International Solidarity with Communist Fight in Puerto Rico here ♦ Communism, Not Democracy Can Defeat Israeli Fascism here ♦ UPS Workers Need Strike Against Capitalism here ♦
International Solidarity with Communist Fight in Puerto Rico against US Imperialism
July 25—Members of Communist Workers and Students for Social Change in Puerto Rico braved pouring rain and a massive police presence to demonstrate in front of the Fort Buchanan military base. They denounced the imposition of capitalist colonial rule in Puerto Rico 125 years ago, its continued imposition, and US military actions around the world.
Before the demonstration, they sent a message to ICWP:
Given the threat of the possibility of a third world war, we call on revolutionary communist organizations to show solidarity with this effort by sending a written message to be read at the demonstration. This will take place in front of the entrance to Fort Buchanan in San Juan.
The Fort Buchanan military base, symbol of the repressive forces of US imperialism in Puerto Rico, was the place where different aggressions and invasions of various countries in Latin America and the Caribbean were coordinated. Today, Lenin’s slogan is more valid than ever: War on wars and our slogan: Peace between nations, and war between classes!
Down with capitalism! Death to imperialism! The workers’ struggle has no borders! The working class has no borders! Long live proletarian internationalism and communism!
ICWP sent solidarity messages from the US and El Salvador, which were read at the demonstration.
From the US:
“Our goal is the same: a communist world without exploitation, racism, sexism, xenophobia, borders or nations! ICWP is organizing a new international communist movement with the slogans: One class, one red flag, one political line, and one Communist Party!
When war broke out in 1914, the Russian working masses and soldiers responded to the Bolshevik slogan Turn imperialist war into a revolutionary war! They did just that.
Today China’s and Russia’s capitalist rulers are fighting US imperialism for world domination, leading rapidly to World War III. We have every confidence that the working masses will once again do the ‘impossible.’ When they embrace our communist political line, nothing and no one will stop them. Victory will be ours.”
From El Salvador:
“Comrades, we support your fight, which is our fight. The working class has never been passive. We are inspired by our own history to fight directly for communism. Here we continue to live the oppression of the fascist government of Nayib Bukele. Amid this repression, we are building communist collectives in the maquilas. Join us in building communist cells and we will break the chains of wage slavery. Long live the international working class! Long live communism!”
Communism, Not Democracy, Can Defeat Israeli Fascism
USA, July 30— “What’s going on in the world right now is terrible,” said O. She is an Israeli friend living in the US. “But I can’t disconnect from this disaster in Israel.”
The Israeli Knesset (parliament) has passed laws to prevent the judiciary from overruling “unreasonable” legislation. Prime Minister Netanyahu is facing trial and possible jail time for corruption. His main hope is for his Knesset allies to stop the prosecution without judicial interference.
These allies are open racists, ultra-nationalists, and religious extremists. “They are holding Netanyahu hostage,” said O. They plan to annex the West Bank and deport the Palestinians. They want to force their religious law on Israel, which was founded as a secular state. For that they need Netanyahu’s “judicial reform.”
Hundreds of thousands of Israelis have marched and protested since January 7. Trade unions, doctors, universities, and even business associations have held or threatened political strikes. One thousand military reservists pledged to quit if the fascist policies go through. Some already have.
Women protest in red costumes inspired by the TV series “The Handmaid’s Tale.” They know that religious fascists, unleashed, would quickly subjugate women and re-criminalize LGBTQ people.
But how many of these pro-democracy protesters fight against the Israeli government’s racist oppression of Palestinians in Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank?
“The very radical groups I work with, like Women in Black, do,” O reported proudly. She takes part in protests in the US in solidarity with the Israeli mass movement. For example, hundreds of Israeli expats rallied on June 1 in Teaneck, New Jersey against a prominent leader of the Israeli judicial overhaul.
“Any capitalist country cannot be a pure democracy,” declared O.
Every capitalist country is a dictatorship of the super-rich over the working masses.
Communist ideas have taken root in Israel before. They will again. What if, among those dissident Israeli reservists, a Red Flag collective organized for communist revolution?
Communist workers’ power will give the masses real control over our collective destiny. Isn’t that what most folks want when they march for democracy?
Israel, the Mideast, and US-China Imperialist Rivalry
The USA rulers have armed Israel to the teeth. They continue to do so. But Netanyahu, bent on saving his own skin, ignores Biden’s opposition to Israeli judicial reform.
US imperialist mouthpiece Thomas Friedman says that Biden really wants a US-Saudi security pact. This is a very slim possibility. The point would be to normalize Saudi-Israeli relations to oppose Iran. That would require Israeli concessions to Palestinian national aspirations. Critically, it would require cutting back Saudi ties to China.
The Saudi rulers are considering selling oil to China for Chinese renminbi instead of US dollars. That would seriously threaten dollar supremacy. Any deal would have to stop it.
For domestic and international reasons, Netanyahu would have to break from his far-right supporters. This, remarkably, is where Friedman sees hope for the Israeli pro-democracy movement!
Don’t hold your breath. Friedman says that “success would be a long shot, at best.” Even though such a deal, he says, would be “hugely in the interest” of the US, Israel, and Saudi Arabia. He doesn’t mention that it would drive China closer to Iran. That would increase the likelihood of all-out war in the region.
In 1948, US and British imperialist policy pushed Palestinian people from their homes to create Israel as a client-state. That was the “Nakba” (catastrophe). Now, as our friend O says, this catastrophe engulfs the masses of Israelis, including Jews.
The global march deeper into fascism is indeed terrible. There is just one solution: from Israel to India, from El Salvador to the USA. That is to mobilize the masses for communism.
UPS Contract Ties Workers to Wage Slavery
Workers Can Make History Fighting for Communism
LOS ANGELES (USA), July 28— “Did you see that the UPS drivers settled their contract fight?” a comrade asked a worker.
“Yeah! They got the big wage increase they needed and air conditioning,” she answered.
“They got NO immediate air conditioning! And they’re getting a $7.50 an hour wage increase over 5 years. It sounds like a lot, but inflation will eat it up. Whenever workers get raises, the bosses raise prices even more. They keep us barely surviving. We need a different system.”
“You’re right,” she said.
UPS didn’t agree to put air conditioning in new trucks until January 2024. In some areas only, and only in new trucks. And maybe put some fans in some old trucks sooner. That means more deadly months of working in dangerously hot trucks.
In June 2022, Esteban David Chavez Jr, a 24-year-old UPS driver, died while delivering packages in Pasadena (USA) as temperatures soared in the 90’s. His family says he had a heat stroke and was dehydrated. He apparently passed out in the back of his truck. Someone found him about 20 minutes later and called for help, but he had already died.
This summer, many drivers have fainted from the heat. Temperatures in the back of the trucks reach 130 degrees F (54.4C). Some have been hospitalized. More could die.
UPS reported a profit of $13 billion last year. But they say they “can’t” add air conditioning to all UPS trucks right away. They have 120,000 delivery trucks worldwide. Does it cost more than $100,000 to air-condition a truck?
The profit system kills! It exploits workers for maximum profit worldwide! Climate change, too, is caused by same drive for maximum profit.
The Teamsters Union and bosses’ press touted the contract settlement as a big victory for the workers. This is a lie. It’s meant to tie the vast working class into believing that the social fascist reform leaders offer us a solution to deadly capitalism.
The workers have the power to make history!
The bosses’ press said that, if it happened, this strike would have been “historic.” It would have been the biggest strike against a single employer in US history. It would have disrupted the US economy. A 10-day strike would have cost the US economy an estimated $7 billion. It could have given masses of UPS drivers a taste of their potential power. The Teamsters were ordered to settle, and the press called it a victory.
A really historic strike would be UPS drivers striking against capitalism and its murderous wage slavery! It would deepen the understanding of workers worldwide that reform demands only perpetuate capitalism and its horrors. It would vividly fire up workers’ imagination that our historic task is to destroy it with a communist revolution!
Workers make and transport everything of value. 340,000 UPS workers and billions of others have the potential to mobilize for a communist system without profits or money. Industrial workers worldwide are key to revolution and a communist society where the health and safety of the working class will be the purpose of society. Where we produce and transport goods to meet the needs of the masses everywhere.
We need to spread Red Flag to build the fight for communism and c4ounter illusions in reformism. Capitalism in crisis cannot give us what we need. It only offers us a future of fascism and war. Communist revolution is the way to end capitalism’s horrors. Communist society, based on collective production for need is our future.
Help us spread this message!
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