Articles
Wednesday, February 1, 2023
Israeli elections are usually a distraction from Palestinian self-determination. However, to the alarm of Israel’s mainstream and liberal apologists, the hard-right government emerging from the November 2022 election puts Palestine centre-stage. The extreme anti-Palestinian racism of parties in Netanyahu's coalition and their anti-liberal views are causing concern among supporters of Israel abroad and buliding Palestinian resistance and solidarity.
Tuesday, January 31, 2023
The death of Mikhail Gorbachev drew glowing tributes from the Western media for his role in the destruction of the Soviet Union and reestablishing capitalism. He is remembered less fondly by people in Russia and other former Soviet republics who saw their hard won social benefits vanish and living standards plummet. Part of the legacy of the end of the Soviet Union has also been the rise of divisions, ethnic tensions and war.
Monday, January 30, 2023
Though they managed to wriggle out of the crisis caused by Liz Truss’ disastrous premiership, the Tories still face multiple problems. The party remains riven by divisions. Simply allowing public services to fall apart and taking a confrontational stance towards strikers doesn’t seem to be going down well. Many more people support the strikes than oppose them, with striking nurses achieving over 60% approval ratings. There is an opportunity for the working class and the trade unions to take advantage of the Tories difficulties, to build greater unity of strike actions and campaigns and make gains.
Sunday, January 29, 2023
There have been large demonstrations in many European cities against soaring cost of energy and the cost of living crisis. Protesters have linked this to the war in Ukraine and there has been an anti-war, anti-NATO aspect to the demonstrations as well. this contrasts with the UK where criticism of its role in fueling the war remains marginalised and opposition to NATO is now virtually taboo.
Saturday, January 28, 2023
Yemen has for the past few years been in the news mainly because of the war waged on the country by Saudi Arabia, which has resulted in so many deaths and reduced Yemen to one of the poorest countries in the world. Few people talk about the People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen, which existed in South Yemen from 1970 to 1990, and achieved much in that short time.
Saturday, October 8, 2022
Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan was a deliberate provocation to China, designed to ramp up tensions as prelude to a possible war. This visit was extremely dangerous as the United States heads towards unilaterally ripping up the internationally agreed “One China” principle which recognises that Taiwan is part of China.
Friday, October 7, 2022
The sanctions imposed at the behest of the United States have hit European economies hard, particularly the Greman economy. It is not only gas supplies that are affected, sanctions on Russia will also impact heavily on its key automotive industry. The severe blow to Germany’s economy will weaken its dominance of the EU and strengthen the influence and control of the US in Europe. Ironically China’s car industry may well be the beneficiary of these sanctions on Russia. The war in Ukraine is reshaping the world in more ways than one.
Thursday, October 6, 2022
Liz Truss will be even worse than Johnson – however hard this might be to believe. Truss has already declared war on the trade union movement by proposing to bring in even more restrictive anti-union legislation which would make it virtually impossible to take legal and effective strike action. She has shown a total lack of understanding the threat from the cost of living crisis to working class people. She proposes to slash taxes, but without taxes there can be no hope of improving our collapsing public services, including the National Health Service, nor infrastructure which has been neglected over decades. The crisis facing the British people is, at least in part, a product of the Thatcherism that Truss seeks to emulate. She doesn’t even pretend to have a “levelling up” agenda and has expressed herself content that the rich will benefit far more from tax cuts than the poor.