Mersey school occupied

Scan page 7

PARENTS AND pupils are occupying Croxteth comprehensive school, in Liverpool, to stop it being closed.

The occupation began three weeks ago, at the end of term, when equipment was being moved out to prepare for the merger of Croxteth into a comprehensive school two or three miles away and on an inferior site.

Despite electricity

being ei it off from the school, the occupiers I lave already begun a succes sful programme of classes -are determined to keep the school running.

A demonstration of 250 round the local estate last Saturday, 7th, drew support from Knowsley Trades Council and other trade unionists. Money and messages of support to Croxteth school, Stonebridge Lane, Liverpool 11.

For just £2 you can get this amount of space to urge delegate to back a resolution that you support, to remember an issue you feel strongly about or come to a meeting you are organising ... and its amazing how much you can cram into a space this size!

Just write to Nik Barstow c/o 41 Ellington Street, London N7.

Scan page 8

Socialist Organiser analyses the background to the Lebanon holocaust AS Israel's artillery pounds Beirut into bloody wreckage, the US is posing as a force for peace.

But in truth the Zionist state has been acting as the mailed fist of US imperialism.

The EEC states, while condemning Israel's invasion, continue to supply arms to the Zionists. There has been dissent within the US ruling class (possibly reflected in the replacement of Haig by Schultz). Indeed, there are even differences between the Begin-Sharon leadership and the more reliable interpreters of US foreign policy in the leadership of the so-called Israeli Labour Party over precisely how to effect a final solution.

But whatever differences there may be, all these forces are united on the need to crush the Palestinians and defeat the Lebanese National Movement.

The Arab regimes too have no wish to see the victory of the Palestinians and the Lebanese National Movement. At present a victory of this alliance would be incomparably more threatening to them than a strengthening of imperialism through the victory of Zionism and the Lebanese Right. Their play at 'forcing concessions from imperialism and Zionism is a show in response to the pressure from the masses.

The invasion of Lebanon by Israel was aimed at delivering a crushing blow to the Palestinians and creating, through the defeat of the Lebanese National Movement, the conditions for the restabilisation of Lebanon on the basis of the rule of bourgeois reaction.

Its timing derived from the pressure on the Zionist state coming from the mounting Palestinian action on the West Bank on the one hand, and on the other the freedom of action granted to Israel by Egypt's signing of the Camp David Agreements and Iraq's embroilment in the Gulf War.

More fundamentally, however, the invasion connects back to the Lebanese civil war. This war was the outcome of two intersecting developments.

On the one hand the distribution of state power enshrined in the National Pact of 1943 no longer represented the communal balance within Lebanon as the Muslim population increased. On the other hand a radicalisation had taken place among the Lebanese working class and petty bourgeoisie (mainly in the Muslim communities), catalysed by the presence of the Palestinians. nich the PI.O and restabilise Lebanon Both 'developments threatened the relatively privileged position of the Maronite community and the position of the Maronite bourgeoisie in particular. And while the class struggle had not advanced to the point of challenging bourgeois power, it created instability (in itself worrying for imperialism and conditions • which permitted the Palestinians a considerable freedom of action.

Mid-'70s The mid-70s saw the beginning of a systematic offensive by the Lebanese fascists, playing on the existing communal divisions, directed at the forces challenging the traditional allocation of power.

In the course of the counter-offensive against the fascists and their allies, there evolved an alliance between the PLO and the LNM - an alliance which not only constituted an immense step forward in the fight against Lebanese reaction and Zionist attacks, but pointed towards the strategic alliance necessary between the Palestinians and the oppressed masses if Zionism is to be defeated.

The refusal at first by the PLO leadership effectively the leadership of Fateh - to involve their forces in domestic struggle in Lebanon, constituted a criminal repetition of their line that in 1970 enabled Hussein to slaughter the Palestinians in Jordan. It permitted the advance of the Lebanese fascists against both the Palestinians and the LNM.

Alliance

The course of events and pressure from the base forced the PLO leaders belatedly to create an alliance with the LNM.

The recent desertion from this alliance of sections of the LNM, above all of Walia Jumblatt, represents, whatever statements may be made about the continued commitment to fight Zionism and Lebanese fascism, an historic betrayal.

It weakens not only the Palestinian struggle, but also the fight against the extreme Right and opens up the possibility for imperfalism to impose its solution, drawing in some of those elements until recently fighting on the side of the Palestinians and the forces opposing fascism.

Role

The role of Israel flows from the nature of the Zionist state. It was established by dispossessing the weapon against any Arab initiatives opposed to the interests of imperialism, the Zionist state is compelled to try to impose its will over, and sometimes to occupy, ever-wider surrounding territories, either for its own security or to do the bidding of imperialism.

Victims

The Palestinian people are the direct and central victims of the imperialistsponsored Zionist settlement. A just solution in the Middle East demands the destruction of the Zionist state and unconditional support for the struggle of the oppressed nation, the Palestinians, against the oppressor, Israel.

What should replace the Zionist state? The Palestine