Category: Uncategorized

GLOBAL SOUTH, RESIST NATO!

by justpeace87

Article by ILPS Secretary General Azra Sayeed

Read and sign the Resist NATO Unity Statement here

As a Pakistani, I have borne daily witness to relentless exploitation by Western imperialism. The lives of Pakistani workers and farmers, like those of millions across Asia, Africa, and Latin America, are defined by misery, hunger, landlessness, under-employment and untreated illness by imperialist design.

Imperialist powers, led by the U.S., have ensured that our nations remain shackled to debt, dependency, and violence. And now, as NATO extends its tentacles into the Asia-Pacific under the guise of “security,” we must recognize this for what it is: a recolonization project, dressed in the language of “democracy” and “stability”.

US-NATO has spent decades plundering our lands, propping up puppet regimes, and waging wars—both hot and cold—to maintain their stranglehold over our resources and our futures. NATO’s 2030 initiative seeks to dramatically expand the alliance’s global reach while designating both Russia and China as existential threats. The plan calls for deepening military ties with US states far beyond the north Atlantic, from Colombia to Kuwait, militarizing space, maintaining aggressive forward deployment of forces, expanding nuclear capabilities, and conducting increasingly provocative war games in the Asia-Pacific region.

The Iran-Israel conflict, the genocide in Palestine, the military buildup in the South China Sea, the US troop deployments in the Philippines, and the NATO summit itself are all part of a coordinated imperialist strategy led by the United States and its allies to crush liberation movements and preserve a dying global order.

From the beginning, the U.S. orchestrated this war, arming “Israel” to the teeth, green-lighting its attacks, and intervening when it found a smokescreen to finally launch a direct aggression on Iran. The US is repeating the same move that it made in 2003 when it falsely claimed that Iraq was developing nuclear weapons. What followed was a brutal US invasion and occupation that tore the country apart, killed close to one million people, devastated the infrastructure including hospitals and schools, and has left the country’s people in political chaos and dependency to US oil and development companies to this day. The US wants to see Iran and its people suffer the same fate.

But as with Iraq, the US has committed an act that will drag it further down in its own spiraling collapse. The US under Trump is mired in a deep political and economic crisis from being overstretched and engaged in endless wars. This attack on Iran exacerbates the crisis, as the US will pour even more money into waging war, either directly or by continuing to arm Zionist “Israel” to do its bidding.

This brings us to NATO’s expansion and influence in the Asia Pacific. In 2011, Hillary Clinton, then U.S. Secretary of State, openly declared the Obama administration’s “pivot to Asia,” framing it as an embrace of the region’s “strategic importance.” But we know what “strategic importance” really means: domination. The U.S. does not engage with the Asia-Pacific as equals; it seeks to control it. The so-called “Indo-Pacific Strategy” is nothing but a blueprint for militarization and resource extraction.

The very term “Indo-Pacific” is a calculated insult. It binds together two fascist allies—the U.S. and India—under the banner of containing China. India, a state that massacres its own people in Kashmir and brutalizes indigenous communities in mineral-rich regions, is now Washington’s favorite enforcer in the region. Meanwhile, the U.S. demands that North Korea denuclearize while it stockpiles thousands of warheads and has conducted 192 nuclear tests in the Pacific alone. The hypocrisy is staggering.

France, a self-proclaimed “Pacific nation,” has no business in our waters, yet it maintains a permanent presence in colonial military outposts like New Caledonia and French Polynesia, and wages war games in Asia Pacific like RIMPAC in Hawai’i, Balikatan in the Philippines and La Pérouse across 9 pacific nations. The U.S., for its part, has turned the Pacific into an armed camp, with installations from Okinawa, to the Philippines, to Guahan, to Palau, to Diego Garcia. This is evidence that NATO has no interest in defence, but represents a bloody marriage between the US and European imperialists and the puppet governments of countries in the Asia Pacific, doing the bidding of the West.

Last year, NATO took its most brazen step yet: the formal inclusion of the “Indo-Pacific Four” (Australia, Japan, New Zealand, and South Korea) into its summit. It was the culmination of years of creeping militarization, now codified in the 2024 Washington Declaration, which explicitly labeled China as an “enabler” of Russia’s war in Ukraine.

This is not diplomacy, it is a declaration of war against national liberation movements and anti-imperialist nations.

Of the three major conflict fronts in the world today, two are in the Asia-Pacific: the U.S.-China cold war and the genocide in Palestine and assault of the US on the sovereign nation of Iran. And yet, Western leaders speak of “stability” while fueling arms races and backing apartheid regimes.

US-NATO’s expansion is about plunder of our resources, especially minerals. In 2023, NATO publicly identified 12 critical minerals essential for its war machine. Who controls these minerals? Not the West. China produces 69% of the world’s graphite; bauxite, the main mineral used in aluminum metal production, is concentrated in Australia, China, and India.

This is why indigenous lands in India are being seized. This is why Adivasi communities and Maoist rebels are slaughtered—not because they are “terrorists,” but because they stand in the way of corporate theft. The same logic applies to deep-sea mining, the next frontier of ecological destruction. The Pacific Ocean, already scarred by nuclear testing, is now being carved up for its mineral wealth. The U.S. will drown entire ecosystems in pursuit of profit.

The need for global resistance

The cracks within NATO—over Ukraine, over Israel—are real, but they will not dismantle imperialism on their own. The people must force them open. We have seen glimpses of this power: the millions who marched against the Iraq War, the workers’ strikes in India, the Palestinian resistance that refuses to die. But posters and protests alone will not save us.

We must organize and we must fight, linking arm-in-arm with oppressed and exploited people around the world. The colonizers will not relinquish power willingly. If history has taught us anything, it is that empires only fall when they are broken by the masses.

The choice is ours: Submit to a new century of colonial horror, or rise up and reclaim our future. The time for resistance is now.

Signed,

Azra Sayeed, ILPS Secretary General

Support African Liberation

by justpeace87

Long Live the Struggles for African Liberation, Self-Determination, and Anti-Imperialist Unity!

The African Liberation Day commemorated every May 25 stands as a symbol among African peoples and all oppressed nations struggling against colonialism, imperialism, and neocolonial domination.

This day traces its roots from the 1958 Conference of Independent African States in Accra, Ghana that gathered newly liberated nations asserting their independence and forging solidarity. It was formalized in 1963 with the founding of the Organization of African Unity (OAU), now known as the African Union (AU), as a day to recognize the struggle of African peoples in resisting centuries of slavery, colonization, and exploitation.

The ILPS Commission 10 raises fists in solidarity with our African brothers and sisters across the continent and the diaspora. African Liberation Day is not only a celebration of past victories—it is a living, breathing reminder of the ongoing struggles for independence, land, and self-determination faced by oppressed peoples worldwide under the imperialist and neocolonial domination.

For Indigenous Peoples and National Minorities across the globe, African Liberation Day reinforces the inalienable right to self-determination. The historic struggles in Africa against apartheid in South Africa, colonialism in Algeria, and today’s plunder of the Congo’s mineral wealth by Chinese, US, and EU corporations, mirror the struggles of Indigenous Peoples and national minorities resisting militarization and mining, fighting land dispossession resisting occupation, and resisting extractivism and settler colonialism.

Today, Africa continues to be a frontline of resistance against neocolonial control through debt, military bases, and extractive industries. There is the impacts of multinational mining in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where child labor and environmental destruction prop up the imperialist industries’ demand for cobalt. In the Sahel, foreign troops and interventions often obscure neocolonial agendas under the guise of counterterrorism and stability. Yet, from Burkina Faso, where movements have overthrown neocolonial leaders, to Kenya, where land defenders face state violence, while rising against the claw of IMF-World Bank and its loans and policies against the poor.

We salute the revolutionary legacy of African leaders and movements—from Thomas Sankara, who declared the need for “a united front against imperialism“, to the Pan-Africanist movements that built bridges between Africa, the Caribbean, and Black liberation struggles in the Americas. We call on everyone, from the grassroots defenders of land and rights, to food sovereignty advocates, workers, Indigenous communities, and the youth to trace back and understand the radical traditions of liberation in Africa and the world.

On this African Liberation Day, ILPS Commission 10 stands supporting the struggles of African peoples for liberation and self-determination, understanding the inseparable fight from slavery, racism and discrimination to the fight for freedom against modern-day colonization, oppression and marginalization.

Long live African Liberation Day!
Long live international solidarity!
Down with imperialism and colonialism!
Forward with the struggles of Indigenous Peoples and oppressed nationalities!

Reference:
ILPS Commission 10 Secretariat
ilpscommission10@gmail.com

Workers Unite for Just Peace!

by justpeace87

No to imperialist war! Workers of the world, unite for a just and lasting peace!

On this International Workers’ Day, Resist US-Led War Movement uplifts the struggles of workers around the world against wars for plunder and profit!

Workers and War

Growing inter-imperialist conflicts and wars of aggression have unleashed widespread brutality and suffering on workers and other toiling people, subjected semi-colonial countries to greater national oppression and further intensified the exploitation of the workers in all countries. The imperialist countries are now preparing to fight for the re-division of the world. The US, as the main imperialist power, has directly financed wars of aggression and counterinsurgency against the working people of Palestine, Philippines, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and so many more just in the past year. The U.S is now also preparing for hot war with China, the biggest threat to its hegemony since WW2.

Factories and fields are bombed, infrastructure is destroyed, and workers are left to rebuild amid rubble. Workers are the first to suffer from sanctions, inflation, and austerity imposed to fund war, while the same governments slash wages and social programs. We reject the lie that imperialist war brings security.

Especially in times of acute economic crisis, war is seen as a way out for the imperialists. They whip up nationalist chauvinism against so-called “enemies”, resort to war, genocide and fascist killing and displacing millions, to divert people’s attention from the crumbling economic and political crisis.

Militarization and war have always been a profitable business for the monopoly capitalists. Preparations for war include a sharp increase in the budgets for “defense” in all imperialist countries and their puppets. The same governments that slash social programs and suppress workers’ rights pour billions into militarization, diverting resources from healthcare, education, and infrastructure.

The war profiteers like Boeing, Lockheed Martin, RTX, and Northrup Grumman, thrive on this exploitation, conscripting workers to produce instruments of death while denying them fair wages, safe conditions, and rights. Meanwhile, the weapons they build are made from minerals extracted through brutal exploitation methods that break the bodies of workers and devastate the environment in the communities they live in. From factory floors to mining communities to battlefields, workers are used as pawns in a profit-driven machine for war and militarism.

Workers and the fight for Just Peace

Workers are confronting mass unemployment, skyrocketing inflation, and cuts to social services that come in the wake of every war economy even as they are the first to be targeted for military conscription for wars they did not choose and do not want.

Working people of the world shoulder the struggle for just peace and lead the fights for liberation against US military oppression, towards national liberation and sovereignty. Workers resist by refusing to load weapons onto ships, holding solidarity strikes with peoples resisting militarization, and directly fighting back against the attacks on their communities during military aggression.

As the global anti-war movement rebuilds its strength, we must link arms with workers, in a united front against US-led war. Together, we can wage mass resistance to disrupt the war machine and win a just peace, refusing to fund, build and deploy the weapons to fight wars for the rich.
No to imperialist war! Workers of the world, unite for a just and lasting peace!

No to Imperialist War! Workers of the World, Unite for a Just and Lasting Peace!

Peacebuilding and Social Development!

by justpeace87

To: Media Relations Office, Global Affairs Canada 

Reply of Just Peace Committee to the Joint Statement of the G7 Foreign Ministers published on March 14, 2025

PEACEBUILDING AND SOCIO-ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT FOR THE PEOPLE!

Upon studying the Joint Statement of the G7 Foreign Ministers of March 2025, Just Peace Committee is stunned by the foreign ministers neglect of people’s needs and commitment to warmaking. We object because it ought to address climate change and renewable energy, economic security for the poor and sustainable economic development, women’s security, and peacebuilding through de-escalation, negotiations and demilitarization.

The Foreign Ministers’ Joint Statement is dishonest, arrogant and belligerent, particularly in its positions on the Ukraine War, Haiti, the Middle East, China, Venezuela and North Korea. You talk about peaceful intentions and efforts when you have been engaged in military interventions and provocations. You talk about the G7 as a factor for peace when it is clearly a factor for war.

Ukraine

You say you want prosperity, security and independence for Ukraine, yet you as NATO members and allies have interfered, stirred up conflict and played a large part in the destruction of Ukraine. Led by the US, you backed a coup against a Russia friendly president to install one who was not, encouraging fascist entities along the way. You did nothing about the attacks and exclusionary policies against ethnic Russians that went on for many years. You pushed NATO forces to encircle Russia, endangering its security and provoking it, after several warnings, to attack Ukraine. When there have been opportunities to negotiate peace before, you prevented a resolution and kept funding and supplying Ukraine against ethnic Russians and Russian intervention forces. Even now as the US and Russia are arranging a ceasefire to eastern Ukraine, the UK, Germany and Canada want to keep militarizing Ukraine. Hundreds of thousands of people have perished and around two million have fled in the three years of war. Today, as a ceasefire is being discussed between the US and Russia, you expect the dominant force, Russia, to give concessions.

West Asia (“middle east”)

We oppose the state of Israel’s merciless assault on civilians in Gaza over the past 18 months, which has killed 10’s of thousands of children and defenseless elders, women, infants and hospital staff as well as journalist and aid workers. Self-defense in response to the Palestinian resistance’s assault on Israel on October 7, 2023, was justified. Their continued cry of self-defence is false, however, because of their vicious and blanket assaults on civilians. We call for the release of all captives. We thoroughly condemn, however, the daily mass slaughter since then. We contest Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories, as you should. We thoroughly condemn the US and its allies supplying arms and funds to the Israeli government; without this massive support, the genocidal campaign could not have been waged for long. The US and Canada should remove their forces from the area (Canada’s Operation Proteus). You are complicit. There is no negotiating such terrible crimes. The US and allies among you simply could have stopped assisting the slaughter if you had wanted to end it.

We express our support for the people of Syria and Lebanon, as both countries work towards peaceful and stable political futures. At this critical juncture, we reiterated the importance of Syria’s and Lebanon’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. We call unequivocally for the rejection of terrorism in Syria. Israeli and Turkish forces should leave Syria. Stop supporting these actors in Syria! We condemn strongly the recent escalation of violence in the coastal regions of Syria and call for the protection of civilians and for perpetrators of atrocities to be held accountable. We stressed the critical importance of an inclusive and Syrian-led political process. We welcome efforts to eliminate chemical weapons. As for Iran, the belligerence and provocations must end. Foreign meddling, espionage and assistance to criminal and anti-government elements in other countries must stop.

We are aware that most of the G7 states possess nuclear weapons and nuclear weapons capable equipment, which makes you all great security threats. All parties should withdraw and dismantle their nuclear weapons. You and all states should sign the Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.

Venezuela

You took part in attempts to stage coups in 2002 and 2019. The US illegally took control over Venezuela’s state petroleum enterprise, CITCO. You refused to recognize the elected leadership and presented an imposter, Juan Guaidó, whom you allowed to steal Venezuelan wealth. Canada led a hostile contingent they called the Lima Group. You spread lies. Rather than trying to support a democratic process and help the Venezuelan people, you are trying to destabilize the country and your sanctions are causing great hardship.

Haiti

The US, France and Canada have been actively meddling in Haiti, propping up unelected and anti-people leaders and training armed forces, some of whom are criminals, to suppress the people’s just movement for democracy (free and fair elections) and socio-economic development in the name of fighting gangs.

The G7 statement to “restore democracy, security and stability” in Haiti is beyond disingenuous and outrageous. It was the US, Canada and France that overthrew the democratically elected President Jean-Bertrand Aristide in Haiti in 2004 that has led to the political crisis and gang violence in Haiti today where there are no elected officials in the country. There has been no accountability on our countries for causing this regime change and ensuing immense suffering to the people of Haiti over the past twenty years.

China

The G7 foreign ministers’ statement demonizes China, which has not started any wars in 40 years and has the Belt and Road program that developing countries are signing onto in the desperate hope of development something that the G7 countries have denied them by blocking the New International Economic Order for fifty years. China is seen as a trust partner in development and has lifted hundreds of millions of people out of poverty in the country, for it is helping many countries with infrastructure and building high speed rail, public transit systems, health clinics, universities, etc. China is the world leader on renewable energy technologies. While China has repeatedly called for win-win solutions, it is the G7 countries that are militarizing the Indo-Pacific and constantly provoking China by sailing our warships right on their coast and arming Taiwan! Imagine if China were arming Quebec to violently separate from Canada. It is the G7 that is expressly militarizing the Indo-Pacific with the aggressive U.S. and Canadian Indo-Pacific strategies, AUKUS, NATO partners in Asia, more US bases in the region etc. It is the US that has repeatedly called China a threat and an enemy.

North Korea

At the same time, the G7 countries and their partners have been encircling North Korea and constantly conducting war maneuvers, even mock invasions. You keep the region destabilized and pose a threat with your high degree of militarization and anti-North Korea propaganda, rather than promoting peace on the peninsula and working towards a peace treat between North Korea and the US. North Korea is no threat; it has to maintain military defense because of your threats. You should contribute to demilitarizing the region.

Africa

As for Africa, the US and NATO must shut down AFRICOM and stop the interference in African countries to put and keep favoured political figures in power and have access to African assets. The US and NATO presence does not help or defend the African people.

The Canada-Wide Peace and Justice Network, a collection of some 50 groups interested in just peace across Canada, rejects the Joint Statement of the G7 Foreign Ministers. It fosters militarization while posturing as pro-peace. It denies your own responsibility for destabilization, war and global insecurity. It is self-centered and alien to international law. It completely disregards the peoples’ needs. In fact, it ignores the destruction to societies for which you are in large part responsible. We, like so many others in Canada, do not want to continue on the same path. We want de-escalation and de-militarization, increased social spending, a ban on nuclear weapons and peaceful global relations for mutual gain without ideological imperatives. We want negotiated resolutions with local people involvement that help the affected people. You must begin peacebuilding and serving socio-economic development, not military development.

Justpeace.blog/           www.facebook.com/jpVancouver

by justpeace87

for Palestinian Land Day

Statement of the ILPS

ILPS commemorates Palestinian Land Day in solidarity with the Palestinian people and their struggle for self-determination against Zionist settler-colonialism actively seizing their land and attempting to exterminate them. In the face of the renewed genocidal offensive by the Zionist entity, we call on members to militantly stand with the Palestinian people and their resistance in their fight to end the occupation of their historic land.

First commemorated in 1976 following a general strike in which 6 Palestinians were massacred by the Zionist entity while protesting land stolen from the Arab villages of Sakhalin and Arraba, Palestinian Land Day has stood as a day of national unity of Palestinians for the demands of the return of their land, the end of the Zionist occupation and settlements, and the right of return for Palestinians. At the end of the day, the struggle for Palestinian self-determination is a struggle for their land against Zionism and U.S. imperialism.

Since the Balfour Declaration in 1917, British and then U.S. imperialism has supported and used Zionism as a tool to dispossess the Palestinian people of their land in their attempts to carve up West Asia. Sanctioned in the UN’s Partition Plan for Palestine in 1947 and enacted by the Zionist settlers through the Nakba in 1948, half of the Palestinian population was displaced and dispossessed of their land. Since then, the Zionist entity supported fully by the new hegemon—U.S. imperialism—has continued to violently uproot more Palestinian people and occupy more of their land with aims to annex the West Bank, Gaza, and whole countries in West Asia through its aspirations for a ‘Greater Israel’. The continued barbaric imperialist control by the U.S. and Zionist occupation of Palestine is based on the significance of West Asia’s massive reserves of fossil fuels, but also strategic trade routes critical for transporting plundered resources from Africa and the Asia-Pacific to Europe.

In general, imperialism will always aim to expel the oppressed and toiling peoples from their land in order to deprive them of their livelihood and self-determination so they cannot act as a united political force against their oppressors. This is why the imperialists support and create fascist puppet and settler states such as the Zionist entity, which has a messianic drive to separate the people from their land and whose main ideology is to exterminate the people at all costs to do this. Land is life and central to the struggle of the Palestinian people alongside those in the countryside in the colonies and semi-colonies across the world for national and social liberation.

Now, with an over year-long genocide conducted by the Zionist entity with the full support of U.S. imperialism that has spilled over to Lebanon and Syria after the Al-Aqsa Flood, the demands that Palestinian Land Day stands on must be propagated internationally to isolate the Zionist entity and weaken a limb of imperialism in solidarity with the Palestinian people. Now, more than ever, the peoples across the world must take the streets and show unconditional solidarity with the people of Palestine and their demand for sovereignty, ending the occupation, and a right to return to their historic land.

Condemn the end of the Gaza Ceasefire

by justpeace87

Statement of the ILPS

ILPS militantly condemns the continuation of indiscriminate airstrikes by the U.S.-Zionist entity and the deliberate engineering of the end of the Gaza ceasefire. This is part of the war of extermination against the Palestinian people that the U.S.-Zionist entity has continuously pursued to advance its expansionist settler-colonial project. The Palestinian people and its unified resistance continue to stand strong in the face of genocide and will continue to resist until the Zionist occupation has ceased to exist.

In the last 24 hours, more than 400 displaced Palestinian civilians have been killed while asleep in their tents in Gaza from the indiscriminate airstrikes, with at least 560 wounded. Since October 7th, 2023, there have been at least 70,000 Palestinian people killed with over 1.8 million displaced by this genocide. Beyond the Zionist entity’s genocide against the Palestinian people, their bloody hands have killed 2,720 Lebanese people with over 1.4 million displaced by their invasion of Lebanon since October 1st, 2024.

The end of the ceasefire was engineered with the full cooperation of the United States, not the resistance forces of Palestine as the imperialist press is propagating. In the words of the Zionist entity’s Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, “The operation in Gaza is gradual, and we have planned it over the past few weeks since the appointment of the new Chief of Staff [of the IDF, Eyal Zamir].” These developments are not surprising, as the Zionist entity was blocking humanitarian aid and withholding Palestinian hostages since the beginning of the ceasefire deal, but this new surprise offensive by the Zionist entity with consultation and support from the U.S. shows a further commitment to a war of extermination against the Palestinian people for their settler-colonial project and marks the U.S.’s additional focus against Iran and the Axis of Resistance in their imperialist strategy.

The surprise attack on Gaza, with clear intents of preparations for further escalation, the military and political changes in Syria, and renewed attacks on Yemen are directed by the U.S. to a geopolitical recalibration of political balance, with ultimate intent of weakening/eliminating Iran, who for many decades has remained one of the strongest, if not the strongest resistance against US imperialism.

The Zionist entity and its allies have constantly broken its ceasefire with Hezbollah by continuing to shoot civilians, conducting airstrikes, bombing infrastructure, and not ending their occupation of part of Southern Lebanon alongside manufacturing tensions at the Lebanese-Syrian borders in order to destabilize Lebanon and pull Hezbollah into a side battle so they can occupy more of Mount Hermon in sovereign Syrian land. The Zionist entity’s and U.S.’s support of the HTS-led coup in Syria has killed 4,711 people, including 1,805 executed in HTS’s ethnic cleansing campaign since December 8th, 2024. The Zionists have enflamed ethnic tensions to secure control in the Druze-minority areas and are opportunistically using the ongoing Syria-Lebanon border clashes to weaken Hezbollah and keep them from intervening in solidarity with Gaza.

The U.S. Central Command has also engaged in naval warfare and airstrikes against Yemen and their blockade against the Zionist entity, killing over 50 people and wounding dozens in recent days. This comes as Ansar Allah has resumed its naval blockade on ships and fired against U.S.-Zionist military structures in solidarity with the people of Gaza. In addition, Trump has stated that Iran must be ‘held responsible’ for ‘leading’ Ansar Allah’s defensive actions, threatening “great force, and there is no guarantee that that force will stop there.”

The death toll, displacement, and destruction caused by the U.S.-Zionist entity alliance is only rising because of their inability to accomplish any military objectives. In contrast, he resistance has grown in numbers, refilling its ranks with the full support of its people, who know that their existence and victory can only be assured by ending the Zionist occupation and ridding U.S. imperialism from the region. Now, more than ever, the peoples across the world must take the streets and show unconditional solidarity with the people of Palestine, Lebanon, Yemen, the wider West Asia, and the united Axis of Resistance.

Signed,

International League of Peoples’ Struggle

End the Palestine Occupation!

by justpeace87

END APARTHEID AND OCCUPATIONS!

Statement of the Just Peace Committee, February 2025

Just Peace Committee (JPC) joins the millions of good-hearted people who’ve been protesting the genocide and occupation of Palestine by the Israeli state, supplied and supported by the US and other states including Turkey and Jordan. Support for genocide is reprehensible. We welcome the ceasefire in the Palestinian territories started on January 19, a tremendous achievement. We are relieved that many Palestinian prisoners and resistance captives are being safely returned home from Gaza.

JPC recognizes the legal right to resist genocide and occupation. Resistance is not terrorism. We call for an immediate end to apartheid and occupation. We want justice for Palestinians and against Israel and all those complicit.

Hands off Palestinian territories!             Hands off Lebanon!                       Hands off Syria!

The US is operating a command post in Jerusalem to direct its puppets, the Palestinian Authority. The PA is hostile to the Palestinian resistance forces in the West Bank. Canada has been directly participating in this nefarious activity with Operation Proteus. Canada and US Out! The West Bank settlements are illegal and must be emptied, with Israeli residents leaving immediately.

The US has military bases throughout West Asia and Canada several military operations. We say: Canada, out of West Asia! Canada, out of NATO! Shut down the foreign bases!

The JPC further calls for an end to Israeli, Turkish and US expansionism and occupations in West Asia and all the support and assistance from neighbours. It condemns Israel’s armed incursions into Lebanon and occupation of part of Syria. We support resistance to the foreign aggressors and occupiers in Syria. The US, Israel and NATO allies are overseeing the total destruction of Palestinian territories and Syria as they have done in Iraq and Libya. We oppose the regime change programs of the US, all of NATO and its many partners, who engage in demolition and chaos creation in order to quell independent governments and independence movements.

JPC strongly opposes the criminalization of protesters and journalists who speak out against genocide and occupation, and support resistance to genocide and occupation.

While many businesses are boycotting and divesting from Israel, many companies are profiting from war, occupation and genocide. No to war profiteering and a war economy!

Build the Opposition to Occupation and Genocide!

A peace process for West Asia cannot be led by the USA which is a belligerent in Israel’s genocide in Gaza, its bombing of Lebanon and Yemen and its overthrow of the government of Syria. All parties to and their terms of ceasefires must be respected. All parties must work to make a just, comprehensive and lasting peace settlement based on numerous UN resolutions on the conflict and international law. The process must be guided first by the wishes of the Palestinian people and presided over and ratified by the UN as an international authority.

The international movement to defend and assist Palestinians and all victims of occupation, apartheid and genocide and inform the public of the truth must carry on and grow. We must together work to stop militarization and the war industry. This is a long-term struggle against colonialism and neo-colonialism. It is necessary to achieve just and lasting peace.

 https://justpeace/blog                               www.facebook.com/jpcvancouver               justpeace87@yahoo.com

The Heroic Struggle in West Asia

by justpeace87

THE HEROIC PEOPLES’ STRUGGLE WILL DEFEAT THE US-ZIONIST-TURKISH ONSLAUGHT ON WEST ASIA

The International League of Peoples’ Struggle salutes the brave sacrifice and resistance of the Palestinian and Lebanese people and condemns the expansion of regional conflict into Syria by imperialist and fascist proxy forces. As the genocidal US-Zionist-Turkish alliance unleashes wave upon wave of attacks against the people, we remain steadfast in our solidarity with all progressive forces in the region as US imperialism lets loose its attack dogs to slow its inevitable decline.

After many months of sacrifice by the Lebanese people, in which Hezbollah’s declared “support front” for the Palestinian resistance in Gaza was turned into its own front for the defense of Lebanese sovereignty, the resistance agreed to a ceasefire with the Zionist entity. This deal was brought to the table after the Zionists were unable to achieve any of their objectives in Lebanon despite indiscriminately killing well over 3,000 people in the country since October 7, 2023, including some of Hezbollah’s key leaders like the late Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah. The settlers to the north of occupied Palestine have not been able to return home despite the hollow promises of the Zionist government. Hezbollah also proved that its attacks could hit deep into Tel Aviv, destroying military sites and forcing settlers to flee to shelters on a daily basis. The Lebanese resistance remains strong, and they now have the hard won space to recuperate to carry on their fight. In fact, it has already been reported that the Zionists committed at least 50 violations of the ceasefire through continued missile attacks, shooting at civilians including journalists, and preventing Lebanese people from returning to their homes.

Regardless of how long the ceasefire lasts due to Zionist provocations, it is clear that the Zionists knew they would expend too many resources in a war in Lebanon while the genocide in Gaza is still taking place, and they saw that the resistance would not back down, nor were they losing support among the people. Instead, the US special envoy to Lebanon pressured the Zionists into making a deal due to the unwavering strength of the resistance. This sacrifice of the people in their fight for liberation is as much an inspiration as the fight of the Palestinian people, and the entire region shines bright in the beacon of their resistance.

As the Lebanon ceasefire was reaching its start, a new reactionary wave was unleashed on Syria from Turkey. Terrorist mercenaries trained by Turkey and armed with US-made weapons stormed through Syria’s Idlib Province and reached Aleppo within just a few days. These mercenaries belong to the group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, a reorganized fragment of the previous US-trained and al-Qaeda affiliated al-Nusra Front whose majority membership would go on to form the Islamic State terrorist organization, as well as the so-called Syrian National Army, made up of former fighters of the Free Syrian Army, a group armed and trained by the US and Turkey and financed by US-provided funds. Their sole purpose was to take advantage of the Arab Spring in which people across West Asia and North Africa took to the streets to demand an end to political repression and economic crisis, and to inflame a civil war to topple the Bashar al-Assad regime that stood in opposition to US imperialism in the region and is a close ally of US rival Russia.

The destructive path cut through Idlib and into Aleppo by these US-Turkish and pro-Zionist mercenaries exposes their anti-people interests and false claims of wanting to free the Syrian people from repression. They have ambushed civilians and beheaded soldiers and civilians alike. They have blockaded key roads such as the highway to Damascus, which has led to hamletting of communities and cut them off from food and aid. They have enacted indiscriminate violence against national minorities such as the Kurds. It is clear from these actions that these forces are mere proxies for Turkey as the fascist Erdogan regime seeks to take advantage of the chaotic genocidal war of the Zionists and stave off internal crisis at home while enacting its own genocidal war of extermination against the Kurdish people fighting for their national liberation. It also took advantage of a key moment when Russia, Syria’s key military ally, is mired in its proxy war with US-NATO forces that the US provoked to weaken Russia in Ukraine.

In summary, the outstanding heroic performance of the resistance both in Gaza and Lebanon, which prevented Israel from realizing its declared objectives of its war has forced Imperialism to unleash its plan B in order to cut all routes which might be used to reinforce all needed resources in this decisive war. Turkish military forces and its puppets in Northern Syria as well as US agent forces were used to execute their plot to force the Syrian regime to cut relations with the Palestinian and Lebanese resistance or be in danger of being internally defeated and the Syrian nation and state to be partitioned and disintegrate into warring groups. This plot is being now defeated by the awareness of the Syrian people and the steadfastness of the Syrian army and its allies in the battlefield. 

The war is escalating in Syria, yet the balance of forces is moving in the right direction against the Imperialists, the Zionists and the Turkish regime. As US imperialism wages its violent strategy to counter its ultimate regional rival Iran by letting loose its puppet and satellite states against the people and independent states of the region, let us remain patient and steadfast in struggle as the people, the true makers of history, fight on to free themselves from imperialism and all reaction. Their resistance is a beacon to our own resistance, and our solidarity in the midst of our own struggles for liberation is the greatest gift we can offer.

For reference: Len Cooper, ILPS Chairperson

Statement of the International League of Peoples’ Struggles, Dec. 03, 2024

No to NATO!

by justpeace87

NO TO NATO! CWPJN Statement on NATO’s 70th Annual Parliamentary Assembly

in Montreal Nov. 22-25, 2024

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the U.S.-led, nuclear-armed, military alliance that was founded by twelve countries, including Canada, in 1949, is holding its 70th Annual Parliamentary Assembly in Montreal. In the last 25 years, NATO has left a trail of death and destruction from its military interventions in the former Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Libya, and now Ukraine. These interventions have led to failed states, environmental and climate damage, violence against women, and humanity’s largest refugee crisis. NATO allies have wasted trillions of dollars on wars and weapons to enrich the (mainly US) arms industry while exacerbating conflict around the world.

NATO DRIVES MILITARY SPENDING, IMPOVERISHES CANADIANS, WIDENS WARS

In 2014, NATO allies pledged to increase their military spending to 2% of gross domestic product (GDP). According to NATO’s latest Defence Expenditures report, over the past ten years, Canada’s military spending has increased 100% from $20 billion in 2014 to over $40 billion in 2024, which is 1.4% of GDP. It now wants to spend $41 billion a year. Military spending diverts crucial resources away from public needs putting more Canadians into poverty and homelessness. NATO bureaucrats are trying to establish the 2% ceiling as a floor and raise the ceiling to 3%, which the media trumpets.

NATO weapons prolong the war in Ukraine and the genocide in Gaza. Since 2022 alone, Canada has committed a staggering $17 billion CAD in financial and military aid to Ukraine to prolong a NATO proxy war against Russia, while rejecting negotiations to end that war. NATO calls Israel “its vital ally in the Middle East”, conducts military exercises with Israel, and has a robust trade with it in arms and weapons research. Canada and all NATO members continue to oversee contracts for weapons for Israel, a nuclear-armed state, despite its genocide against the Palestinian people, its illegal and merciless bombardment of Lebanon, and its recent attack on Iran. At the same time, however, a survey by the Institute for Global Affairs found a majority of people inside NATO countries want negotiations to end the war in Ukraine and an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.

NATO’S RECKLESS NUCLEAR GAMBLES IN UKRAINE & WEST ASIA

Humanity today is facing its most perilous nuclear threats since the Cuban missile crisis of 1962 in two theatres of war. NATO has recklessly escalated the stakes in its proxy war with Russia over Ukraine. Three NATO countries – the US, UK, and France – recently announced intentions to install in Ukraine long-range missile systems capable of striking deep into Russia. NATO’s new Secretary-General, Mark Rutte, approves their use. Because targeting for these missile launches would be done by the U.S. and NATO allies, the Russian government considers such attacks acts of war against Russia and has threatened to retaliate onNATO targets. NATO leaders are thus gambling – with our lives – that the Russian government is bluffing. Trudeau recently endorsed the gamble. However, if Russia does retaliate, NATO will immediately invoke Article 5 for a collective reprisal, which puts the world at the brink of nuclear war. The stakes could not be higher!

In West Asia, NATO continues to support the State of Israel whose attack on Iran is likely to ignite a wider regional war and might also lead to a nuclear confrontation between the great powers. We are poorly served by the Trudeau government, the opposition parties, and mainstream media, none of whom has adequately warned Canadians of the existential danger of NATO’s nuclear brinkmanship in Ukraine and West Asia. Prime Minister Trudeau himself has never called President Putin to find out what it would take to end the Ukrainian conflict, nor has he exerted any serious pressure on Israeli PM Netanyahu or on US President Biden to stop the war in West Asia. As well, it is because of our membership in NATO that Canada won’t join the Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.

WE NEED PEACEBUILDING AND INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION, NOT NATO

Canada can pull back from nuclear brinkmanship by supporting negotiations to end the wars and joining the nuclear ban treaty. As well, Canada must also create a two-way arms embargo against Israel, support an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, and a lasting political solution between Palestine and Israel. The Trudeau government must condemn Israel’s illegal invasion of Lebanon and suspend diplomatic relations with Israel until it withdraws from that country and ceases to attack other countries in West Asia. Canada must cooperate and build peace with all countries, so that humanity can achieve the Paris Agreement and UN Sustainable Development Goals by 2030. Only 32 Western countries are part of NATO. We can build peace and trust through diplomacy, international law, conflict prevention, and disarmament. It’s time for Canada to withdraw from NATO and work cooperatively with all countries.

SUPPORT THE COUNTER SUMMIT IN MONTREAL !

The Canada-Wide Peace and Justice Network is organizing the Counter-Summit (to NATO’s Parliamentary Assembly) in Montreal with the participation of local antiwar and social justice organizations on Sunday, November 24th. To register for and support the Counter Summit, click here: tinyurl.com/StopNATO . To join the Canada-Wide Weekend of Action vs NATO, contact the Canada-Wide Peace & Justice Network: peaceandjusticenetwork.ca @CanPeaceJustice

SHUT DOWN THE ABBOTSFORD AIRSHOW!

by justpeace87

STOP WAR! STOP THE INDUSTRY OF DEATH!

SHUT DOWN THE ABBOTSFORD AIRSHOW!

REMEMBER HIROSHIMA AND NAGASAKI!

CANADA, OUT OF NATO!

As peace loving citizens and residents of Canada who want an end to war, we members of 50 groups collectively known as the Canada-Wide Peace and Justice Network, strongly oppose the Abbotsford Airshow. Events such as this serve to normalize and expand the arms trade, aggressive military policies, growing military budgets and aggressive military engagements.

It is especially troubling that the Abbotsford Airshow, which runs at the Abbotsford Airport from August 9 to 11, is taking place just after the anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, August 6, and opening on that of Nagasaki, August 9. Public administrations and businesspeople should be organizing mass commemorations of the victims of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki nuclear explosions and denouncing war and all weapons of mass destruction. Instead, Canadian and US military air forces are celebrating the technology of war including nuclear capable tech and military action at this show.

The Abbotsford Show is advertised as a family-friendly event or merely a benign display of aviation technology where young children are to admire the machinery of death by air. It is really a military event to promote war and war machinery. It teaches youth to overlook the destruction of life that is escalating around the world as tensions between the biggest powers grow and militarization is being ramped up in which yet again hundreds of thousands of civilians are being wounded and killed. There should be mass events to express the common yearning for world peace, demilitarization, cease-fires in Palestine, Ukraine, Sudan and all conflicts and negotiations to end them in a just way. Warfare is not entertainment!

In addition to the Canadian Snowbirds, the show is demonstrating the RCAF CF-18 Hornet jet fighter. There will be an RCAF drone demonstration on the Friday of the show. Both the drones and CF-18 are currently active. The US Airforce will be a major presence with a presentation of a training plane (USAF F-22 Raptor) and the USAF  F-16 Fighting Falcon which are also being deployed around the world.

We are campaigning to stop the Canadian government’s plans to acquire of 88 fighter jets (F-35) for at least $70 billion. We underscore that such fuel-intensive craft contributes massively to climate disaster. We stand against the purchase of armed drones, too, as well as surveillance aircraft and IT.

Just as we staunchly protested the CANSEC arms trade fair, we adamantly protest the Abbotsford Airshow (and the national airshow in Toronto), as it is characteristically a military exhibition intended to promote Canada’s military materials and engagement. We oppose the arms trade and policies and actions of military aggression.

Signed: The Canada-Wide Peace and Justice Network (July 2024)

http://www.peaceandjusticenetwork.ca