The recognised date known as International Working Women’s Day is March 8th and it was commemorated on that date with a march and revolutionary words and symbolism organised by Irish Socialist Republicans in Dublin.
The marchers gathered outside Wynn’s Hotel in Lower Abbey Street, to mark the founding there of the revolutionary Republican military women’s organisation, Cumann na mBan, on 2 April 1914. The organisation, with its own officers, was possibly the first of its kind for women in the world.1
From there the march set off into O’Connell Street, then marching southward to cross the Liffey into D’Olier Street before turning left into Townsend Street, continuing to the statue of Constance Markievicz where the colour party’s flags were lowered in respect.
The march near the start in O’Connell St (photo credit: An Pobal Abú FB page)
Throughout, chants of “Ní Saoirse go Saoirse na mBan”2 and “Britain out of Ireland” reverberated through the streets of Dublin as banners displayed the slogans “coinníonn na mná suas leath na spéire / women hold up half the sky” and “Queers Against Imperialism”.
Markievicz was an active member of Iníní na hÉireann, the Irish Citizen Army and of Cumann na mBan. She was part of the command of the Stephens Green/ College of Surgeons garrison in 1916 and elected MP on an abstentionist ticket in 1918 and Minister of Labour in the First Dáil in 1919.
Continuing along Townsend Street and ending at Elizabeth O’Farrell park where a commemoration was held outside in honour of the role of women in the struggle for national liberation while the colour party took up position inside the park.
(Photo credit: An Pobal Abú FB page)
A woman read a speech on behalf of the AIA, tracing founding of International Women’s Day from when women in Russia in 1917 had led strikes and marches against the Tsar and WW1, later becoming known as the February Revolution, leading later to the October Socialist Revolution.
The speaker went on to speak of the role of women in the Republican struggle, from Cumann na mBan, the Irish Citizen Army and Armagh Gaol Republican prisoners, followed by a woman reading the 1916 Proclamation of Independence and the burning of two green flares.
(photo credit: An Pobal Abú FB page)
A new plaque of the Socialist Republican Mairéad Farrell was unveiled with the laying also of a commemorative wreath during a minute’s silence observed for all revolutionary women and gender oppressed people who gave their lives for national liberation and anti-imperialist struggle.
The Colour Party in Elizabeth O’Farrell Park (Photo: R.Breeze)
At the same time the colour party lowered their flags in respect, during which the command calls in Irish rang out in the area through the silence.
The area in which the Elizabeth O’Farrell and her life-long friend Julia Grenan3 grew up is a south Dublin docklands still largely working class area. It was in a yard in Lombard Street nearby, actually within sight of the park, that the IRB (Fenians) was founded on March 17th 1858.
Laying of the wreath (photo credit: An Pobal Abú FB page)
Elizabeth O’Farrell and Julia Grenan both participated in the 1916 Rising and, along with Winifred Carney, refused to join the earlier evacuation from the burning GPO building on the Friday, later participating in the final evacuation which ended in the central terrace in Moore Street.
When the leadership took the decision to surrender, O’Farrell went out to negotiate under a white flag even though a man had been killed under such a flag earlier in the very street. In 1922, along with almost the entirety of Cumann na mBan and the ICA, she rejected the Anglo-Irish Agreement.
(Photo: R.Breeze)
Many women were interned by the nascent neo-colonial Irish Government.
After the Elizabeth O’Farrell Park event, people gathered again at a recently-occupied social centre in Dublin, to view an exhibition of images in honour of the day and to watch an English-subtitled French-language film about women and the Omani Resistance, followed by a music session.4
Part of exhibition for International Working Women’s Day in the social centre (Photo: R.Breeze)
End.
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Footnotes
1In its early years the organisation worked mainly as an auxiliary to the Irish Volunteers but asserted greater independence at a later stage. It coincided in time with the women in the Irish Citizen Army who shared equal status with male members and indeed in the case of some of them, such as Markievicz and Lynn, actually commanded men. Wynne’s Hotel was also where the decision to found the Irish Volunteers had been taken in 1913.
2Translated as ‘There can be no freedom until women are free.’
3And life partner, many have speculated – certainly they lived together until the end.
4The Hour of Liberation Has Arrived by Heiny Srour
Reprinted from author’s substack 11 March 2026 and reformatted for Rebel Breeze
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Photo: US Military Base Qatar Under Iranian Attack 2026
On February 28th the Zionist regime of Israel and the USA commenced a lethal bombing campaign against Iran, choosing as their first target a school where more than 168 girls were murdered.
The Western press took its time in questioning the attack and the western governments never really did.
The press “explains” that the school was near a centre of the Revolutionary Guard, but they don’t explain that it was a cultural centre and a clinic and pharmacy all of which enjoy protection under the Geneva Conditions.
They tell us that these places “perhaps explain the attack.”[1] Well no, they don’t. They remain war crimes.
Iran’s response was robust. So robust that the western press and politicians condemned it and asked Iran to not attack the other states of the region (calling the Emirates countries or nations is a bit much).
They never asked the US or its attack dog, Israel, to cease its attacks.
Iranian civilians are less important than investments in Dubai and other places. Iran attacked military bases, radar installations and hotels housing US soldiers who had transferred there given the possibility of an attack on their bases. The counterattacks uncovered some truths.
The first one is that the Arab monarchies of the region are nothing more than US lapdogs and the myths about their economies went up in smoke in seconds. They are not safe places to invest in and less so to live in as shown by the mass of tiktokers crying into the camera.
It is worth pointing out that many of them boasted about not paying taxes and one or other explicitly stated they had set up in the region in order not to pay taxes and now they want their respective governments to spend taxes that they not only didn’t pay but didn’t want to in order to rescue them.
It might be that Dubai and the other monarchies never fully recover.
Another truth that was revealed is the real role of US military bases. The Yanks like to say that it is to protect and defend the countries they are located in against attacks.
That myth also went up in smoke just like the myth of Dubai as a safe place for digital nomads, tiktokers, bankers and even drug traffickers like the Kinahans who have lived there openly for the last number of years.[2] They will all have to think of other places.
The military bases were not capable of defending the monarchies and moreover the US transferred a good part of its military capability to Israel and left them to their fate.
Recently the president of South Korea announced that the USA had transferred part of its defence system to Israel.[3] The presented lamented the situation but explained that there was little he could do, i.e. the USA decides everything.
In the case of Spain, President Sánchez said he would not allow the USA to use the shared military bases in the country to launch attacks on Iran. Trump’s response revealed the real role these bases play and the real authority over them.
He said they didn’t need them, but if they want to, no one is going to tell them no.[4] In many of the military bases, in law, it is the host country that commands and controls the base. The reality is otherwise and Trump showed it.
In others cases, particularly in Japan and some European countries it is the US that has formal control.
The bases are not there to defend the host countries but rather to defend US interests and to act as they see fit. The Arab monarchies have just learnt that lesson the hard way. Spain has yet to, but Trump has warned them that it is in practice he who decides what is done, where and how.
This brings us to the question of military bases in Colombia. Theoretically Colombia has authority over the bases and can limit what is done. In practice it is not so.
The supposedly progressive government of Gustavo Petro never did anything to expel the Yanks from the bases in the country. Nor is he going to do so in the few remaining months of his presidency.
The question is what will the new government that comes into office on August 7th do? For the moment it looks like the next president will be Iván Cepeda from the same political force as Gustavo Petro.
In the midst of tensions between Colombia and the USA Cepeda stated from Madrid that Colombia wasn’t a Yankee colony.[5] When he is president he will have ample time to prove it and can start on August 7th by ordering the north American troops out of the country.
The rest of the countries in the world should do the same.
It is clear that the bases are an extension of the USA and at all times serve it and nobody else.
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Translated by R. Breeze from Spanish-language post in Bultza, Basque Marxist-Leninist Telegram channel, 2 March 2026
(Reading time:4 mins.)
The armed resistance of the Palestinian people—the vast majority of whom are Muslim—has stirred up a kind of “neither-nor” sentiment. The “progressive” left refuses to take sides.
They labelled the acts of armed resistance on October 7, 2023, as terrorism and equated them with the genocidal policies of the State of Israel. Was terrorism that which the Jews of the Warsaw Ghetto waged in their guerrilla operations against the Nazi occupation army?
This is not the first time we have heard the hackneyed rhetoric against the Muslim religion. A discourse cloaked in a “progressive” mantle, where they speak of human rights, freedoms, women’s rights, and so on.
Some even compare it to the Franco regime in a display of “intellectualism.” A comparison that cannot withstand the slightest scrutiny of logic. Did the Franco regime confront the greatest empire on the planet? Quite the contrary.
The fact that Francoism and its entire cultural and political apparatus existed was thanks, among other things, to the largest empire in the world today: the United States.
Trump has spoken, on several occasions, about how the Iranian government oppresses its people through Islam, that “the regime of the ayatollahs” must be overthrown, etc. This discourse has also been echoed by several European leaders, including the “progressive” Pedro Sánchez.
A few weeks ago, we heard Gabriel Rufián1—the future leader of the “re-establishment of the Left”—saying that the burka and the hijab should be banned. But there is one aspect they all have in common: they all say this from NATO countries.
Countries that exploit the wealth of every continent, including Muslim countries where religion is not conceived in the same way as it is in imperialist countries. Yet, they say absolutely nothing about the Atlanticist organization. They do not question its crimes.
In addition to discrimination based on religion, there are two more forms: discrimination based on belonging to a culture different from Western culture (imperialism and colonization) and class discrimination.
The “progressive” Left only mobilises when the oppressed are portrayed as victims, not when they gain strength and resist the assaults. In other words, if you are massacred by the empire, they will offer you alms. If you resist, you become the target of their criticism.
We’ve already seen this with the constant denunciations of the Palestinian armed resistance, or the scant impact the resistance of the Shiite armed movement Hezbollah, which has repeatedly halted Israeli Zionism, has had on the Spanish population.
We’ve also seen it when the Shiite movement Ansar Allah fired rockets at the US Sixth Fleet, cutting off the Red Sea and Israeli communications.
In other words, the “progressive” left supports you if you die, not when you fight.
It’s the practical application of putting money into the coffers of the missions. If you’re a sovereign country seeking liberation from imperialist yokes and you fight with all your might, you’re labelled a terrorist and an oppressor.
And the media plays a significant role in this, the same media on which progressives occasionally complain of not being given as much airtime as before.
In the words of the African American leader Malcolm X: Beware of the media; they will make you hate the oppressed and love the oppressor.
In the world of social media, we easily lose our memory. Therefore, it’s necessary to remember that the Algerian separatists of the National Liberation Front were Marxist-Leninists. And this didn’t prevent them from also being Muslim.
The People’s Republic of North Yemen—Muslim—along with the People’s Democratic Republic of Algeria, supported the anti-fascist armed movements in the Spanish state.
In other words, Islam and anti-imperialist (and anti-fascist) resistance are concepts that have gone hand in hand on numerous occasions.
The USSR itself not only maintained but also promoted madrasas, or Islamic schools, in Muslim-majority territories. Was the USSR—the world’s first secular state—the same as Francoist Spain? But perhaps this doesn’t mean much to the progressive, or the purist of the moment.
In the 1960s, there emerged in Latin America a concept called Liberation Theology. This movement led to the creation of armed groups of Catholic origin whose demands included socialism and social justice.
Movements like the Montoneros in Argentina and the Colombian National Liberation Army (ELN) emerged from this context. It is important to remember Father Carlos Mugica, the priest and guerrilla leader.
These armed movements caused considerable headaches for Washington’s Operation Condor and all the dictatorships imposed by the School of the Americas—dictatorships that, incidentally, sympathised with and admired Francoism.
Were these guerrilla priests the same as their enemies in the White House and their puppets?
These movements resonated in Spain. This theory spread throughout the Basque Country and the working-class neighbourhoods of major cities like Madrid and Barcelona, as well as regions like Andalusia.
The parishes of Vallecas, Carabanchel, Moratalazo, and Vicálvaro2 became meeting places for numerous anti-Francoist movements and groups, where these same worker-priests were active.
A very recent example is that of Father Diamantino García: one of the founders of the Andalusian Rural Workers’ Union (predecessor of the Andalusian Workers’ Union). Were these worker-priests the same as Francoism?
Fr. Diamentino Garcia Acosta (1943-1995) addressing a worker’s rally.
Let’s remove once and for all the veil that prevents us from seeing the reality of Third World countries. Who are we to tell oppressed countries what to do? Isn’t that just another form of imperialism? Do we fight in the same way they do?
We cannot view the processes of decolonization and liberation of those who are fighting with all their might against the West and its empire through Western eyes.
To paraphrase our Asturian comrades from La Clase Trabayadora:3 we must put an end to the left wing of imperialism and all that it entails. Even in the cultural sphere.
End.
FOOTNOTES
1MP and spokesperson of the Ezquerra Republicana de Catalunya (Catalan Republican Left) in the Spanish Congress, also active in left-social democratic coalition Súmate and the grassroots National Assembly of Catalunya. (R.Breeze)
2Particularly working-class areas of Madrid (R.Breeze)
3Anti-NATO and anti-rearming organisation based in Asturies. (R.Breeze)
The title paraphrases the concluding words of Jane Fonda, actress and veteran anti-war campaigner, speaking yesterday1 at a downtown Los Angeles rally against the USA’s current war against Iran, in reference to current US President Trump’s regime.2
It is slogan the oppressed and exploited around the world might well adopt for ourselves, though Fonda may have meant only the replacement of Trump with a milder representative of US Monopoly Capitalism.
Though a long-time campaigner against US Wars, it is unlikely that Fonda was advocating the overthrow of the capitalist-imperialist system currently in power in most of the states around the world. But we might well invest that meaning in the call amongst ourselves.
History shows us that capitalism exploits our labour power and the fruits of our toil, even as it evolves into monopoly capitalism, squeezing hundreds of its weaker competitors out of business before going to war with other monopoly capitalists and states that resist being dominated.
OUR REGIME DRAGGING US INTO WAR
This is the kind of system in power in Ireland, though our ruling class is, unlike the rest of the European states, a client state. Typically, client states have one master – ours has three: British colonial-imperialism; US imperialism; EU imperialism.
The dominant states of British imperialism and EU imperialism, viz. the UK, France and Germany, issued a joint statement at the outbreak of this war. Not to condemn the US and Israel assassinations and other bombing attacks on a non-aggressing country but instead, the victim of aggression!3
The same states the leaders of which justified Israel genocide against those it oppresed as Israel’s “right to self-defence”, failed to accord the right of the Iranian people to defend themselves through the action of their state against unprovoked Zionist and imperialist attack.
These are the powers to which the Irish ruling neo-colonial class wants Ireland subsumed, to join our exploiters and colonial occupiers, states with a long history of colonial occupation and genocide, including ours, against people who do not threaten us and have never done us any harm.
It is their alliance into which our neo-colonial rulers are attempting to drag us, by lies and deceit and by scaremongering about danger from other states that have never threatened us.
Cartoon by Paul Cobaugh
WHAT THIS WAR AGAINST IRAN IS ABOUT
There must be very few people on this Earth who believe that the aggression against Iran is about restricting the state from developing nuclear weapons. The religious leader of Iran, Khamenei (assassinated by the USA), has long opposed the development of weapons of mass destruction.4
In fact, according to the Omani intermediary at the US-Iran talks on nuclear energy, Iran volunteered not to amass enriched nuclear material, to convert its stock of highly-enriched uranium to fuel, putting it beyond any possible use of weaponisation and submitting to inspections.5
In addition, the intelligence services of the USA and the monitoring by the IAEA6 have never found any evidence of such development.7 But in any cases, who are the USA and Israel, both states with nuclear weapons, to dictate to anyone else what weapons they may or may not have?
The USA is actually the only state in the world that has used atomic weapons against people, not once but twice: Hiroshima and Nagasaki, with an estimated death toll through initial explosion of up to 140,000,8 with more dying of subsequent radiation.
Iran signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and agreed to inspections by the IAEA, whereas Israel refused to sign it or agree to inspections (or indeed to even admit to the well-known fact it has nuclear weapons, the only state in West Asia to possess such).
France and the UK, endorsing the current USA and Israeli war, also have nuclear weapons and the only reason Germany does not have one of its own (though many of the US on its territory) is that its European partners can’t trust it after two wars against them within only four decades.
Israel, the most warlike and expansionist state in the region, also demanded that Iran scrap its ballistic missiles and end its support for resistance organisations. Yet Israel and the USA support subversive organisations around the world, wherever they find their wishes obstructed.
More than that, the resistance organisations are fighting for the freedom of their people and, where they have one, the sovereignty of their state, whereas the terrorist organisations supported by the US and Israel seek fragmentation,9 collapse of independence and sovereign national resistance.
There is too a longer-term purpose in the attack on Iran, as on Venezuela, also recently attacked by the USA, and on Russia, currently in a war as a result of NATO encirclement Eastern Europe. All three are suppliers of oil and gas to China, an opposite poll to the bloc dominated by the USA.
As to Iran’s ballistic missiles, the fate of Syria once the Assad regime was overthrown – and Lebanon currently — illustrates starkly what happens to West Asian states that do not possess strong weapon defences against Israel (and its backer, the USA).
SOLIDARITY AND RESISTANCE
In the face of such naked aggression against a state merely for insisting on its sovereignty, our clearest path is that of solidarity. But also against our own state enlisting us in imperialist wars, making us accomplices and our children burnt offerings to place on the pyres of those wars.
Cartoon by D.Breatnach
Initially that path involves resistance to neo-colonial propaganda and measures of the State to remove the triple-lock from State legislation. But more, we need to remove the RAF from our skies, US military from our airports, UK Navy from our seas and NATO from the Six Counties.
The US and Israel have shown us the future cost of neglecting to undertake these measures. The colonial and gombeen neo-colonial system in Ireland needs to be overthrown. It is over time for REGIME CHANGE HERE!
End.
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(Transcribed in entirety but reformatted for Rebel Breeze by permission of the author from his 16 August 2025 article in Al Mayadeen titled Declassified: CIA’s covert Ukraine invasion plan.)
Introduction
We tend to see US Imperialism as the hidden hand behind the Zelensky regime and understandably so, as the US is the leader of NATO. But British Intelligence has played a major role there from many decades in the past right up to the present.
Kit Klarenberg’s article discussing plans of the CIA in earlier times to invade Ukraine also deals with the much-less understood role of the British secret services in similar objectives. British spy planes are supporting the genocide in Gaza and their spooks are active in Ukraine.
Many of the invasion assessments of these agencies in times past had to dispense with propaganda in the interests of accuracy and in fact bear out what many opponents of the NATO-proxy war and Ukrainian regime have been saying about the various sympathies of the people in Ukraine.
Expressing these realities had us, despite the track record of many, being labelled ‘Putinistas’ by elements of the electoral Left as well as by liberals. Klarenberg is an investigative journalist exploring the role of intelligence services in shaping politics and perceptions.
Diarmuid Breatnach
Kit Klareberg writes:
On August 7, US polling giant Gallup published the remarkable results of a survey of Ukrainians. Public support for Kiev “fighting until victory” has plummeted to a record low “across all segments” of the population, “regardless of region or demographic group.”
In a “nearly complete reversal from public opinion in 2022,” 69% of citizens “favour a negotiated end to the war as soon as possible.” Just 24% wish to keep fighting. However, vanishingly few believe the proxy war will end anytime soon.
The reasons for Ukrainian pessimism on this point are unstated, but an obvious explanation is the intransigence of President Volodymyr Zelensky, encouraged by his overseas backers – Britain in particular.
London’s reverie of breaking up Russia into readily exploitable chunks dates back centuries, and became turbocharged in the wake of the February 2014 Maidan coup.1
In July that year, a precise blueprint for the current proxy conflict was published by the Institute for Statecraft, a NATO/MI6 cut-out founded by veteran British military intelligence apparatchik Chris Donnelly.
In response to the Donbass “civil war“, Statecraft advocated targeting Moscow with a variety of “anti-subversive measures”. This included “economic boycott, breach of diplomatic relations,” as well as “propaganda and counter-propaganda, pressure on neutrals.”
The objective was to produce “armed conflict of the old-fashioned sort” with Russia, which “Britain and the West could win.”
While we are now witnessing in real-time the brutal unravelling of Donnelly’s monstrous plot, Anglo-American designs of using Ukraine as a beachhead for all-out war with Moscow date back far further.
In August 1957, the CIA secretly drew up elaborate plans for an invasion of Ukraine by US special forces. It was hoped that neighbourhood anti-Communist agitators would be mobilized as foot soldiers to assist in the effort.
A detailed 200-page report, Resistance Factors and Special Forces Areas, set out demographic, economic, geographical, historical, and political factors throughout the then-Soviet Socialist Republic that could facilitate or impede Washington’s quest to ignite local insurrection, and in turn the USSR’s ultimate collapse.
The mission was forecast to be a delicate and difficult balancing act, as much of Ukraine’s population held “few grievances” against Russians or Communist rule, which could be exploited to foment an armed uprising.
Just as problematically, “the long history of union between Russia and Ukraine, which stretches in an almost unbroken line from 1654 to the present day,” resulted in “many Ukrainians” having “adopted the Russian way of life”. 2
Problematically, there was thus a pronounced lack of “resistance to Soviet rule” among the population.
The “great influence” of Russian culture over Ukrainians, “many influential positions” in local government being held “by Russians or Ukrainians sympathetic to [Communist] rule, and “relative similarity” of their “languages, customs, and backgrounds,” meant there were “fewer points of conflict between the Ukrainians and Russians” than in Warsaw Pact nations.
Throughout those satellite states, the CIA had to varying success already recruited clandestine networks of “freedom fighters” as anti-Communist Fifth Columnists. Yet, the Agency remained keen to identify potential “resistance” actors in Ukraine:
“Some Ukrainians are apparently only slightly aware of the differences which set them apart from Russians and feel little national antagonism. Nevertheless, important grievances exist, and among other Ukrainians there is opposition to Soviet authority which often has assumed a nationalist form.
Under favorable conditions, these people might be expected to assist American Special Forces in fighting against the regime.”
‘Nationalist Activity’
A CIA map split Ukraine into 12 separate zones, ranked on “resistance” potential, and how “favorable population attitudes [are] toward the Soviet regime.” South and eastern regions, particularly Crimea and Donbass, rated poorly.
Their populations were judged “strongly loyal” to Moscow, having never “displayed nationalist feelings or indicated any hostility to the regime,” while viewing themselves as “a Russian island in the Ukrainian sea.”
In fact, as the study recorded, during and after World War I, when Germany created a fascist puppet state in Ukraine:
“Inhabitants of Donbass strongly resisted Ukrainian nationalists and at one point created a separate republic, independent of the rest of Ukraine. 3
In the following years, they defended Soviet rule and Russian interests, often attacking the Ukrainian nationalists with more zeal than the Russian leaders themselves.
During the German occupation in the Second World War, there was not a single recorded case of support for the Ukrainian nationalists or Germans.”
Still, invading and occupying Crimea was considered of paramount importance. On top of its strategic significance, the peninsula’s landscape was forecast as ideal for guerrilla warfare. The terrain offered “excellent opportunities for concealment and evasion,” the CIA report noted.
While “troops operating in these sectors must be specially trained and equipped,” it was forecast that the local Tatar population, “which fought so fiercely” against the Soviets in World War II, “would probably be willing to help” invading US forces.
Areas of western Ukraine, including former regions of Poland such as Lviv, Rivne, Transcarpathia, and Volyn, which were heavily under control of “Ukrainian insurgents” – adherents of Stepan Bandera4 – during World War II, were judged most fruitful “resistance” launchpads.
There, “nationalist activity was extensive” during World War II, with armed militias opposing “pro-Soviet partisans with some success.”
Conveniently, too, the mass extermination of Jews, Poles, and Russians by Banderites in these regions meant there was virtually no non-ethnic Ukrainian population left.
Furthermore, in the post-war period, “resistance to Soviet rule” had been “expressed on a great scale” in western Ukraine. Despite “extensive deportations”, “many nationalists” remained in Lviv et al, and “nationalist cells” created by Bandera’s “task forces” remained dotted around the country.
For example, anti-Communist “partisan bands” had taken up residence in the Carpathian Mountains.
The review concluded, “It is in this region [US] Special Forces could expect considerable support from the local Ukrainian population, including active participation in measures directed against the Soviet regime.”
It was also determined that “Ukrainian nationalist, anti-Soviet sentiment” in Kiev was “apparently moderately strong,” and elements of the population “might be expected to provide active assistance to Special Forces.”
The capital’s “large Ukrainian population” was reportedly “little affected by Russian influence,” and during the Russian Revolution, “provided greater support than any other region for Ukrainian, nationalist, anti-Soviet forces.”
Resultantly, “uncertainty about the attitudes of the local population” prompted Moscow to designate the Ukrainian SSR’s capital, which it remained until 1934.
The CIA document further offered highly detailed assessments of Ukrainian territory, related to their utility for warfare.
For example, “generally forbidding” Polesia – near Belarus – was noted to be “almost impossible” to traverse during spring. Conversely, winter provided “most favorable to movement, depending on the depth to which the ground freezes.”
Overall, the area had “proved its worth as an excellent refuge and evasion area by supporting large-scale guerrilla activities in the past.” Meanwhile, “swampy valleys of the Dnieper and Desna rivers” were of particular interest:
“The area is densely forested in its north-western part, where there are excellent opportunities for concealment and maneuver…There are extensive swamps, interspersed with patches of forest, which also provide good hiding places for the Special Forces.
Conditions in the Volyno-Podolskaya Highlands are less suitable, although small groups may find temporary shelter in the sparse forests.”
‘Strongly Anti-Nationalist’
The CIA’s invasion plan never formally came to pass. Yet, areas of Ukraine forecast by the Agency to be most welcoming of US special forces were precisely where support for the Maidan coup was the highest.
Moreover, in a largely unknown chapter of the Maidan saga, fascist Right Sector militants were bused en masse to Crimea prior to Moscow’s seizure of the peninsula. Had they succeeded in overrunning the territory, Right Sector would’ve fulfilled the CIA’s objective, as outlined in Resistance Factors and Special Forces Areas.
Given what transpired elsewhere in Ukraine following February 2014, other sections of the CIA report took on a distinctly eerie character. For instance, despite its strategic position facing the Black Sea, the Agency warned against attempting to foment anti-Soviet rebellion in Odessa.
The agency noted the city is “the most cosmopolitan area in Ukraine, with a heterogeneous population including significant numbers of Greeks, Moldovans and Bulgarians, as well as Russians and Jews.”
As such: “Odessa…has developed a less nationalistic character. Historically, it has been considered more Russian than Ukrainian territory.5
There was little evidence of nationalist or anti-Russian sentiment here during the Second World War, and the city…was in fact controlled by a strongly anti-nationalist local administration [during the conflict].”
Odessa became a key battleground between pro- and anti-Maidan elements from the moment the Maidan protests erupted in November 2013.
By March the next year, Russophone Ukrainians had occupied the city’s historic Kulykove Pole Square, and were calling for a referendum on the establishment of an “Odessa Autonomous Republic”.
Tensions came to a head on May 2, when fascist football ultras – who subsequently formed the Azov Battalion – flooded Odessa and forced dozens of anti-Maidan activists into the Trade Unions House, before setting it ablaze.
In all, 42 people were killed and hundreds were injured, while Odessa’s anti-Maidan movement was comprehensively neutralized. In March this year, the European Court of Human Rights issued a damning ruling against Kiev over the massacre.
It concluded local police and fire services “deliberately” failed to respond appropriately to the inferno, and authorities insulated culpable officials and perpetrators from prosecution despite possessing incontrovertible evidence.
Lethal “negligence” by officials on the day, and ever after, was found to go far “beyond an error of judgment or carelessness.”
The ECHR was apparently unwilling to consider that the lethal incineration of anti-Maidan activists was an intentional and premeditated act of mass murder, conceived and directed by Kiev’s US-installed fascist government.
However, the findings of a Ukrainian parliamentary commission point ineluctably towards this conclusion.
Whether, in turn, the Odessa massacre was intended to trigger Russian intervention in Ukraine, thus precipitating “armed conflict of the old-fashioned sort” with Moscow that “Britain and the West could win” is a matter of speculation.
4A fascist and Nazi occupation collaborator which President Yuschenko (Yanukovych’s forerunner) tried to recognise a Ukrainian national hero in 2010 (while criticising ‘national heroes’ was also declared a crime), which only failed due the requirement for candidates to have been a Ukrainian citizen, which Bandera had never been. His birthday is nevertheless celebrated annually by the State and features a torchlit parade of far-Rightists and fascists.
There is an unfortunate trend in the socialist movement in Ireland to underplay or even to completely ignore the continuing colonial occupation of Ireland, while at the same time raising the other evils of imperialism and capitalism.
This harmful trend is epitomised by an article from Paul Murphy in the current issue of the ecosocialist Rupture magazine1 (of RISE, a network of the People Before Profit political party) – without conscious irony entitled THE MAIN ENEMY IS AT HOME – TODAY.
In the piece under discussion, Murphy discusses the blocs forming up in contention and for world war, with the US leading the western bloc and China-Russia the Eastern,2 with the ruling classes of the EU and Ireland lined up with the USA, though the Irish State is not yet a part of NATO.
Rupture Magazine generic image
This is a correct analysis by Murphy and he is right to call for defence of the Triple Lock3 as far as we can in order to prevent or at least impede the Irish ruling class from dragging the population of the Irish state into imperialist war.
Invoking the threat of NATO as a war-making alliance and danger to the limited neutrality of the Irish state is of course absolutely correct. But how can the actual NATO membership of the Occupied Six Counties be ignored in that analysis? Yet Murphy does so, completely.
Murphy is neither blind nor stupid and one must suspect that he does not mention Britain’s Irish colony because his former and current parties both fear to mix their ‘class politics’ with any kind of Irish nationalism – even anti-colonialism – or to find common cause with Irish Republicans.
Those parties took a sudden interest in the potential politics of a united Ireland only when discussion of that possibility was being thrown around in the media and by some political actors.4 But before and afterwards, they ignored them (except on occasion to castigate Irish Republicans).
The ‘enemy at home’ is indeed, as Murphy states, Irish capitalism – however not also British colonialism? But it cannot be ignored that Irish capitalism is subservient to British colonialism, US and EU imperialism. Well, can’t be ignored by revolutionaries that is, whether Marxist or not.
Ireland as treated in the Rupture analysis – but something’s missing! (Image sourced: Internet)
It was through analysis of the subservience of the Irish capitalist class that Connolly wrote that “Only the Irish working class remains as the only incorruptible inheritors of the fight for freedom in Ireland”5 – and that was even before the bourgeois counter-revolution/ Civil War of 1922-’23.
Murphy, PBP and the Socialist Party are all fond of quoting James Connolly but only selectively and never on the question of overthrowing British rule in Ireland.6
A TIMELY WARNING
Before ending let us note that Paul Murphy’s words are not those of some green novitiate; aside from being a TD,7 he is a long-standing member of the Irish Trotskyist movement, formerly a leading member of the Irish Socialist Party before he left it to join PBP-Solidarity.8
Furthermore he has been active at times in street events and was one of the Jobstown Five who were arrested in early-morning raids by the Gardaí and tried but found ‘not guilty’ on charges of ‘kidnapping’ Joan Burton, Tánaiste9 of the Fine Gael-Labour Party coalition government.10
We are entitled to assume, given his prominence and the article’s publication, that Murphy’s political position outlined here is one with which PBP-Solidarity and Rise find no serious disagreement, to the disgrace of any party claiming to be Marxist and revolutionary in Ireland.
Furthermore, their position gives activists timely warning once again that although we may well join with PBP on certain issues, including opposition to US imperialism, they will not be found to the serious side against British colonialism in Ireland or in any fully-committed struggle against NATO.
While upholding principles of a broad front, in any struggle we need to be fairly sure of which forces will stand with us to the end and which may drop us, perhaps even at the worst and most dangerous moment.
End.
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2In the course of which Murphy states that Russia is an imperialist country but neglects to show any evidence of that. Capitalist and undemocratic does not equal imperialist, which Marxists today understand as the export of finance capital to extract super-profits from under-developed lands through exploitation of the labour there and plunder of their natural resources.
3Ireland’s “Triple Lock” is a policy requiring UN mandate, Government approval, and Parliamentary approval before more than 12 Irish troops may be deployed in overseas support operations.
4Though never taken seriously by some, including myself. I commented that British colonialism/imperialism had many opportunities to end their colonial rule in Ireland and on each occasion had dug their heels in harder, most recently by fighting a vicious war of three decades. In addition, if it were ever even half-considered, it is the British who would decide what the proper majority percentage would be, after which it would need to be agreed in Westminster and then approved by the British Monarch.
6Sadly it is also true that many Irish Republicans quote Connolly only in the reverse, i.e. only about Ireland’s national liberation struggle.
7Teachta Dála, elected member of the lower house of the parliament of the Irish State.
8People Before Profit is now what used to be called the Socialist Workers’ Party, an iteration of a British-based Trotskyist party, as is the Irish Socialist Party similarly of the British-based Socialist Party.
9The Tánaiste is equivalent to Deputy Prime Minister in the UK and many other parliamentary systems.
As the northern hemisphere turned eastwards and the majority western calendar turned to a new year, it has been customary for people to wish one another a ‘Happy New Year’, not just for the first day of January but for the twelve months to come.
Although the Celtic New Year will not begin until the first of February, and the new year begins with “teacht an Earraigh … tar éis na Féile Brighde”, I have done likewise but with deep feelings of ambivalence.
Because facing us as 2026 progresses is genocide in some parts of the world, growing fascism in some other parts, tighter squeezes on working people, smaller proxy wars and, almost certainly, a larger war, with desperate migrations of people, if surviving death to find racism and exploitation.
Faced with armed occupation and genocide, armed resistance is justified and arguably necessary, even were it not established as a right within the Geneva Convention. But even unarmed and peaceful resistance is being penalised and repressed, including in the ‘Western democracies.’
Support and solidarity organisations are being outlawed, people expressing legitimate opinions against genocide, racism, ethnic cleansing and armed occupation supported by those ‘democracies’ are being hounded in their jobs and private lives, beaten and arrested by police and even shot dead.
But where there is oppression there is also resistance. The struggles against the racist and genocidal entity, though supported in arms, finance and politically by the Western ‘democracies’ have awoken people in those countries to solidarity action in the face of their governments’ opposition.
(Cartoon by D.Breatnach)
Hugely important lessons have been learned: about the nature of the Zionist state, about the collusion of the ‘democracies’ in colonial occupation and genocide, about ‘the independence of the judiciary’ and the ‘free press’, along with the partiality and ineffectiveness of ‘international law’.
And also about the ineffectiveness of liberal opinion and organisations, even in their heartlands of the ‘democracies’, to achieve meaningful change or even stop the repression. And about how the State knows this and reacts most violently against direct solidarity action.
Organic links have become clear between war in Yemen and Somalia, the spread of Islamist jihadism and imperialism, between prison struggles in Palestine, Britain and Ireland, between the troubles of the world and much of their origins among the colonial and imperial powers.
Yes, where there is repression, there is also resistance and our duty lies in feeding that resistance in all the ways that we can, including being visible in protests at their trials and supporting them in jail. And impeding our ruling class’ attempts to tie us to NATO or other military alliance.
So what I wish for is an increase in the militant resistance of the masses and greater unity in struggle, simultaneously with greater disunity among the imperialist states and ruling classes, bringing us closer to the kind of world we need.
I wish that for us all throughout 2026.
End.
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Thousands of ex-ISIL (ISIS) fighters and their families have been freed during the Syrian government forces assault on the SDF-guarded Al-Shaddadi jail. Both sides blame the other for the release although the Government forces admit their assault.
The SDF, mainly Kurdish forces supported by the US/ NATO coalition to oust the former Assad regime, have been guarding an estimated 10,000 prisoners in the jail since the collapse of the ISIS offensive in the region.1
Observers have feared the release of the ISIS fighters and their ‘radicalised’ families since the December 2024 collapse of the Assad regime in a Turkey-supported offensive.
That attack was led by Ahmed Hussein al-Sharaa, former Al Qaeda fighter and second-in-command of the ISIS-supported al-Nusra forces in Syria, a coalition of fundamental Islamist jihadists fighting under ISIS leadership though their leader claims to have fundamentally changed.
Ahmed Hussein al-Sharaa changed his name to al-Jolani and claims to have renounced ISIS, proclaimed himself President of Syria and filled his cabinet with ‘former’ ISIS commanders, since which Western imperialist leaders have accepted him and Trump praised him greatly.
Cartoon by Carlos Latuf depicting the Western imperialist makeover of the ISIS Ahmed al-Sharaa to al-Jolani, self-appointed President of Syria (Sourced: Internet)
The western powers cancelled his designation of ‘terrorist’, presented their compliments at his throne, some, including French and German envoys, travelling to meet him2 (even before the $10m bounty on his head3 had been removed). Or invited him to call, as Macron did for France.4
Al-Jolani offered friendship to ‘Israel’ even as the IOF occupied additional parts of Syria and bombed any remaining military installations of the Assad regime.5
THE KURDISH-LED SDF, TURKEY AND AL-JOLANI
The objective of the SDF had been to overthrow Assad so as to form a Kurdish state within Syria in order to link up with other Kurdish regions to create a federal Kurdish state. Turkey feared this project, having fought decades of bloody war against the PKK in its own Kurdish region.
Apologies for use of CIA map but difficult to get publishable image showing Kurdish-controlled areas within Syria. (Image sourced: Internet)
Consequently Turkey was at odds with US/NATO forces and the participation of the SDF within it, although Trump, as his previous Presidency drew to an end, publicly withdrew support for the Kurdish coalition. Turkey has welcomed the Damascus forces defeat of the SDF.
Since al-Jolani and his own coalition came to power, he attempted to integrate the SDF fighters within his own forces. The Kurds reluctantly agreed but insisted they be incorporated as a unit and not dispersed among al-Jolani’s forces, a proposal declined by the new President.
Since then there have been numerous clashes between the different forces, with the SDF holding their own, until the recent few days when they lost a number of strongholds, including that guarding the Al-Shaddadi prison, leading to thousands of former ISIS fighters being freed.
This prison breach, welcomed by Turkey,6 must be viewed with horror by many Syrians, in particular by the Yazidi, Alawite, Druze and Christian communities who have been subjected to home invasions, humiliation and massacres, along with rape and kidnapping of women.7
Neighbouring Iraq, Lebanon and even Jordan have cause to worry too.
Again, difficulty in getting publishable map showing Syria with its neighbours but also Iran. (Image sourced: Internet)
In sifting through the disputing claims, it is worth noting that the SDF claimed that the International Coalition base, only two kilometres away from the jail in Syria’s Hasakah province, did not respond to calls for assistance8 and the SDF denounced the failure of the USA’s forces to support them.9
It is relevant too that the SDF are not Islamist Jihadists and fought them many times in Syria, although it is true that the Western powers, while supporting the SDF, also supported and instigated ISIS to overthrow Assad, although bombing them too in periodic control operations.10
Events from the coming to power of Al-Jolani to the freeing of the Al-Shaddadi Prison may hold lessons of importance too for some strains of the Western Left and Liberals who supported the insurgent opposition to Assad in favour of ‘democracy’ while parroting mass media propaganda.11
It may also add a cautionary example to the dictum that ‘the enemy of my enemy is my friend’, often quoted by otherwise anti-imperialists who supported the IDF’s alliance with the US/NATO to overthrow the Assad regime.12
CUI BONO? WHO GAINS?
What now? (Cartoon by D.Breatnach)
One might think that the Western Powers, who have been in coalitions fighting ISIS and have suffered some attacks on themselves, including the Al Qaeda attack on New York’s Twin Towers, would be strongly opposed to this liberation of thousands of experienced Islamist jihadist fighters.
But if so, how are we to understand the refusal of the Coalition forces to intervene during the attack on the SDF forces guarding the jail? Or the Western Powers legitimising of the Al-Jolani regime running Syria, despite the al-Nusra background and religious sectarian massacres since?
It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that the imperialist powers wish to see those Islamic fundamentalist ex-fighters freed — but what could be their purpose? To instigate an internal conflict in Lebanon, perhaps, occupying Hezbollah away from ‘Israel’ and excusing foreign intervention?
Or keeping the Iraqi Government busy and deepening its reliance on US forces just as it seems to be asserting some independence. Or to sent north-eastwards against Iran. One thing is clear, the Western Powers allowed it and the reason nothing to do with concern about jail conditions.
End.
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FOOTNOTES
1At the end of 2020, the U.S.-backed militia in northeast Syria held at least 10,000 ISIS prisoners, one of the largest populations of detained Islamists in the Middle East. Thousands of ISIS fighters were captured as the Islamic State collapsed in early 2019. The fighters were held in approximately 14 detention centers operated by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the U.S.-trained Kurdish and Arab militia that fought ISIS in Syria.https://www.wilsoncenter.org/article/islamists-imprisoned-across-middle-east
6From The Cradle, on Telegram: Omer Celik, spokesman for Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ruling AK Party, said that recent gains by Syrian government forces had “thwarted” attempts by Kurdish groups to obstruct Turkiye’s peace process. Feti Yildiz, deputy leader of the government-aligned Turkish nationalist MHP party, described Sunday’s agreement in Syria as having “a favorable impact.” “Things will become easier,” Yildiz told reporters in the Turkish parliament when asked how the Syrian deal affects the PKK process. “It had been standing like an obstacle, and for now it looks as though that obstacle has been removed.” Turkish security sources, speaking to Reuters on condition of anonymity, called the deal a historic turning point.
10The SDF contains female Kurdish and Yazidi fighters too which would be anathema to Islamist fundamentalists.
11It should not be understood from this that I was a supporter of the Assad regime; I attended demonstrations against imperialist invasion and regime change while also refusing to support the regime itself. I had arranged with Eva Bartlett, a much-publicised critic of the regime-change operations of the US/NATO forces, to organise a Dublin public meeting for her to address and had her stay at my home. After learning that I was also going to criticise the regime position against the Kurds she left without explanation and I had to cancel the meeting venue booking.
12In discussions with Anarchists of the WSM (organisation no longer in existence) and Irish Republicans of (Éirigí organisation much diminished since and now in coalition with another group) I refuted the correctness of application of this principle to the major imperialist power in the world, the USA. At a conference of the Éirigí group I spoke from the floor in criticism of that and some other aspects of the SDF and was heavily criticised from the floor also while the Chairperson reiterated support for the SDF. Though no-one spoke in my support, at least three Irish Republican activists approached me afterwards to express their support for my statements.
In an 11th January interview with state public television channel Télé Liban, Joseph Aoun, President of Lebanon, cited the disarming of the Provisional IRA with regard to the disarming of Hezbollah, which is being demanded by the USA and ‘Israel.’
Significant points from the interview were translated in summary and posted on The Cradle news updates channel on Telegram on the anniversary of Aoun’s election to the Presidency, for which he was constitutionally obliged to resign from his previous position of head of the armed forces.
In a post-colonial polity balanced between sovereignist and anti-imperialist forces on the one hand and pro-Western imperialist elements on the other, Aoun is widely regarded as the West’s man, a verdict justified by a constant thread in his Presidential statements and replies in this interview.
The whole issue of Hezbollah disarming arises mainly from the Zionist state and its main backer, US imperialism and has been much in the news for months.
Samir Geaga, Lebanese politician of the Christian far-Right, back in his Christian Front days during the Lebanon Civil War. (Photo sourced: Internet)
In addition there is an internal Lebanese element with a background of right-wing Christian fascist militias,1 pro-Western imperialism and recruited as proxies by the ‘Israeli’ armed forces when they occupied Lebanon (1982-2000), before the rise of Hezbollah which led the liberation of the country.
Hezbollah’s last armed action was towards end of October 2025 after bombarding the Israeli occupation of northern Palestine in order to divert the Zionist armed forces from the accelerated genocide of Gaza, then in a defence of the IOF’s attack on Southern Lebanon.
Cartoon comment on the constant defeat of Israeli invading forces by Hezbollah in 2024 and 2025. (Cartoon: D.Breatnach)
This was so effective that the Zionist state sued for a truce.
Meanwhile Hezbollah had been weakened by Israeli-programmed exploding pagers and mobile phone devices, along with the assassination of its widely-respected and charismatic leader, Hassan Nasrallah and agreed to the truce which it has scrupulously observed to the time of writing,
However, the same truce has at the time of writing been violated over 10,000 times by the Zionist armed forces2 in daily drone strike assassinations, bombings of homes and construction sites, troop invasions and checkpoints on Lebanese soil and even kidnappings of citizens.3
All without a word of condemnation from the truce’s guarantors, the USA and France, the former loud in its demands for Hezbollah disarmament along with threats by Trump and Netanyahu.
Joseph Aoun (centre, in civilian suit) upon his inauguration as President of Lebanon, reviewing troops of which had only recently been Commander in Chief. (Photo sourced: Internet)
SUMMARY AOUN’S STATEMENTS WITH COMMENTS
• The Lebanese army has many missions and cannot focus solely on one task. Israeli occupation persists, and attacks continue. Halting attacks and Israeli withdrawal would greatly help accelerate progress.
Yes indeed and people may wonder why a) the Lebanese state forces are not in action repelling that very ‘Israeli’ occupation and attacks and b) why the disarmament of the Resistance is even being contemplated in the current circumstances.
Any assistance to the army facilitates operations. The decision has been made, and implementation speed depends on army leadership and available capabilities.”
It is not clear to which assistance Aoun is referring but otherwise he is admitting that the Lebanese Army is unable to disarm Hezbollah, a Resistance better-armed and more widely supported than the State Army and that serious attempts to do so would result in civil war.
• “The [resistance] weapons were initially deployed for a specific purpose when the army was absent. Now the army exists, and Lebanon’s armed forces are responsible for national security.
Clearly Lebanon’s armed forces are either unwilling or incapable of defending national security, since Aoun admits to the occupation and attacks by a foreign entity, which have been ongoing since the October 2025 ‘truce’.
The weapons no longer serve their role; their continued presence is a burden on their environment and Lebanon. This is not about Resolution 1701—the weapons’ mission is over.
To whom is the continued presence of weapons a burden? Are Lebanese people being attacked by those weapons? No, they are a burden only to the Zionist entity and its imperialist backers who wish to dominate West Asia – and of course to the domestic collaborators.
• “I want to tell others: it is time to be reasonable. Either you are truly part of the state or you are not. The state must take responsibility for protecting its citizens and land. The entire country bears this burden. Logic must prevail over force.”
This is clearly directed at Hezbollah and Amal, political forces represented in the Lebanese Parliament. If the state must take responsibility for protecting its citizens and land, then why not actually do so and demonstrate the alleged lack of necessity for the weapons of the Resistance?
What Aoun really means is that while there is an effective armed resistance, he will not be left in peace by the Zionist State or by US imperialism. And why not? Because they seek to dominate West Asia, which in itself proves the need for an effective armed Resistance.
• “Official positions are taken by official institutions. Lebanon will not be a platform threatening other states’ stability. During summer rocket attacks, the intelligence directorate apprehended the perpetrators quickly and warned Hamas officials they would be expelled if repeated. We will not allow Lebanon to be used for unwanted actions.”
The ‘Summer rocket attacks’ were not from Hezbollah but, if not from provocateurs, were an independent and unprofessional unit – this is well-known.
• “The appointment of Ambassador Simon Karam was made internally in Lebanon, not at the request of the US or any foreign party.”
Hmmm. Even if that were true, it cannot be denied that he is the choice of the USA.
• “Lebanon’s interest requires that decisions be made within the country. No one will fight or stand for us; all parties must cooperate with the state for Lebanon’s benefit.”
If the state wants cooperation for Lebanon’s benefit, surely it should first show itself deserving of that cooperation by standing up for its sovereignty against Zionist invasion, bombings and assassinations, along with Western imperialist threats and bullying?
• “Lebanon has three tools: diplomacy, economy, and military. We have tried war—it ended. Diplomatic paths offer a 50% chance of progress. Political negotiation, not war, resolves conflicts globally—Vietnam, Irish Republican Army, Gaza. Lebanon must pursue diplomatic solutions.”
The war cannot be counted as ‘ended’ with over 10,000 Zionist violations of the ‘truce’, nor did the State ‘try war’, it was entirely Hezbollah resisting the attempted Zionist invasion although as is its wont, the Zionists did bomb civilian homes and infrastructure in Lebanon.
Political negotiation works when the state with which being negotiating either a) would rather not have war or b) is afraid to attack. The first case clearly does not apply to the Zionist State, nor will the second if the resistance is unarmed and all they have to worry about is Lebanon’s Army.
The examples Aoun quotes actually work against his theoretical trajectory: one proves the exact opposite and another two are not at all functioning in the interests of the people nor of secure peace.
The US was forced to negotiate with the Vietnamese liberation forces because of the strength of the latter’s resistance, after nearly 20 years of war.4 Even so, the US dragged out the negotiations until the liberation forces entered Saigon and US helicopters left in a hurry.
The Zionists continue to attack Gaza daily although they have levelled most of it. The Provisional IRA has not won Irish independence or territorial unity, the aims for which it declared it had been fighting and its political arm5 is now serving the administration of the colonial Occupation.
As has been pointed out many times in Rebel Breeze, the imperialists and their stooges learn from and copy one another’s tactics which was demonstrated very clearly in the trajectory of the imperialist pacification processes and how they contaminated a number of resistance movements.
There is never any reason for a national Resistance movement to surrender any of its weapons before the establishment of a strong independent state, well-armed and led by determined and uncorrupted people.
People very different from Youssef Rajj, Foreign Affairs Minister of Lebanon, who in interview with Sky News Arabia stated that as long as Hezbollah holds on to weapons, ‘Israel’ is entitled to attack Lebanon. Apart from its traitorous nature, the statement is not even formally correct.
Youssef Rajji, Foreign Affairs Minister of Lebanon (Photo sourced: Wikipedia)
Officially a state of war still exists between the Lebanese state and ‘Israel’ so of course the Resistance is entitled to hold weapons. More fundamentally, no Government Minister should justify another state attacking their country (as for example Machado does in relation to Venezuela).
National servility, collusion and treason are seen around the world but fortunately so too is resistance.
End.
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FOOTNOTES
1Most of these were present in the ‘Lebanese Forces’ who carried out the massacres of the Sabra and Shatilla Palestinian camps of 1,300 and 3,500 civilians—mostly Palestinians and Lebanese Shias—in the city of Beirut during the Lebanese Civil War (1975-1990).
4That was with the USA (also Australia). Before that the Vietnamese Resistance fought and defeated the French and Japanese.
5The Sinn Féin party, which is also the party with the second highest representation in the parliament of the Irish State and seeks to form a governing coalition with one of the established neo-colonial parties.
A lesson today: an important truth was demonstrated to a number of us protesting by visible presence and song outside the US Embassy (at the weekly Wednesday afternoon Palestine solidarity event there organised by Jimi Cullen).
We were accosted by a woman who said she was Palestinian, didn’t agree that we were supporting Palestine and insisted we should be pushing for peace.
‘Peace with Zionism?’ someone asked.
‘What is Zionism – do you know?’ she responded.
‘Yes, it’s a belief that Jewish religion gives them the right to occupy someone else’s land and kick the indigenous out.’
‘No, that’s not what it is!’ (but failed to elucidate for us what she claims it is).
Then: ‘That flag is not for freedom for Palestine! Do you know when it was created?’
We were saying ‘Yes’ when she started running down Hamas (which didn’t even exist when the flag was designed and popularised).
She kept saying: ‘I’m a Palestinian!’ (as though that meant she must be right and also that we had no right to contradict her).
Just in case we were confused about her wider ideology, she began to attack Venezuela under ‘communist rule’ (sic).
Most of those attending on 7th January, some time after our encounter with the person under discussion. (Photo source: J.Cullen)
THE LESSON
Her intervention and her manner were annoying but she underlined an important point in political discourse: Nobody’s nationality, ethnicity or residency status gives them guaranteed possession of the truth, nor the right to assert that other opinions must for that reason be wrong.
In every country there is a variety of people, including social classes and a range of opinions on important political and social questions. It is likely that some will have very progressive ideological positions, some less so but still progressive, some conservative and some others, reactionary.
It is more complicated even that that, for some might be progressive on some issues but conservative or reactionary on others – and vice versa.
Of course we fight for the right of Palestinian voices to be seen in print and heard on mass media, as a question of justice and also as the voices of witnesses, those who have experienced the genocide at first hand, or at close second hand through family and community.
We disagreed with silencing Palestinian voices objecting to the Palestinian Ambassador (she was a Palestinian too!) addressing a Belfast meeting organised by Sinn Féin in February ‘24 not because they had to be correct as Palestinians but because their objection was an important one to be heard.
The Ambassador does not represent Palestine but rather the Palestine Authority, which in turn cannot claim to represent the Palestinian people, if for no other reason than that it has not held elections for its Presidency in twenty years.
In fact there are many other reasons including financial corruption, nepotism, repression of any kind of criticism, collusion with the Zionist Occupation, jailing Resistance fighters and actually killing some. Those critics – even had they not been Palestinian – should have been heard instead of being ejected.
It would have been instructive, educational even, to listen to the condemnation by Palestinians of an official who claimed to represent them. But of course, the Sinn Féin party, like nearly all states and all western political parties of any size, supports the Palestinian Authority and its Embassy.1
In this case, it appears from what they were saying and what we can verify, that the Palestinian critics were correct and we know too that the Ambassador is wrong and in fact illegitimate, both in representation status and also in terms of national sovereignty.
But when people claim possession of the truth and immunity from criticism solely on the basis of where they are from or to what ethnic or other group they belong, we need to oppose that undemocratic cloak very resolutely as they use it to close down debate and education.
It’s not only the person claiming a kind of ethnic certainty we must beware of but often also the one who claims to speak for them, who takes a position as their defender and therefore their spokesperson for the truth. Apart from being patronising, such a position is wrong in principle.
And usually opportunist in essence.
This general principle holds true with regard to individuals or groups from any social or ethnic group or community, whether Palestinian, West Asian, Muslim, Six-County, 32-County, homeless, Traveller, working class, disabled, migrant, Irish speaker … etc.
end.
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