Middle East
Global revolt of 2011: Not the time to make peace with the system
By the Partido Lakas ng Masa’s (Party of the Labouring Masses, Philippines) international affairs department
[The following educational report is being discussed in PLM branches across the Philippines.]
January 5, 2012 – Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal – In 2011 we experienced revolutionary upheavals and mass upsurges that have further deepened the crisis of global capitalism. The impact has been the deepening of the political crisis of the international capitalist system and the weakening of its ideological hold and legitimacy. The inequalities of the “American Dream”, for instance, are now almost household knowledge: that the top 1% get more than 20% of the national income. Perhaps the most telling figure is that one-tenth of the top 1% – around 400 families – earn as much as the bottom 120 million people.
A poster from Cuba depicts Jesus the revolutionary.
By Phil Shannon
Egyptian left answers the state's attack
The Egyptian military's December 16 attack on protesters provoked outrage.
December 23, 2011 -- Socialist Worker (USA) -- The military regime that has ruled Egypt since the fall of Hosni Mubarak has taken a harsh turn toward repression, symbolised by this month's barbaric attack against protesters outside the cabinet's headquarters.
Now the generals and their allies are singling out the Revolutionary Socialists among other leading voices of Egypt's left. In a pattern that activists say is consistent with past propaganda campaigns, the regime is trying to whip up a hysteria about the group, using videotape of a meeting at which leading members talked about the need for Egypt's mass movement to break the power of the state and the army. Clips from that meeting showed up on the Interior Ministry website, and on television stations run by the state and by hardline Islamists, known as Salafists, who now support the military.
In this statement, the respond to the smear campaign. [Below that, a range of political forces on the left also offer their solidarity.]
Boris Kagarlitsky: Reflections on the Arab revolutions
By Boris Kagarlitsky, translated from Russian by Renfrey Clarke
Tunisia: Interview with Communist Workers' Party (PCOT) leaders
Ted Walker interviews Samir Taamallah, Chrif Khraief and Jilani Hamemi
November 26, 2011 -- Al-Thawra Eyewitness, posted at Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal with the author's permission -- I first met with Samir Taamallah, a former political prisoner and member of the central committee of the Communist Worker's Party of Tunisia (PCOT), in Tunis on October 4, 2011, to discuss the October 23 Constituent Assembly election and Tunisia's ongoing revolutionary struggle. The first part of the interview took place before the election. The follow-up interview part took place after the results were known.
* * *
How is the election campaign going?
Egypt: The rise and (potential) fall of the Muslim Brotherhood
Arabic slogan that reads "No for military trials for civilians" over protesters' mouths during a rally in Cairo's Tahrir Square, where tens of thousands rallied against military rule. Photo by Amr Nabil / Associated Press
By Tim Dobson
November 29, 2011 -- Red Press Box, posted at Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal with permission -- While the results of the Egyptian election won’t be known for a while, initial reports make it fairly clear that the election will result in a substantial victory for the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party.
By Abohoraira Ali
November 29, 2011 -- Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal/Green Left Weekly -- On November 23, Sudan lost an invaluable activist, writer and leader.
Al Tijani Al Tayeb was one of the founders of the Sudanese Communist Party and the editor of the SCP's newspaper Al Midan. He dedicated his entire life to the movements against colonialism, dictatorship and capitalism in Sudan and against imperialist exploitation of Africa and the Middle East.
Al Tijani was born in 1926 in a poor village near the town of Shendi in north Sudan. His father was heavily involved in the Sudanese independence movement, fighting against the British occupation. Al Tijani learned much from his father’s ideas.
His family moved to Omdurman in Khartoum when Al Tijani was young. He attended school there and studied at Gordon College, which later became Khartoum University.
Al Tijani then went to Egypt to study, where he became involved with Egyptian communists and other leftists. After one year, he was arrested for helping the Egyptian people fight against the British, capitalism and the caste system.
Al Tijani was deported to Sudan where he continued to fight the British occupiers.
Boris Kagarlitsky: Políticas económicas después de la muerte del neoliberalismo
Boris Kagarlitsky.
[In English at http://www.links.org.au/node/2593.]Por Boris Kagarlitsky, traducido del inglés para Rebelión por Germán Leyens
El sistema económico internacional que se perfiló después del colapso de la Unión Soviética todavía no está muerto, pero está moribundo. Lo vemos todos los días, no solo en informes sobre la crisis sino también en otras noticias de todo el mundo que cuentan la misma historia: el sistema no funciona.
La verdad es que el sistema nunca ha funcionado para los pobres y las clases trabajadoras. No se diseñó con ese propósito, no importa lo que nos digan todo el tiempo sus propagandistas y diversos intelectuales corruptos. El sistema funcionó para las elites: generó una tremenda redistribución de la riqueza y del poder a favor de los que ya eran ricos y poderosos. Aunque las elites no tienen suficiente coraje para admitirlo, hay que transformar el sistema.