The resistance continues, and the flames of intifada burn: PFLP message to éirígí and Irish struggle

The resistance continues, and the flames of intifada burn: PFLP message to éirígí and Irish struggle

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine sent the following message to éirígí on the occasion of its Ard Fheiss, or National Conference on November 29, 2014:

On the occasion of your national conference, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine extends to you our comradely and revolutionary greetings. The Palestinian people and the Irish people have a long history of joint struggle, confronting and challenging colonialism, political imprisonment and military occupation. The British colonialism that you today struggle to end in Ireland, and to unify your country, is the same British colonialism that brought the Balfour Declaration and welcomed the Zionist movement to colonize and occupy Palestine. We salute your struggle for a fully liberated, democratic, socialist Ireland!

Today, in Palestine, the Palestinian people are facing an escalating onslaught from the Zionist settler colonial racist state. In Jerusalem, there is an ongoing, constant drive to erase the Palestinian character of the city and to push the Palestinian people from Jerusalem. Home demolitions, land confiscation, settler invasions and settler attacks, official threats to Muslim and Christian holy sites, the stripping of Jerusalem IDs and residency rights – all of these are part of a systematic campaign by the Zionist state. The ongoing attacks on Palestinians in Jerusalem and the escalation of the rapid colonization and ethnic cleansing of Jerusalem are part and parcel of the ongoing Nakba that has been taking place in Palestine for over 66 years.

In the West Bank, colonial settlement construction is increasing – Palestinians are daily faced with land confiscation, violence and attacks by occupation soldiers and colonial settlers. Mass arrests continue in the West Bank and Jerusalem and over 6,200 Palestinians are held as political prisoners inside occupation jails. On a daily basis, homes are raided late at night, belongings ransacked and Palestinians kidnapped for interrogation, torture and arrest. Palestinian children and youth are targeted for arrest, interrogation and harassment by the occupation forces.

Meanwhile, the Palestinian Authority and its “security forces” continue to arrest and detain strugglers of the Palestinian resistance, while soldiers and settlers attack Palestinians and their villages and cities – burning olive trees and other crops, running down children, invading mosques, attacking women and men – on a daily basis, while the PA “security” do nothing to protect the Palestinian people.

In Gaza, thousands of people remain without secure housing or homes following Israel’s genocidal “Operation Protective Edge” in July-August 2014. We saw the massive upsurge of the people around the world protesting the occupation aggression on Gaza, and in support of the Palestinian resistance. The siege continues against the Palestinian people, and the United Nations’ so-called reconstruction plan threatens to continue to impoverish Palestinians, while providing profits to occupation capitalists. It collaborates with the occupier’s “security” agencies to surveil Palestinians while attempting to disarm the resistance, something to which our people will never concede or agree. It is imperative to keep up the international support for Palestinians in Gaza, Jerusalem and throughout Palestine and make it clear that the solidarity on the streets of the world this summer continues.

In occupied Palestine ’48, our people face an increasing racist onslaught. From the so-called “Jewish nation-state” proposed bill, to demands for workplaces “free of Arabs,” to repeated and institutionalized threats at the highest levels of the state to transfer and strip Palestinians in ’48 of citizenship, to the over 50 laws that discriminate against Palestinians in ’48, there is a racist attack and continuing Nakba that has never ended against Palestinians, no matter what citizenship they are forced to carry.

Palestinian refugees inside and outside Palestine continue to struggle for their right of return. The Palestinian people are in a state of siege everywhere – inside occupied Palestine on the entirety of our land – and inside the refugee camps of Lebanon and Syria. Palestinian refugees in Lebanon face massive poverty and are denied basic rights, while Palestinian refugees in Syria struggle to survive amid war. And all of these Palestinian refugees face the struggle they have continued since their expulsion from Palestine – to implement their right to return to their homes, lands and villages from which they were expelled by the occupation and its armies of terror. The right of return is the central issue in Palestine, the key to the liberation of our land and our people as a whole.

Palestinian political prisoners are under attack and under siege – as mass arrests continue on a daily basis, prisoners are denied family visits, and regularly face armed raids by occupation “special forces.” There are now over 500 Palestinian political prisoners held in administrative detention without charge or trial. The cadres of the PFLP throughout the West Bank are facing mass arrests and ongoing targeting attempting to disrupt and demoralize the work of the Front. Just today, 27 November, Comrade Abdel-Alim Da’na, a long-time leader of the Front in al-Khalil, who spent over 17 years in occupation prison, was once again kidnapped by occupation military forces who raided his home at dawn. The political leadership of the Palestinian people – including Comrade Ahmad Sa’adat, General Secretary of the PFLP – is held in the prisons of the occupation in a desperate attempt to suppress the growing popular movement that is escalating on a daily basis toward a new intifada. Éirígí has been a consistent voice and presence, raising the images and the voices of Palestinian political prisoners and standing with Comrade Sa’adat. The distinguished experience of Irish political prisoners is one that also inspires and informs the struggle of Palestinian political prisoners; the connections between our prisoners of freedom stretch back decades and continue to the present day.

The Palestinian resistance is indeed strong and growing. At all levels, from demonstrations, to sit-ins, to armed resistance as a central core of the struggle for liberation, the Palestinian people are resisting the occupier and dedicated to breaking its racist siege everywhere in Palestine. The resistance in Gaza prevented Israel from achieving any of its goals in its brutal aggression over the summer; today, the resistance in Jerusalem is burning and growing, confronting the settlers and their army and demanding freedom and liberation. After the murder of Mohammad Abu Khdeir, the occupation state attempted by all means to suppress the growing resistance in Jerusalem and the West Bank – from the mass arrests of thousands of Palestinians, to the demolition of the homes and stripping of IDs of resistance fighters in Jerusalem, to the shooting and killing of young demonstrators, to escalating their aggression and murdering thousands of civilians in Gaza – yet the resistance continues, and the flames of intifada continue to burn.

International solidarity is critical at this time. The Palestinian people are under siege – and are struggling for justice and liberation. The work that éirígí has done in this regard is a critical part of a growing international movement that stands with the Palestinian people and supports the Palestinian resistance in all its forms. It is clear on the streets, from Ireland, to Europe, to North America, to Asia, to Africa, to Latin America, to the Arab world – that the people stand with Palestine, with the struggling Palestinian people, and against the occupier and his illegitimate, racist, settler colonial project on Palestinian land. The growing international boycott at all levels of the occupation state – including economic, academic, cultural, political and all other forms of boycott – reflects a growing movement for international isolation of the Zionist project in Palestine. Your revolutionary solidarity and steadfastness gives strength to the Palestinian national liberation movement and our people as we struggle for a democratic, liberated Palestinian on the entire land of Palestine. U.S. imperialism and the European Union are doing all they can to support their strategic ally, the Zionist state. The Palestinian struggle is not only a confrontation with the Zionist project, but with global imperialism. And just as the imperial powers stand with the occupier, the people of the world stand with Palestine.

On this occasion, we bring to you the greetings of Comrade Ahmad Sa’adat from behind the bars of the occupation, General Secretary of the PFLP; Comrade Abu Ahmad Fuad, the Deputy General Secretary of the PFLP; the Central Committee and all of the cadres and members of the Front. We also extend our solidarity to you – in your struggle for freedom and liberation from colonization; against exploitation and injustice; and for a truly socialist and liberated Ireland. Every victory that you achieve in your struggle is also a victory for the Palestinian people and for our collective struggle for a world that is free of racism, colonialism, imperialism, oppression and capitalist exploitation.

Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine

Abla Sa’adat in Spain for International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People

Abla Sa’adat in Spain for International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People

On the occasion of the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, theCommittee in Solidarity with the Arab Cause in Asturias, Spain hosted Abla Sa’adat, Palestinian activist, women’s organizer, and the wife of imprisoned Palestinian leader Ahmad Sa’adat.

Abla Sa’adat spoke on November 27 and 28 about the situation of Palestinian political prisoners in Israeli occupation jails. Sa’adat also met with Senator Jesus Iglesias and local media, discussing the urgent situation of her husband and Palestinian political prisoners in general.

“The Israeli government has increased repression since the start of this year, 2014. There are escalating punishments and penalties for acts of popular resistance. We have seen the war in Gaza, mass arrests and repression inside the prisons. The occupation wants to push Palestinians off their land…it pursues a Palestine without Palestinians…Israel has expelled Palestinians since it was founded in 1948,” she said, speaking of the current situation in Palestine.

New statement from occupation prisons: Palestinian political prisoners plan to escalate protest

New statement from occupation prisons: Palestinian political prisoners plan to escalate protest

The following statement was released on 29 November by the Prison Branch of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and reflects the organizing of prisoners from all Palestinian political parties inside Israeli occupation prisons, including the organizing of PFLP prisoners. The Campaign to Free Ahmad Sa’adat is distributing the statement below and will participate in international solidarity actions with the striking prisoners as news and actions develop:

At the time when the occupation is continuing its onslaught against our people everywhere, escalating the attack and violations and racist hatred in everywhere, this attack is becoming more violent and ugly against the prisoners’ movement. Here, there are not even the barest elements of parity in the balance of power, which falls decisively in favor of the enemy, as conditions become more difficult and cruel and the occupier escalates its policies that aim to undermine our determination, will and revolutionary humanity through a series of measures impacting all aspects of prisoners’ lives inside the occupation prisons. These policies include denial of family visits, limitations and prohibitions on deposits of money to the prison “canteen” (commissary) accounts, eliminating almost all television stations except two Hebrew channels and 1 Arabic channel, as well as arbitrary transfer and a recent increased escalation of solitary confinement and isolation. This comes on top of restrictions on movement within prison sections and continuation of the deliberate policy of medical neglect, denying sick prisoners visits with specialist physicians under various pretexts, and the violent night raids and invasions of prisoners rooms under the pretext of inspection and searches for contraband. These so-called searches aim to uproot all stability in the lives of prisoners and make it clear to prisoners that they are being targeted on a daily basis. All of these raids only emphasize the steadfastness of the prisoners and their insistence on their will for life and freedom, which is truly what these raids are attempting to confiscate.

In light of the escalation of these attacks, backed by the political decision of the right-wing extremist Zionist government, and after all efforts have failed to end these attacks, which have been escalating since 12 June 2014, the prisoners’ movement has held a series of meetings in various prisons about the current situation, which have issued several specific demands and which have decided to begin the implementation of a program of steps of protest with increasing escalation and rejection of the policy and procedures of the prison administration, in order to pressure the prison authority to implement these demands. These protest steps will begin on 1 December 2014 and will continue until the desired goals are accomplished.

Prisoners’ specific demands:

Restore the situation to what it was prior to 15 June 2014

Cancel all denials of family visits, restore the removed television channels, cancel all prohibitions on canteen deposits, and restore conditions of life in general. Resume visits to prisoners from the Gaza Strip with equality with prisoners from the West Bank

End all of the recent punitive practices, including lengthy delays between family visits, prohibitions on assembly and movement within sections, the escalation of isolation and solitary confinement, frequent transfers by “Bosta” and address all matters relating to this issue, which inflicts significant suffering on prisoners while being transferred between prisons or taken to court

Improve the treatment of prisoners suffering from medical conditions and provide the necessary medications to prisoners suffering from disease

End administrative detention without charge or trial

Announced schedule of protests to achieve these demands:

1 December 2014, Monday – Sending a message to the director of the prison to discuss this issue

2 December 2014, Tuesday – One-day hunger strike in all prisons

9 December 2014, Tuesday – One-day hunger strike in all prisons

10 December 2014, Wednesday – Afternoon protest in the prisons

16 December 2014, Tuesday – One day hunger strike in all prisons

18 December 2014, Thursday – Boycotting the prison administration and striking by sections

23 December 2014, Tuesday – One day hunger strike in all prisons

25 December 2014, Thursday – Boycotting the prison administration and striking and protesting in sections

26 December 2014, Friday – Strikes and protests in all prisons, announcing the beginning of mass civil disobedience

This program will escalate in protest steps in order to build up pressure on the prison administration to support our struggle and achieve our just demands. The jailer, sooner or later, will be subject to the will and the victory of the prisoners!

Glory to the martyrs and victory to the revolution.

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine branch in Israeli jails

Brazil’s Landless Workers Movement salutes Ahmad Sa’adat

Brazil’s Landless Workers Movement salutes Ahmad Sa’adat

The Landless Workers Movement (Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra (MST)) of Brazil sent the following letter of solidarity and support to Comrade Ahmad Sa’adat, imprisoned PFLP General Secretary. The MST is a mass social movement, formed by rural workers and by all those who want to fight for land reform and against injustice and social inequality in rural areas.

We want to express thanks for the beautiful solidarity message that you sent for the Sixth Congress of our organization, which was held early this year. At the Congress, we read the letter to the 18,000 landless workers who committed to strengthen solidarity with the Palestinian people, especially with the prisoners held in Israeli prisons.

Please know that one day we will have the conditions to speak personally with you and with other activists in this legitimate struggle for justice, democracy, and national independence since one day we will see the end of the illegal Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands.

Here in Brazil we are part of various struggles in defense of the Palestinian people: boycotts and divestment aimed at Israel, marches, solidarity committee meetings, the People’s Tribunal that judged and condemned Israel for crimes of genocide, etc.

Throughout Brazil there were acts of solidarity with the Palestinian people between July and August this year, with special attention to the situation of aggression and genocide against the people of Gaza. Activists of various people’s organizations, the labor movement, the student movement, the various religions (Jews, Christians, Muslims, African religions), the left parties all took to the streets against the government of Israel. In São Paulo, 5000 people marched and surrounded the Israeli consulate building, demanding an end to attacks on Gaza, an end to the Israeli occupation and the release of Palestinian prisoners.

During the week of October 17 to 30, we also participated in the international campaign for their release. We are mobilizing activists from various organizations and conducting gatherings, debates, and meetings and initiating a campaign of letters to be sent to you and your comrades in prison, so they know that even separated by geography, we are with you in this fight that is already victorious.

Despite all that happened in the Gaza massacre and repression by Israel in the West Bank, Jerusalem and the territories occupied in 1948, we realize that major lessons were learned from the popular resistance in the Battle of Gaza. Our hope is strengthened when we see the political unity of the Palestinian people being built in the daily struggle against Israeli occupation. Gaza showed that no single organization can defeat Israeli aggression, but people united by their legitimate organizations become an invincible social force.

You always talk about national unity against the Israeli occupation, and that is the path to victory. It was that way in Vietnam, in overthrowing the apartheid regime in South Africa and here in overthrowing dictatorships in Latin America.

The bars of Israeli jails cannot imprison ideas, feelings, wishes, the desire for transformation. The bars of Israeli jails cannot stop this feeling of justice and freedom that today takes hold of all mankind. Palestinian prisoners have won the support of all the men and women of the world who struggle for a new society.

In the history of the struggle of the peoples of Latin America we also had our prisoners and our martyrs, and we learned that struggle and resistance is the only path that can lead to liberation and put an end to injustice.

We just came out of an electoral battle where we succeeding in defeating the candidate of the right, who represented the interests of more conservative and fascist sectors, that is, the pro-Israel political sectors. Zionists in Brazil mobilized in the elections, but were defeated at the polls. We know the limits of bourgeois elections. We do not have any illusions, but Dilma’s victory maintains the most favorable conditions for the struggle in solidarity with the Palestinian people.

Comrade Ahmad Sa’adat, your courage and consistency inspire us, because we live in a time where men and leaders sell themselves, betray their people, abandon their principles and choose the easy path of capitulation and cowardly submission to the enemies of the people. You and your comrades chose the more difficult path, but it’s the most fair way, the most correct way, and the Palestinian people already recognize that sacrifice, and already have the ability to see who are their legitimate representatives in the struggle against Israeli occupation.

At this time we also remember our brothers and sisters peasants, fishermen and women, and farm workers, who suffer from the ban on access to land, water and sea, basic resources that enable them to lead a dignified life.

The struggle of the Palestinian people is a legitimate national liberation movement, inspired by the fundamental principles of the UN Charter and international law. We continue to support the legitimate right of the Palestinian people to continue the struggle for the return of all their lands occupied in 1948, and in 1967 after the Oslo Accords. We are for an end to the Israeli occupation of Palestine, an immediate release of all political prisoners, support for Palestinian national unity, the right of return of all Palestinian refugees and compensation for those who had their homes and property destroyed, an economic, political, cultural and military boycott of Israel, the immediate destruction of the apartheid wall, and an end to the Brazil-Israel military agreements and the Mercosur-Israel Free Trade Treaty.

Comrade Ahmad Sa’adat, please receive the supportive embrace of workers in Brazil and Latin America. Share our solidarity with all Palestinian prisoners of all organizations, because the unity you have achieved within the prisons is coming to the streets of Palestine, and that is the basic condition for victory.

Landless Workers Movement

Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra – MST

Brasil

São Paulo, Brazil, October 27, 2014

Take Action: Free Palestinian professor and political leader Abdel-Alim Da’na!

Take Action: Free Palestinian professor and political leader Abdel-Alim Da’na!

[Photo on the left:] Abdel-Alim Da’na, for the Electronic Intifada

20 Palestinians were arrested throughout the West Bank on Thursday, 27 November, in a series of night-time raids in Al-Khalil (Hebron), Jenin and elsewhere by the Israeli occupation military. Among those arrested was Abdel-Alim Da’na, 65, a prominent long-time leader in the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and a professor at Palestine Polytechnic University in al-Khalil, who had previously served nearly 17 years in occupation prisons. Take action now and demand the immediate release of Abdel-Alim Da’na and an end to the raids and imprisonment of Palestinian political leaders.

His home was attacked and raided in early dawn hours by occupation forces; his son, Bashar Abdel-Alim Da’na, has been detained in administrative detention without charge or trial since April 20 of this year. Da’na suffers from several diseases, including high blood pressure and diabetes.

He has been politically visible denouncing recent Israeli attacks on Jerusalem, as well as challenging the role of the Palestinian Authority, saying that the PA was derelict in its duty to the Palestinian people for pursuing negotiations while Israeli soldiers and settlers were attacking the Palestinian people of Jerusalem.

Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network notes that Da’na is clearly being targeted for his political activity and views and is being held as a prisoner of conscience. He has a long legacy of struggle for the Palestinian people and is being targeted because, despite age and illness, he continues to speak out for the full rights of the Palestinian people.

[Photo on the right:] Bashar Abdel-Alim Da’na, Abdel-Alim Da’na’s son, held in administrative detention without charge or trial

In 2011, Da’na was interviewed by the Electronic Intifada about his time in occupation prisons. He is also well-known for his role in the 1970s in involving Israeli citizens, particularly Arab Jews, in joining the Palestinian resistance. The full interview with Abdel-Alim Da’na is below, on the history of Palestinian prisoners’ resistance. During his 17 years in prison, he spent 4 years held together with Ahmad Sa’adat, today the imprisoned General Secretary of the PFLP.

Click here to take action and demand the immediate release of Abdel-Alim Da’na and an end to the raids and imprisonment of Palestinian political leaders.

Interview from the Electronic Intifada:

Ben Lorber, contributor to The Electronic Intifada, interviewed Abdel-Alim Da’na in his Hebron home on 8 November 2011.

Ben Lorber: How long were you in prison?

Abdel-Alim Da’na: I spent 17 years in Israeli prisons. In 1972 I spent more than one year, and in 1975, they gave me 17 and a half years. I was released by an exchange of prisoners between PLO and Israel in 1985. I spent ten years and two months in jail. Then they arrested me in the first intifada, the first uprising, and I spent four years without a trial, as an administrative detainee. Then I spent about one year or more, and then in 2004 I spent one and a half years.

BL: How were you treated inside prison?

AD: The Israeli management inside the prisons is very difficult, and they mistreated us inside the prisons. Dozens of people inside the prisons were absolutely crazy, I saw many go crazy because of the very bad conditions inside the prison. More than two hundred detainees died inside the prisons. I have written many books and essays about the prisoners inside the prison. I wrote a book about the 94 prisoners who died inside the prisons, and I am going to continue to speak about the other men who died inside the prisons because some of them were killed because of interrogations, and some of them were not given suitable treatment. In interrogations I spent more than a hundred days inside isolated cell without anybody, and they used all kinds of torture to take information from me. Not only me, but many persons, many detainees.

And you must believe me that the situation is very difficult, very hard. Because we are inside the prisons, everything is confiscated, including our freedom, and we haven’t enough food, our family can’t visit us inside the prison freely, and they mistreat our families when they visit us.

BL: How did prisoners resist the occupation from within the prison?

AD: We had many hunger strikes, and were used to struggling inside the prison to make our life possible. For example, the first hunger strike was in 1970 — this strike was to put an end to Israeli mistreatment of our prisoners. The guard or the policemen said “Issa, come in!” He beat him. Why? “Because I don’t like him!” And when you speak to the guard, you had to say “please sir, ok sir” and you had to bend your head. We saw that they are treating us in a very ugly, very inhumane way. This was the first hunger strike. And we succeeded in this hunger strike in 1970, to put an end to the guards’ mistreatment of prisoners.

And then we called to bring us newspapers. They at first brought us a newspaper called which was [written and published] by Israel intelligence, by Shabak [Shin Bet]. We wanted to change this. So Ashkelon prison had a big strike, they continued with this strike for forty eight days, so as to bring freely Arab magazines and Arab newspapers and Arab books inside the prisons. And the Israelis consented to bring in the books! We called this very important for the prisoners — it changed our lives.

We did not have radio transmitters. We were smuggling transistor radios, but the Israeli authority considered it very dangerous. In September 1985 we had an important hunger strike, we continued it for 13 days. The police minister discussed with us about this hunger strike. We had six representatives among the prisoners — I was one of them — and we discussed our demands and we forced them to permit us to bring a radio. And this made a revolution inside the prisons!

[Photo on the right:] Abdel-Alim’s granddaughter with a poster of Bashar, demanding his freedom

BL: How did you organize and educate yourselves inside the prison?

AD: Every political organization makes their systems and law. There were Fatah, PFLP,DFLP, and these were the three main organizations [in the 1980s]. All the organizations did their best to find books. At first, we hadn’t books, we hadn’t newspapers, we hadn’t papers or pens [with which] to write, but we smuggled many things like these. Also, once we smuggled books into prisons, we smuggled papers and pencils and we copied the books by hand to give to our friends.

Everyone, when they enter the prison, must learn to read and to study. When some people enter the prison, they cannot read or write, and we put an end to their illiteracy. Some of them are very famous journalists now, some are poets, some are writing in the newspapers and writing research. I have many names of these people who couldn’t read or write, and now they are very respectable members of Palestinian culture, men in the Palestinian Authority and writers of all sorts.

BL: What did you teach the prisoners?

AD: We had many educational programs inside the prison; for example, the leftist organizations like PFLP or DFLP had programs in philosophy, political economy, Lenin’s books, and all of the Marxist-Leninist texts. It is a part of our culture.

The education rate inside the prisons is very high. This is true for all the Palestinian people. We are a highly-educated people, and for this we are proud, and we do our efforts to put an end to illiteracy. Now, as the United Nations reports, Palestinian people are one of the highest-educated people. The rate of Palestinian people who are educated is 90 percent, which is more than any Arab country and many countries in Asia and Africa. This makes us proud of our people.

BL: What Marxist-Leninist books did PFLP teach the prisoners?

AD: Dialectical philosophy. All the Lenin books. Das Kapital.

BL: All of Das Kapital?

AD: Yes! It was large, and very difficult, but we studied it. Because we studied political economy, we were dependent on it. Engels’ The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State: I explained this book more than ten times, I admire this book. It is very important. Also Gramsci’sPrison Notebooks. And we read [Che] Guevara, and many Marxist-Leninist theoreticians.

We also had [internal] prison magazines we wrote by hand. For example, Fatah had one or two magazines inside the prison, and also PFLP had a magazine, al-Hadaf [The Goal]. We wrote these magazines by hand, with pencils, and some people put drawings in the magazines, and some prisoners wrote poems, some wrote tales and short stories.

BL: Did you also write about political theory and philosophy inside the magazines?

AD: Yes of course, we wrote about political theory and philosophy inside the magazines, and political economy, many Marxist-Leninist essays inside these magazines. And we also had essays where we discussed our situations inside the prisons, and news, and our relationship with other organizations.

BL: Israel’s policy of mass imprisonment and torture attempts to break the political resistance and will of the Palestinian people, but prison life only increases political resistance and revolutionary will …

AD: Israel can arrest hundreds of people, thousands of people, but in spite of that Israel cannot put an end to the revolution and Palestinian resistance. Since 1967, Israel has been arresting people, but it cannot end the resistance. Israel has mistreated all the prisoners and detainees, but we have a soul. We do not enter prison because we rob or rape or anything, but because we resist the occupation authority, because we resist Israel’s procedures against our people.

And the Palestinian people support the prisoners in demonstrations, in protesting, and support them by money, and by visiting the families of prisoners — these prisoners are the heroes of our people. And the prisoners who enter these prisons live in a nationalist atmosphere and a resistance atmosphere.

BL: When prisoners learn about resistance and revolution in the past and in other countries, does this help them understand how the Palestinian resistance is part of the revolution all over the world?

AD: Yes, we consider ourselves a part of the international revolution. We did not have relations with the world revolution because we were inside the prison, but we are with any movement that struggles for its freedom, for its liberty, and we support all the movements all over the world who want to determine themselves and their own people.

BL: Speaking of world revolution, how does the Arab Spring relate to the Palestinian struggle?

AD: I say it is a very good revolution and a very civilized revolution, and this reflects that the Arab people want to live in a democracy like other people all over the world, to elect their governors and dismiss them! We are proving ourselves as Arabs.

In one sense, I do not [see] us as Palestinians, I [see] us as Arabs. We are all speaking Arabic, from Morocco to Amman, and Islam is our culture, and we have cooperated with each other on many many things. We have the same culture, the same happiness. Imperialism divided us, because when we are divided it can exploit us, and exploit our wealth. All of the Arabs are with us as Palestinians, because they know we are under occupation … all their revolutions call to dismiss Israeli occupation from the occupied territories, and the uprising people believe in Palestine.

And they know that Israel was not established against Palestinians, it was established to weaken the Arab world, so that imperialism and capitalism can exploit all the wealth in the Arab world. The Arabs who are torn and not united will see that their interest is to make a union between them.

BL: But in the struggle against imperialism, religion has become very influential since the 1990s. In the Palestinian resistance now you have many people turning to Hamas’s fundamentalism instead of PFLP’s secular leftism. Why?

AD: You see, the Marxist-Leninist theory failed. Not because it is wrong, but because its applications failed. For example, the Soviet Union failed to apply this theory, and this affected many leftist organizations. The people want to search for other ideologies to explain the world and to struggle against imperialism and colonialism, and of course Israel. And for them, the religious ideology serves to explain all the difficulties that they face.

BL: How does the PFLP feel about Hamas?

AD: It considers Hamas as a nationalist organization that struggles against occupation. But we have many differences with it, because it explains the world and situations not like us, you see. And it is not considered a historical resistance organization. It began in 1987, but we have leftist national organizations that began a half century ago.

BL: What do you think of Hamas’ prisoner deal?

AD: We appreciated this bargain, yes.

BL: But the PFLP was holding a large hunger strike at the same time.

AD: When we began the hunger strike we did not know that there would be a bargain between Hamas and the Israel authority, and it is not in the interest [of the hunger strikers]. If they knew there was going to be an agreement, they would not have begun the strike. But in spite of this the strike was not bad, it ended solitary confinement.

BL: Why were you arrested?

AD: Because I resisted the occupation, and in 1972 I organized the students in the West Bank to resist the occupation. And I made contact between an Arabic and Israeli organization to resist the occupation authority, and some of them have been arrested from the Israeli side, and some escaped outside the country.

BL: Do you mean the socialist anti-Zionist political organization Matzpen?

AD: Not Matzpen, with the Israeli Black Panthers. We helped each other organize and cooperate with many things against the occupation. Also with some Haredim, some very religious men who believe that establishing a Jewish state is against God’s will. They consider Zionism as against Judaism and against God’s will — Neturei Karta and other organizations. To prove they were with us, for example, they brought weapons for us! I did not use it, but they smuggled weapons to us to prove they were with us to resist against the Israeli occupation. We cooperated with them in many branches of struggle. Also, they brought us instruments to press magazines.

The Black Panthers sang many songs — one of their songs went “I went to the labor office, so as to work. They asked me, ‘where are you from?’ I said, ‘From Morocco!’ They said ‘get out!’ I went to the labor office, so as to work. They asked me ‘where are you from?’ I said ‘From Poland!’ They said ‘Ah yes! Bring him a cold drink!’”

***

TAKE ACTION!

1. Send the letter below to demand the immediate release of Abdel-Alim Dana. He is being held as a political prisoner for his public advocacy for Palestinian rights. International pressure can help free him! 

2. Join an action or start an action in your city to defend Jerusalem, Palestine and Palestinian political prisoners. Protests are taking place in cities around the world for Jerusalem and Palestine. Join a protest at an Israeli consulate or embassy, or hold an educational event.

3. Join the movement for boycott, divestment and sanctions. Isolate Israel for its mass political imprisonment of Palestinians. Boycott products like HP and SodaStream, and demand an end to security contracts with G4S, which operates in Israeli prisons. Learn more at bdsmovement.net.

PFLP calls for increased solidarity in the face of ongoing Israeli attacks

PFLP calls for increased solidarity in the face of ongoing Israeli attacks

On the eve of the International Day of Solidarity with the People of Palestine, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) called on the people of the free world to increase solidarity with Palestinian people.

The statement issued on November 29 to mark the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People.

The International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People came at a time Israel escalated its systematic and racist campaign against the Palestinian people, the statement said.

The statement pointed to the Israeli Judaization schemes in occupied Jerusalem, settlement expansion, mounting break-ins into al-Aqsa Mosque, and the Jewish plans to establish the alleged Temple on the ruins of al-Aqsa.

The PFLP also pointed out that the negotiation process only brings losses to the Palestinian people and cause.

“We appeal to you through this statement at a time when our cause is facing difficult circumstances and conditions at all levels and in all areas. We are experiencing a time when the Zionist aggression and repression continues and escalates against our people in various areas, especially against our people in Jerusalem and Gaza, and more recently through the targeting of our people in occupied Palestine 1948 attacking and undermining their existence.”

"To the progressive and democratic forces of the world, we call on you to redouble your efforts to support our just cause, and to expose all the policies of the occupation and its institutions against our people", according to the statement.

The PFLP called upon Arab and Islamic Nation to get ready for the historic battle against the occupation’s ambitions in the area.

For his part, MP Kais Abed al-Karim called on the international community and institutions to bear their responsibility and to protect the Palestinian people from the Jewish settlers’ fierce attacks.

On the anniversary of the 1947 UN vote to partition Palestine and the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, the international community must realize its duty towards our people’s rights for the establishment of an independent state, he said.

Time has come to exercise more pressures on the occupation state to abide by international resolutions and laws and to halt settlement expansion and confiscation policy, he stressed.

He emphasized the need to prosecute Israeli leaders at international courts for committing crimes against humanity in Palestine.

On the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, unite the people of the world to end the racist colonial occupation of Palestine!

On the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, unite the people of the world to end the racist colonial occupation of Palestine!

Since the United Nations General Assembly vote in 1977 designating November 29 as the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, who are struggling to achieve the national rights of return, self-determination and independent statehood, as recognized by the United Nations on multiple occasions and votes.

The International Day of Solidarity this year coincides with the intensifying racist, Zionist occupation attack against the Palestinian people, their land and their rights. There is a systematic campaign of ethnic cleansing and land confiscation for the construction of colonial settlements, the Judaization of Jerusalem, and the threats to Al-Aqsa Mosque of temporal and spatial division in a prelude to its destruction and the establishment of the “temple,” and the Israeli war machine continues its killing, displacement, siege, detention and torture.

2014 was adopted by the United Nations as the Year of Solidarity with the Palestinian People. The occupation state has in no way halted its occupation and aggression and instead has shown unequivocally once more that it continues to implement its assault on justice, peace and the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people, and reject all resolutions of the United Nations and the will of the people of the world. Increasingly, its deceptive façade of democracy is slipping before the eyes of the world and it is being exposed as a racist, exclusionary regime of terror far from any vision of human rights. The Zionist entity’s political current today aims at transforming the nature of the conflict to a religious conflict that would expand throughout the region and threaten all peoples of the area, targeting once more the dispossession of the indigenous Palestinian people from their lands, including those of our people who stand steadfast in their land occupied by the Zionist forces since 1948.

In the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian people, it must be clear that the long years of futile and damaging negotiations have done nothing but inflict great damage on the Palestinian people and their cause while providing cover for the ongoing Israeli crimes, violations and attacks. These negotiations do not serve the interests of justice or peace, but the ambitions of the occupier who would claim all of Palestinian land and deny all Palestinian national rights.

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine salutes the peoples, movements and nations of the world who stand with the Palestinian people and express their solidarity today. We urge the escalation, expansion and development of the solidarity movement, to challenge and defeat the attempts of the occupation state and its allies to deceive the global public by exposing the nature of the Zionist colonial settler project and expand the circle of international support for the Palestinian people, and isolate, boycott and sanction Israel. It is only by achieving and recognizing the Palestinian people’s rights that the values of freedom, justice, democracy, tolerance and peace may triumph in the world.

On this day, the Front also urges Palestinian national unity to emerge from the crisis of the Palestinian national liberation movement to rebuild Palestinian institutions on the basis of democracy, pluralism and commitment to Palestinian national rights and resistance and rejects the approach of negotiations and reliance on U.S. domination. The Palestinian struggle on the official international level must be escalated in the United Nations and its institutions, and without hesitation, Palestine must join the international treaties and organizations, including acceding to the Rome Statute and the International Criminal Court to bring the Zionist leadership to trial and prosecution for their crimes against our people.

On this occasion, the Front salutes those who have fallen for Palestine’s freedom and liberation, wishes a speedy recovery to the wounded and freedom to the prisoners, and appeals to the Arab and Islamic peoples to prepare to confront the Zionist state as it continues its expansion over the entire land of Palestine and threatens the future of the region and its people.