Marching for Palestine!

by New Worker correspondent

Thousands of protesters marched  through central London last weekend to demand that the new Prime Minister take real action to pressure to end its genocide against the Palestinian people. Almost three years into Israel’s genocide against the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip, Britain’s incoming Prime Minister, Andy Burnham, has been forced to apologise and admit that the government got it wrong. As we have always known – it was the people, the millions who have steadfastly stood with Palestine, who got it right.
Millions of us have taken to the streets, joined campaigns for boycott and divestment, and piled pressure on politicians. We have done so despite attempts to demonise and stigmatise our marches and all those protesting against genocide and for Palestinian rights. We have been standing on the right side of history. We must continue to do so.
The Palestine Solidarity Campaign, one of the main organisers of the protests that have rocked London over the past two years, says “we march in London with a clear message for Andy Burnham. If he really wants to break with Starmer’s shameful legacy, he must start by imposing wide ranging sanctions against Israel including a full arms embargo, an end to all military cooperation and diplomatic support, and a total ban on all trade that aids or assists Israel’s atrocities and violations of international law. He must also reverse the spiteful use of repressive public order and anti-terror legislation to target those speaking out for Palestinian rights”.
Burnham clearly wants to distance himself from Keir Starmer’s moral bankruptcy, but in this respect, his statement remains totally inadequate. As the Palestinian people continue to confront Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza and escalating colonial violence and apartheid across their homeland, we demand meaningful action. Mass pressure by our solidarity movement has forced this apology. It is clear that only ongoing action will deliver real change. 

War criminals not welcome here!

by New Worker correspondent

Last weekend over 200,000 Palestine solidarity campaigners marched to Downing Street demanding that the Starmer government take action to stop Israel starving Gaza, end all arms sales and defend the right to protest. The leaders of the Palestine coalition then went to Parliament Square to join the witness circle in solidarity with those protesting against the Starmer government’s proscription of Palestine Action. There the police immediately began to arrest people, including a 62-year-old blind wheelchair user, for showing support for the banned group while the crowd chanted “Shame on you” and “Met Police, pick a side, justice or genocide”.  The Met arrested 857 people for showing support for the banned group, Clashes with the police led to a further 33 people being detained. 
And Downing Street was packed with a large crowd again on Tuesday as demonstrators rallied outside the Prime Minister’s residence to condemn and oppose the visit of Israeli President Isaac Herzog to London. The emergency protest was called by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign which said “we are the people we won't be silent. The Starmer government might welcome the genocide President of Israel Isaac Herzog, but we will never accept anything but justice for Palestine and accountability for the war criminals”. 
Herzog is the head of a state that is currently on trial for genocide and which has already been found guilty of the crime of apartheid at the International Court of Justice (ICJ). In January 2024, the ICJ cited statements made by Herzog personally – that sought to dehumanise Palestinians and called for their collective punishment – as plausible evidence of Israel’s genocidal intent towards the Palestinian people. Herzog’s statements include the claims that there ‘are no innocent civilians in Gaza’ and that it is the ‘entire [Palestinian] nation out there that is responsible’ combined with his promise to ‘fight until we break their backbone.’ Sickeningly, he was pictured writing messages on bombs in preparation to be dropped on Gaza. As a party to the Genocide Convention, Britain has a responsibility to prevent and punish genocide including by bringing to justice those responsible for incitement to commit genocide. 

Cease-fire in Gaza, Yemen and Ukraine now!

by New Worker correspondent

Some 200,000 people from all over Britain joined the national Palestine Solidarity Campaign march from Westminster to the US Embassy on the other side of the River Thames on Saturday. This reflected the massive support across the country for self-determination for the Palestinian Arabs, a sovereign state of their own, and a secure life free from hunger and ceaseless Israeli military and Zionist settler violence. 
They were joined by anti-fascist activists calling for NATO to end its war in Ukraine and an end to Israel's genocidal wars who received an overwhelming, 100 per cent positive response from supporters of Palestinian liberation last weekend. Their protest was organised by International Ukraine Anti Fascist Solidarity (IUAFS), which has campaigned in solidarity with anti-fascists and democrats in Ukraine and in exile since 2017.
Over 100 people, including many media photographers and journalists, filmed or took photos of the IUAFS action, and over 40 joined the campaigners briefly to have their photos taken with the protesters. The enthusiasm for the IUAFS was incredible and many people thanked us for linking NATO’s role in the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East. 
The protesters were most appreciative of the placards declaring that the Global South, the majority of humanity, oppose Israel’s war crimes in Gaza and Lebanon, NATO’s support for the Banderite gangsters in Kiev, and the ten years long bombing of the people of Yemen.
Members of IUAFS believe that their solidarity actions will still be needed long after an agreement to end the conflict is Ukraine is reached. They point out that Britain and its imperialist allies are already planning networks to conduct terrorism in the future with the eventual goal of destroying and dividing the Russian Federation.

Stop arming Israel!

by New Worker correspondent

Over a 150,000 demonstrators marched through central London last weekend to demand an end to the genocide in Gaza and a halt to British arms supplies to the Zionist state. “This weekend, we marched once again in solidarity with the Palestinian people,” Jeremy Corbyn said. The former Labour leader who now heads the Independent Alliance bloc in the House of Commons said “we sent a message to our government: if you knowingly supply weapons to a government whose leader is wanted for war crimes, the long arm of international law will extend to you too”. 
At the rally in Whitehall Husam Zomlot, the Palestinian ambassador to Britain, thanked the crowd for turning out to demand justice for the Palestinians, “Your voices matter more than
they want you to believe” he said. Welcoming the International Criminal Court (ICC) arrest warrants issued for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defence chief
Yoav Gallant, the Palestinian envoy who represents the State of Palestine that runs the “autonomous zone in the West Bank said “these war criminals must be arrested. Their place is behind bars. Arrest them!”
The Starmer government signalled it would enforce the warrants if the wanted men arrived in British territory, but continues to allow arms exports to Israel to commit the crimes the ICC has judged to be indictable. Indeed, the Starmer Government refuses to describe Israel’s actions as a genocide, despite the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruling that that is plausibly the case. Last weekend’s march through the heart of the capital  showed the breadth and depth of the opposition to the government’s illogical and immoral position.

No arms for Israel!

photo: Rana Aria, Hammersmith & Fulham Unison

By New Worker correspondent

Hundreds of thousands of Palestine solidarity supporters took to the streets across the country on Saturday to demand an end to genocidal war in Gaza and an end to British arms sales to Israel. In London demonstrators marched through the heart of the capital to call on the new Labour government to stop arming the Zionist state.
The Starmer government has reportedly suspended the processing of arms export licences for sales to Israel pending an official review. But this is not enough.
Stop the War national convener Lindsey German said “a temporary suspension of the processing of arms export licences to Israel, while David Lammy ponders what to do that won’t hurt his friends in the defence industry or the UK’s relationship with the US and Israel, means little. There must be an immediate ban on all arms sales. Every hour this decision is delayed, more lives are lost. The government must stop facilitating genocide immediately”.
The UK’s deadly arms trade with Israel includes its contribution to the F-16 and F-35 warplanes that Israel is using in its bombardment of the Gaza Strip. 15 per cent of every F35 that Israel is using to bomb Gaza is made by British industry. 
The government’s own Strategic Export Licensing Criteria, under which all arms exports are assessed, states that export licences should not be issued if there is a “clear risk” arms exports might be used in a “serious violation of international humanitarian law”. The Arms Trade Treaty, to which Britain is a State Party, outlines that a State must not export arms if there is “potential” that they could be used to commit violations of international human rights or humanitarian law. It is inconceivable that after over 75 years of Israel’s regime of military occupation and apartheid, and nearly 10 months of Israel’s genocidal assault on Palestinians in Gaza, with over 40,000 killed, that the government’s legal advice has adjudged that such a risk does not exist.
The Palestine Solidarity Campaign, together with the Campaign Against Arms Trade and War on Want is calling on the British government to abide by its domestic and international law obligations by immediately introducing a comprehensive military embargo to end the two-way arms trade with Israel and end all further military assistance to Israel, including through the RAF base in Cyprus.

Stop the war in Gaza!

marching on Starmer's office

by New Worker correspondent

Palestinian solidarity campaigners took a break from marching through London to call for local protests up and down the country. Over a hundred rallies and marches were held across the UK and London was no exception.

 On  Saturday 18th November hundreds of protesters marched through Camden to gather outside Sir Keir Starmer’s office to demand a cease-fire in Gaza. Demonstrators held up posters saying “Stop the war on Gaza” jeering the Labour leader, who is the local MP, calling him a ‘wasteman’ and waving Palestinian flags. Others joined rallies  in Islington, Redbridge and Tower Hamlets or joined sit-down protests at Waterloo and London Bridge mainline rail stations.

In  Scotland hundreds of school students walked-out in support of the Palestinian Arabs and thousands more took to the streets of Glasgow last weekend to demand an end to the fighting, On Glasgow Green SNP, Scottish Labour and Scottish Green leaders addressed a crowd of some 18,000 people at a rally arranged by a coalition of groups called the Gaza Genocide Emergency Committee.

Gaza ceasefire now!

by New Worker correspondent

London comrades joined hundreds of thousands of protesters who marched through the heart of the capital on Saturday 11 November to demand a halt to the savage Israeli onslaught on Gaza. Some comrades took the NCP banner to the start of the demonstration at Marble Arch in Mayfair. Others joined it in Victoria as it proceeded to the American embassy across the Thames at Nine Elms.
The organisers reckon over 800,000 people took part in last weekend’s protest. Others say it was easily over a million-strong. Nobody knows. But what we can say for certain is that the three-mile march through London was clearly the biggest since the Gulf War protests in 2003. 
The Palestine Solidarity Campaign and the others in the consortium that organised the protest that included the Stop the War movement, CND and the Muslim Association of Britain had agreed the three mile route with the police to avoid any possible clashes with racist gangs who were gathering in Whitehall to “defend” the Cenotaph on Armistice Day.
Reactionary politicians had called for the march to be banned while Home Secretary “Cruella” Braverman stoked the flames of Islamophobia by calling it a “hate march” and accusing the police of “playing favourites” with pro-Palestinian protesters while targeting the far-right. But on the day the only clashes were between the “football lads” and the police around the Cenotaph.
Nine officers were injured trying to stop the racist mob getting to the Cenotaph and many detained on breaches of the peace charges or possession of Class A drugs.
Ms Braverman who thinks she’s the darling of the right of the Tory party clearly sees herself as a future Tory leader – and that’s no doubt why Rishi Sunak sacked her on Monday.
“There is no doubt that the violent fascist and  far right thugs out on the streets in London on Saturday were emboldened by Suella Braverman’s reckless and racist interventions last week,” says Sabby Dhalu, the Co-Convenor of the Stand up to Racism campaign. “That’s why she was sacked. Braverman will forever be remembered as the Home Secretary that built the far right. However her sacking will not solve the problem of “stop the boats” racism – that has built the far right. These groups have been demonstrating consistently since Rishi Sunak has been Prime Minister, for which he is responsible”.

Solidarity with Palestine grips London!

 by Dermot Hudson

On Saturday 28 October over 500,000 people marched through London in support of the Palestinian people and to demand an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. It was an amazing event that showed that Londoners are not fooled by the constant flood of Zionist and anti-Palestinian propaganda from the mainstream media including the tabloids and TV talk shows. It was undoubtedly the biggest demonstration in London since the 2003 protest against the Iraq War.The centre of London turned into a veritable sea of red , black ,white and green !
    It was also a good turnout given the fact that the march was heavily policed with 'cop copters' noisily whirling overhead and riot police in paramilitary style clothes as well as police horsemen hanging around. The police imposed a 'Section 60' order giving them powers of stop and search.
Some media outlets tried to say that there were only 100,000 on the demonstration but it took over twp hours for the marchers to just cover a short distance. People were still arriving at Parliament square at 3pm. Afterwards trains , tubes and buses were packed with people who had been on the march , all talking about the need for a ceasefire.
    Parliament Square was packed to the brim with marchers who attended a rally which was addressed by Jeremy Corbyn , Mick Lynch of the RMT, Zarah Sultana MP and others. The speakers brought home the horrific nature of the Israeli offensive in Gaza and the oppression of the innocent Palestinian people by the Zionist Israelis . Mick Lynch brought solidarity of the trade union movement to the rally and added his voice to the calls for a ceasefire.

Afghans protest in London

by New Worker correspondent

Thousands of protesters, mainly from the Afghan community in Britain, marched through central London last weekend to call for an end to Pakistani interference in their country and "immediate action" from the international community to stop the Taliban.
    The “Free Afghanistan – Sanction Pakistan” demonstration was supported by the Afghan Association Paiwand, a charity dedicated to helping refugees and asylum seekers in the UK and a number of other groups of Afghan exiles including supporters of the old king and the recently toppled puppet regime. But some remembered the good old days of the Afghan people’s republic which overthrew the old order in 1978 and outlived the Soviet Union until it finally fell to the imperialist-armed Mujahadeen militias in 1992. At least four of them bought copies of the New Worker on the day.

60,000 march to save the NHS

MORE than 60,000 people braved cold and rain and crammed into Gower Street in central London for the start of a massive protest march to Whitehall to demand that the Government must fund the NHS properly and halt the privatisation of NHS services.

They included nurses, doctors and all other kinds of NHS workers along with trade unionists, patients, pensioners, children and people from all walks of life who value our NHS and its provision of healthcare that is always free at the point of use.

But the NHS has been lurching from one financial crisis to another for three decades now as millions of pounds spent on it is diverted into private pockets.

When the NHS was broken up into separate ‘independent’ hospital trusts in the early 1990s the Tory government saddled the trusts with mortgages for the buildings and land.

Then came the Private Finance Initiative (PFI) schemes whereby the Government financed all new building work, repairs and renovation from private PFI consortia of big business corporations saddling the hospital with colossal new debts to be paid off over 20 to 30 years.

The consortia that funded these contracts then started taking over the running of the hospitals. Hundreds of old hospitals were closed and some new ones opened but with a steady reduction in the total number of beds.

The Labour government led by Tony Blair was equally as guilty as the Tories for accelerating this process of reducing the NHS whilst driving it deeper and deeper into debt.

More and more NHS services are handed out to private health companies who take routine work – and the NHS funding that goes with it – leaving complex and expensive cases for the NHS.

Still the cuts continue, especially to accident and emergency (A&E) units, so that during the winter crisis period the surviving units just do not have enough resources to cope and the spectre of patients waiting long hours on trolleys in corridors or even lying on the floors happens every winter.

NHS staff are worked to exhaustion leading to mistakes but miraculously only a few lives are lost. All this so the business-oriented government can say that the NHS is failing through poor financial management and we need a complete change – the end of the NHS and its replacement with a personal insurance system as in the USA – which will exclude those who cannot afford it.

Saturday’s march was organised by Health Campaigns Together and the People’s Assembly. There were other linked protests all around the country.

One of the speakers at the final rally in Whitehall was Nicky Romero, a mother from Bristol whose 15-year-old daughter died after being sent home from a mental health unit.

Her daughter Becky was found dead in July last year. An inquest found that neglect by the NHS service responsible for her had contributed to her death. Nicky Romero reduced many of the crowd to tears with her emotional speech in which she called for more funding for mental health care.

Another speaker was A&E nurse David Bailey, who told the large crowd that 120,000 deaths could be attributed to austerity. He said: “We’re just reaching a crisis point. In Oxford we’ve had 300 beds closed in a year.”

TV actor Ralf Little spoke of love for the NHS. He said that in an age where the country is divided over so many things, the National Health Service is well loved. And he accused Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt of lying about mental health provisions.

Save Lewisham Hospital campaigner Tamsyn Bacchus, who carried a life-size vulture prop hovering over a bloody-painted NHS placard, said she feared Britain could morph the NHS into a US-style user-pays health service.

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn sent a heartfelt message of support to the marchers, saying that he will fight to stop the privatisation of the health service and promised NHS staff the resources they need.

“It can’t have escaped anyone’s notice that our NHS is crisis,” he said. “It is a crisis created by the Tories and austerity.

“In the face of all the evidence – patients being treated in hospital corridors, people dying in the back of ambulances, hospitals in dire need of repair – they are refusing to give our NHS the money it needs and needs now.

“The NHS will only survive if we fight for it.”

Balfour Day

Thousands march over Balfour betrayal

 

Jews against Israel and Zionism on the march

 by New Worker correspondent 
 
THOUSANDS of supporters of Palestinian human rights marched through London last Saturday to mark the centenary of the Balfour declaration — a document that paved the way for the establishment of the state of Israel and the beginning of a genocidal war against the indigenous people of Palestine.

The march and rally were organised by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PCS), Palestinian Forum in Britain (PFB), Friends of Al-Aqsa (FOA), Stop the War Coalition (STW) and the Muslim Association of Britain (MAB).

It was supported by Unite the Union, UNISON, National Education Union- NUT Section, GMB, ASLEF, RMT, FBU, UCU, PCS, CWU; and Europal Forum, CND, Pax Christi, APCUK, Kairos UK, Friends of Sabeel UK, ICAHD UK, Olive, Amos Trust, APCUK and Muslim Voice.

The Balfour Declaration was written by Britain’s then Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour on 2nd November 1917. It was a defining document in which the British government stated its support for the establishment of a national home for Jewish people in Palestine.

Prime Minister Theresa May last Thursday welcomed the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to a commemorative dinner, expressing Britain’s pride in the document.

But last Saturday’s march expressed deep shame at Britain’s imperialist role in creating a future of displacement, homelessness and ethnic cleansing on the people of Palestine. Placards on the march declared: “Theresa May, shame on you”.

The march was held up for an hour as a small but noisy group of Zionist supporters of Israel staged a counter protest, accusing the marchers of anti-Semitism. They have forgotten that before the creation of Israel in 1948, Zionism was regarded as an anti-Semitic trend mostly supported by Christian imperialists who wanted the Jewish people living in their own countries to go somewhere else.

There were plenty of progressive Jewish organisations, such as the Jewish Socialist Group and Jews for Justice for Palestine on the main march.

The march began in Grosvenor Square outside the United States embassy with speeches.

Rajab Shamlakh, from the Association of the Palestinian Community in the UK, spoke about Theresa May: “She’s proud to celebrate the Balfour Declaration... is she proud to celebrate ethnic cleansing? Apartheid? And the oppression of human rights? This government should feel shame, not pride.”

The march made its way through Piccadilly and Trafalgar Square, along Whitehall and with a pause as it passed Downing Street to a rally in Parliament Square.

Banners proclaimed: “100 years of injustice”, “Free Palestine” and “Israel is a terror state”. Many carried outline maps showing the erosion of Palestinian land by Israel over the last half century so that it is now just one-fifth of what it was at the creation of Israel — and what is left is disappearing fast under new illegal Israeli settlements.

The policy of the Israeli government is for Palestine to disappear, along with its culture, language and history. It has defied numerous United Nations resolutions because it has the total backing of the USA — and Britain.

In spite of economic crises, the USA continues to give Israel billions of dollars every year along with weapons so that the Israeli state can act as an agent of the US government in the Middle East.

At the rally in Parliament Square, speakers included Dr Mustafa Barghouti, Ken Loach, Andy Slaughter MP, Matt Wrack general secretary FBU, Margaret McKee president UNISON, John Pilger, Senator Paul Gavan Sinn Féin, and many others.

Glyn Secker, from the campaign group Jews for Justice for Palestinians, told the crowd: “These criticisms are not and cannot be anti-Semitic — they are to assert basic human and Jewish values.”

Describing Palestine as “the world’s biggest prison” and a “psychological torture chamber”, Secker said: “Netanyahu you do not speak for me, nor for hundreds of thousands of Jews around the world who identify with your victims.”

A video of Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, a long-time patron of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, was also played to the crowd, which burst into energetic chants of “Ohh, Jeremy Corbyn”.

Ismail Patel, founder of Friends of Al-Aqsa, said that the message to the Government from Saturday’s march was clear. “First and foremost, apologise for the Balfour Declaration,” he said.

“Secondly, recognise the state of Palestine today. Third, continue with BDS [boycott, divestment and sanctions] until Palestine is free.

“My friends, take this message home and keep working until Palestine is free,” he added, to rapturous chants of “free, free Palestine”.