En Passant

There are two things that are certain. One, the crisis of poverty and inequality and injustice that brought forth the Arab revolution has not been resolved and will not go away. Two, however terrible the defeats suffered by revolutionaries across the Middle East these past years, the flame of resistance has not been extinguished.

Workers in Egypt do have the power to overthrow their own corrupt and reactionary dictatorship. It is that possibility that offers the ultimate hope for the region and for the liberation of all of Palestine and all of its peoples – Jews, Arabs, Christians, atheists and the rest alike.

A democratic and secular Palestine is only possible, in my view, if there is a working class revolution in Egypt showing the way for democracy and peace and setting the Arab masses across the region alight.

If Abbott and Bishop really want Peter Greste freed, then it is time to play dirty. Threaten Pine Gap and the US base in Darwin if Obama doesn’t get the Egyptians to release Peter Greste and his colleagues. The task for the Egyptian people, again, is to overthrow the tyranny and this time defeat reaction. Only a working class socialist revolution can do that.

Of course the conviction of Peter Greste is a travesty of justice. So too are Aboriginal deaths in custody, imprisoning innocent asylum seekers and their children in concentration camps, criminalising dissent, fining or jailing workers for ‘illegal’ strikes and imprisoning Aboriginal peoples on their own lands.

The fight for justice in Australia is the fight against the same sort of forces imprisoning Peter Greste in Egypt. Our fight against injustice here is the fight against injustice everywhere. Peter Greste’s struggle is our struggle. The best way for Australians to support Greste is to fight for justice and freedom here in Australia.

On the third anniversary of the Egyptian Revolution the military is cracking down. In Socialist Worker UK Wassim Wagdy examines the balance of forces, Mostafa Bassiouny looks at the workers’ movement while Phil Marfleet looks at the role of the old left.

Freedom for Haitham Mohamedain – To sign this statement click on the link at the bottom of the page

We condemn the arrest and detention of Haitham Mohamedain by the Egyptian army on 5th September in Suez. Haitham is a well known labour lawyer and revolutionary activist who has represented hundreds of workers arrested on picket lines or facing court hearings as a result of victimisation by their bosses or assaults by the police. Just two weeks ago he was in Suez defending steel workers whose strike for higher wages was broken up by the Army.

As a leading member of the Revolutionary Socialists, Haitham has also been one of only a small number of revolutionary activists prepared to publicly condemn the brutal crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood by the Army in recent weeks, including the killing of hundreds of protesters on 14th August.

Down with military rule … no to the return of the old regime … no to the return of the Brotherhood

Down with military rule!
No to the return of the old regime!
No to the return of the Brotherhood!
All power and wealth to the people

We must build popular committees to defend ourselves against attacks by the Brotherhood and to protect our revolution which will not subside before it overthrows the regime, and before it wins bread, freedom and social justice, and retribution for all the killers of the martyrs.

he new government is offering the exact same policies as Mohamed Mursi, who offered the exact same policies as Hosni Mubarak. It’s the same neoliberalism and the same strategic alliances with the Gulf dictatorships, the US and Israel. It is as if these policies are written in stone. So the aspirations of the people do not seem to have a reformist outlet.

The revolutionary left is not yet big enough to pose the question of a real alternative, to point beyond the capitalist state. But the revolution could go on for years—and that gives us an unmissable opportunity to grow.