Socialist Appeal - International Marxist Tendency
Marxism. Socialism. Revolution.
Over the past few weeks international media have reported on growing tensions and daily violence escalating in Palestine and Israel. These attacks are not organised by any of the Palestinian factions but are clearly a symptom of the desperate rage of a layer of Palestinian youth against the asphyxiating stranglehold of the Israeli state.
The American imperialists and their “allies” in NATO now find themselves in an impossible situation in the Middle East. They are trying to face two ways at once; in the process they find themselves at every step entangled in new and insoluble contradictions. Meanwhile, Putin has outmanoeuvred the Americans at every step.
Since last week when Russia began bombing targets inside Syria, Western media has been overflowing with articles about the crimes of Russian imperialism in Syria. But, as Hamid Alizadeh explains, the idea put forward that “moderate” rebels are being bombed by ruthless Russians raises more questions than it answers.
This week, for the first time in ten years, Vladimir Putin attended the UN general assembly, followed by a closed door meeting with Barack Obama. Only one month ago such a meeting would have seemed highly unlikely. The significant increase of a Russian military presence in Syria over the past month has changed the situation.
A grotesque humanitarian disaster looms large as the conflagration and mayhem ravages the Middle East. The number of people fleeing the civil war just in Syria has now surpassed four million, according to the UN refugee agency. Only a socialist revolution can cleanse the region of all violence, imperialism, sectarianism and reaction.