Report from the Workers' League (Palestine)

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broke whatever they could, and raised the Palestinian national flag on the roof.

In the Palestinian territories occupied in 1948, presently comprising the racist state of Israel, five major May Day demonstrations were held.

Bused The Histadrut, branding itself 'the Confederation of Hebrew Workers' but actually the• largest employer in Palestine, had organised a 15,000-strong demonstration marching under Zionist slogans such as 'For a realising and colonising Zionism" and "For the Judaisation of the Galilee" , as well as slogans supporting the Camp David imperialist accords.

The Histadrut has been one of the main backbones of the Zionist movement in Palestine since they early 1920s. The overwhelming majority of demonstrators were bused in from the privileged colony-settlements . (kibbutzim).

The Histadrut marched under the flags of the racist state of Israel, with some red LUTTE OUVRIERE fete: international festival of revolutionary socialism. Saturday to Monday, May 29-31, at Presles, val d'Oise, France. A delegation of SO supporters will be going over to the fete: all comrades interested, please write to SO, 28 Middle Lane, London N8. flags for decoration, and ended by singing the Zionist hymn.

A similar demonstration was organised by the Histadrut in the Northern city of Haifa, with an attendance of 3,000.

A rival demonstration to that of the Histadrut was organised in Tel-Aviv by the Israeli Communist Party. This completely Stalinised party traditionally joins the demonstrations of the Histadrut - seeing in the Histadrut a genuine trade union with bad leadership, and denouncing any attempt by workers to organise outside the Histadrut - but was excluded this year from joining by the leadership of the Histadrut.

The CP demonstration also marched under combined Israeli and red flags - as the ICP is openly pro-Zionist, supporting the formation of the state of Israel, and vigorously defending its existence.

It differed from the Histadrut demonstrations by its composition, which was mainly working class.

The demonstrators carried slogans in support of the formation of a PalesLONDON Workers' Socialist League classes on basic Marxism. Next one: Marxism and domestic labour. Friday May 14, 7.30pm. For details of venue, write to PO Box 135, London N1 ODD.

EL SALVADOR: public rally in solidarity with FMLN and FDR. Saturday May 15, 7pm, Conway Hall Red Lion Square, London. Organised by El Salvador Solidarity Campaign. tinian statelet beside the state of Israel, denouncing Israeli policy in the West Bank, and calling for JewishArab brotherhood and Israeli-Soviet friendship.

There were two demonstrations, however, where no flags of the racist state of Israel were raised and only red flags could be seen. These were the demonstrations organised by the progressive nationalist Palestinian movements in the territories occupied in 1948.

Decrees

One was held in Um-ellahem, the third largest Arab village in the 'Green Line' ', by the Abna-el-Balad ('sons of the village') movement. Leading members of this movement, and other progressive nationalist movements, have continuously been under restriction by the military authorities: they could not leave their own towns, and they had to register twice a day at the local police stations.

All these decrees are based on the 'Emergency Regulations'. first introduced by British imperialism EDINBURGH. Monday May 17, 7.30pm, at the Trades Council, Picardy Place: "Fighting the Cuts'.

KILL THE TEBBIT BILL. Mass rally organised by Yorks & Humberside Regional TUC. Sunday May 16, 10am to noon, Sheffield City Hall. atterwards adopted by the Zionist state.

The second demonstration was held in Kabul, a village in Northern Palestine. This demonstration was jointly called by the Abnael-Balad movements of Acre, Kabul, Lydda, Arabe, Sakhnin, the A-Nahda movement of Taybe, The Progressive Nationalist Movement groups in the universities of Haifa, Tel-Aviv, and Jerusalem, and the Workers' League.

Joint

A joint committee of all these groupings, including the movement of Um-elFahem - the National Coordination Committee - was outlawed in February 1981 by the Military Commander, but each of these bodies continues to operate alone.

The Kabul demonstration was planned to include a march in the streets of the village, but this was cancelled after repeated police threats that such a march would mean shootings and deaths.

The 300 demonstrators who gathered in Kabul shouted slogans such as "Popular Revolution", , "May Day - a holiday of the revolution and revolutionists" 'Revolution till the victory", , "No substitute for the PLO", "The Golan Heights belong to Syria not to Begin and his dogs" as well as "Crush Imperialism — build Socialism".

The participants stood WITHDRAW the Fleet: Edinburgh demonstration against Thatcher's war. 11am, Waverley Bridge. May 15 SOLIDARITY with Chile, Central America, and the Caribbean. National conference, Saturday-Sunday May 22-23, starts 11am, Sheffield University. Sponsors include Sheffield & • Rotherham Trades Councils. More details: Cath, 0742 588052.

INSIDE YOUR

FREE THE BRADFORD 12 WOMEN'S memory of the Palestinian martyrs. Eniyat Bour ral, a young woman representing the Abna-el-Balad movement of Lydda, reported on the recent police raids and attacks on the movement in Lydda. Three members were dramup. If prosecuted thee detained after police could be imprisoned for long periods.

She was massively applauded. Lutfie Agbaria, a young woman representing the Progressive Nationalist Movement group in Tel-Aviv University, argued for the importance of the fight for the rights of women workers. An Arab Druze from the occupied Syrian Golan Heights told the demonstrators about the brutality of the Zionist army, and how the local Druze population has succeeded in maintaining an eight week strike against the annexation of the Golan Heights by Israel.

The representative of the PNM group in Jerusalem insisted on the importance of workers organising outside the Zionist Histadrut and the setting up of independent trade unions which will realise the unity of Arab and Jewish workers. In that he was joined Workers ague Lowi, the representative on the platform.

The Workers' League representative explained the need for solidarity with the independent trade union Solidarnosc in Poland, currently under heavy attacks. He went on to denounce the imperialist front around the latest British aggression over the Falklands.

After citing 'sources' in the Zionist army high command, quoted in the Zionist press the day before, which confirmed that, the killings of Palestinian demonstrators in the West Bank are a deliberate policy intended "to cause an erosion in the number of Palestinian demonstrators and thus bring the demonstrations to an end" ('Ha'arets'. ,30.4.82) he went on to say that Arabthe patriotic zeal of the ginand jag belt with visions of the recapture of the Falklands as the first step in a new spread of red on the map, with Princess Di sent out to Buenos Aires to be crowned Empress of Argentina.

But not at all. The Telegraph article, by company boss Colin Phipps, argued that Britain should hand over the Falklands to Argentina - but strike a hard bargain.

Prize

The oil and gas resources of the South Atlantic are, he says, "the big prize"

Now: "Irrespective of the validity of the Argentine claim, in practice it will not be possible to exploit the Malvinas Basin, or to develop the Falklands themselves, without Argentine cooperation. There is already a well-established oil industry in central and southern Argentina and in southern Chile, and the infrastructure this provides will be essential for any major developments.

Thus Phipps proposes that Britain should offer Argentina a deal - Argentine sovereignty over the Falklands and a British/ Argentine deal to split the loot from exploitation of the seas round the Falklands, in return for a firm British grip over the (much bigger) resources in the practically uninhabited regions of the further-out South Georgia and Sandwich Islands and of Antarctica.

Of course, Marxism does not (despite what many antiMarxists say) compel us to believe that direct and immediate economic interests are always the guiding motive of capitalist policy.

Guesswork

Phipps concedes that estimates of the oil resources of the South Atlantic are largely guesswork, and that "although the oil industry could certainly begin to exploit the Malvinas Basin