For years most Palestinians supported the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) and its leading component Fatah. But this year people voted decisively for the Islamist Hamas.

Protests in solidarity with Lebanon across the country

Thousands strong protests in London and Manchester last Saturday showed the depth of the anger against Tony Blair and George Bush for their support for Israel’s attacks on Lebanon.

Labour Representation Committee conference shows support for left leadership contender

The campaign for John McDonnell MP to stand for the Labour Party leadership got a ringing endorsement last Saturday at the Labour Representation Committee conference in London.

Building the Organising for Fighting Unions conference

Union activists are gearing up for the Organising for Fighting Unions conference, set for London on 11 November.

Success for Bury schools campaign

Two community secondary schools in Bury won a significant victory last week, as the Labour controlled council completely backed down after an eight month battle with parents, teachers and pupils.

Impasse in postal workers' dispute negotiations

The long-running national postal workers’ dispute reached an extraordinary impasse last week.

Civil service workers to step up fight against cuts

The July meeting of the PCS civil service workers’ union national executive unanimously agreed to step up the fight against job cuts and privatisation.

Class is a killer in modern Britain

Class determines how long you live and whether you will get to college. Two major reports last week underlined how Labour has left untouched a society dominated by wealth and the social power of the elite.

BBC workers ballot on pay and pensions offer

Unions at the BBC have begun balloting their members on a new offer on pay and pensions, without any recommendation.

Cheltenham march fights NHS cuts

The Regency town of Cheltenham reverberated to chants of "Welfare not Warfare - Keep the NHS" last Saturday as thousands of campaigners marched through the town.

Physiotherapists: ‘We have trained but now there are no jobs’

Emma Collinson I’m 33 and I gave up a professional career, working as an environmental health officer, to become a physiotherapist.

NHS logistics to ballot for strike

Workers in the Unison union at NHS Logistics, the not for profit body that supplies hospitals across the NHS, are planning to ballot for strike action.

Southport and Ormskirk hospital protests against job cuts

Gate protests against job cuts took place at Southport and Ormskirk hospital in north west England last week.

Reports round-up

Firefighters’ new battles over cuts Merseyside firefighters are to hold a strike ballot over the fire authority’s plans to axe 120 frontline firefighters, 15 emergency fire control operator posts and four night time fire engines.

Pensions pitfalls

A report from the authoritative Pensions Policy Institute (PPI) has confirmed many of the criticisms put forward by Socialist Worker when the government’s pension "reforms" were published earlier this year.

Health strikes show workers’ anger

Two strikes last week pitted low paid health workers against managers driving through New Labour’s policies for the NHS.

Driving to disaster

Disney’s new movie Cars portrays a world inhabited by sentient cars. It tells the "heart-warming" story of how young racer Lightning McQueen is pulled for dangerous driving and stuck in a Kansas backwater.

Lebanon unites in anger at Israel and its allies

If the resistance loses here in Lebanon it will set back all the opposition movements in all the Arab countries.

Facts point to an unequal conflict in the Middle East

The US and Israel claim that Hizbollah is a "terrorist" group. In fact Hizbollah is a Shia Muslim resistance movement that grew out of the Israeli occupation of Lebanon in the early 1980s.

Gaza Strip faces more attacks

The Palestinian people are continuing to resist Israel’s onslaught on the Gaza Strip. Israel has placed Gaza under siege since Palestinian groups took an Israeli soldier hostage late last month.

Repression on the West Bank

The Israeli assault is not just taking place in the Gaza Strip. Abedwahab Sabbah, a Palestinian activist in the West Bank, writes, "In the past three months Israel has continued its policy of assassinating Palestinian leaders.

Middle East crisis - read the truth on the web

Around the world people are disgusted by the bias in the mainstream media’s coverage of the Middle East. Many are turning to the Internet for truthful accounts and analysis of events. Socialist Worker rounds up some highlights.

Arab regimes betray masses

Israel’s president Moshe Katsav says of the Arab states "they do not stand behind us, but they do understand why we could not allow Hizbollah to shed our blood".

Anger at murders of two Asian men

There were two brutal racist murders last weekend. Both victims were Asian men. In both cases the police have received reports of racist language being used towards the victims and both murders are being treated as racially aggravated.

updated to 30 July Map of locations bombed in Lebanon

Map posted on <a href="http://lebanonupdates.blogspot.com" target = "_blank">http://lebanonupdates.blogspot.com</a>

Map of infrastructure bombed in Lebanon

Download <a href="http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/graphics/2006/infrastructure_map_12-24.pdf" target = "_blank">PDF of map </a> 216kb

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International

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Comment

Arab voice from Haifa: keep looking to Beirut and Gaza not to Haifa

Haifa, July 19, 2006

Lebanon is Bush’s war too

The war in Lebanon is as much George Bush’s as it is that of Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert. And it is being waged for very high stakes.

George Galloway: Hizbollah is right to fight Zionist terror

There was a deep historical significance to taking to the streets in solidarity with the people of Lebanon and Palestine last Saturday, 22 July.

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Features

Ilan Pappe on how Israel was founded on ethnic cleansing

The present dismal reality unfolding in the Middle East has clear historical roots and a journey into the past may help to illuminate what lies behind the destructive policies of Israel in both Palestine and Lebanon.

Ten reasons to oppose Zionism

Zionism claims that Jews have the right to return to the land where their religion, Judaism, took root, in order to create an exclusive Jewish state.The land of Palestine is a vital centre for all of the three great monotheistic religions with roots in the Middle East - Judaism, Christianity and Islam. None of them can have an exclusive claim of ownership of the land.Zionism claims that the Jews were exiled when the Roman Empire overthrew the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem in AD70. In fact most Jews were already living outside the land of Palestine at the time of the Roman Empire.

Tony Cliff on the roots of Israel’s violence

Looking back on my own experience in Palestine I can see how today’s horror grew from small beginnings. Zionism, Jewish separateness and the belief in a Jewish homeland, have developed into state violence. My parents were pioneering Zionists, leaving Russia for Palestine in 1902 to join a total Zionist population of a few thousand.

Does art have to be politically committed?

Nobel laureate and political activist Harold Pinter has always defended the self?sufficiency of art, claiming that "what I write has no obligation other than to itself".

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Reviews

John Hegley choosing his words very carefully

John Hegley’s poetry is comic, with a quirky mixture of nostalgia, melancholy and hope. His new collection, Uncut Confetti, returns to some of his regular themes - including growing up in Luton and his relationship with his father.

Newly discovered Shelley poem shows his political fire

An early poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley has unexpectedly come to light after an absence of nearly 200 years.

Reviews round-up

TsotsiDirected by Gavin HoodDVD out now This film traces six days in Tsotsi’s life in modern South Africa. He ends up caring for a baby he accidentally kidnaps during a carjacking.

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What We Think

Giving a green light to the world’s tyrants

George Bush and Tony Blair’s support for Israel’s assault on Lebanon sends a message to every petty tyrant throughout the world - that providing they back the "war on terror", they can carry out horrendous crimes and still depend on Western support.

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Other Categories

Ted Grant 1913-2006

Ted Grant, who died last week, was one of the last survivors of the generation of Trotskyists who inherited the movement after the Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky’s murder in 1940.

Letters

Jean Charles de Menezes: justice down the tube So, it’s not possible to bring criminal charges over the case of Jean Charles de Menezes against any individuals? What about answers to the following questions: Who were the individuals involved in devising, approving and implementing the Met’s execution policy Kratos?

Meetings, events and demonstrations

Meetings And Events

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