Marching in the rain against war

by New Worker correspondent

AROUND 2,000 peace campaigners braved the cold and wind last Saturday to march through London to protest at Britain once more getting involved in bombing Iraq and the threat that Britain might also follow the United States into bombing Syria.

Marchers assembled at Temple Place and marched along the Embankment to the Houses of Parliament where they turned and marched up Whitehall for a rally opposite Downing Street.

There were banners from peace groups – mainly Stop the War and CND but also Quakers for Peace and others – and hundreds of placards demanding: “Stop bombing Iraq; don’t attack Syria.”

The rally was addressed by peace campaign veterans Lyndsey German, Kate Hudson, Jeremy Corbyn MP and others.

The bombing campaigns are led by the United States ostensibly to counteract the advance of

ISIS. the very brutal militant Islamic militia that was created a couple of years ago by the US and Saudi Arabia to destabilise the secular Baathist government of Bashar Assad in Syria.

This army has been defeated by the Syrian army and driven out of large parts of Syria and is now rampaging through northern Iraq, picking up support from many Sunni communities that have suffered at the hands of the sectarian Shia puppet government that the US installed in Baghdad.

Marchers agreed that the extremely violent

ISIS militia must be stopped but argued that bombing and the threat of more western invasions did more harm to civilian communities and just made matters worse.

It is also being used by the imperialist powers to continue their intention to destabilise and overthrow the Assad government and replace it with the chaos and confusion of never ending sectarian religious strife that now prevails in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya.

This kind of chaos and corruption allows the western oil giants easiest access to plunder the oil riches of the Middle East.

Just a year ago the House of Commons voted against British involvement in a planned US bombing and invasion of Syria to bring down the Assad government. The US had to postpone its plans in face of growing popular opposition to a new war.

But last week Parliament voted last week for British forces to join US-led raids on targets in Iraq but not Syria. Britain now has eight Tornado jets flying out of Cyprus in combat operations in Iraq.

But now the threat of ISIS – created by western imperialism – is allowing the British and American governments to circumvent popular opposition to new involvement in military action in the Middle East.