On the morning of June 23, Amal El Zein, member of the political bureau of the Sudanese Communist Party, was arrested by Sudanese military intelligence.
According to Fathi Elfadl, member of the Political Bureau of the Sudanese Communist Party, “she was taken to an undisclosed location, and neither her family nor her fellow lawyers have been allowed to visit her or check on her well-being.”
El Zein requires continuous medication from her conditions of diabetes and hypertension.
“We demand the immediate release of Comrade Amal El Zein and insist that her family and fellow lawyers be allowed to visit her to ensure her well-being. Additionally, she must be permitted to see a doctor and receive the necessary medications and treatments,” added Elfadl. “We hold military intelligence and the current authorities fully responsible for any danger that threatens Comrade Amal El Zein.”
Since the civil war broke out between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) on April 15, 2023, the Sudanese Communist Party (SCP) has faced numerous attacks. On May 25, 2023, just over a month after the fighting broke out, the RSF occupied the office of the SCP in Khartoum. At the time, Elfadl had told Peoples Dispatch, “The occupation of our party office is a part of the ongoing attempts by the RSF and the SAF to silence the voice of the democratic forces that opposed this catastrophic war.”
On January 19, 2024, Haitham Dafallah, the editor of the party newspaper Al-Maydan, was kidnapped by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).
The SCP was one of the key organizations leading Sudan’s pro-democracy movement which began in December 2018 with protests against the increase of the price of bread. This movement continued after toppling the then dictator Omar al-Bashir in April 2019 and continued to push for full democratic reforms and a civilian government. While starvation, disease, and war threaten millions of Sudanese people, the SCP continues to fight for socialism and a better world.
Massive marches took place across Yemen in reaction to US-UK aggression, as well as the US’s designation of Ansar Allah as a terrorist organization. Marchers defiantly chanted “steadfast with Palestine, and America is the mother of terrorism.” (Photo: Yemen News Agency)
Instead of responding to call to pressure Israel for a ceasefire, the US continues to escalate the regional conflict
On Friday, the US used airstrikes to destroy three missiles and launchers belonging to Ansar Allah in Yemen, in the sixth round of strikes in 10 days. Also on Friday, the US and the UK conducted two airstrikes on the Al-Jabana area in the city of Hodeidah, Yemen.
This is the latest US escalation since the US and UK began bombing Yemen last week. The Western bombing campaign comes in retaliation against Ansar Allah’s actions of solidarity with Palestine. Ansar Allah, also known as the Houthis, have declared that they will target all ships heading to Israel until it stops the genocide in Gaza.
US President Biden stirred controversy when asked whether the airstrikes in Yemen were “working.”
“Well, when you say working, are they stopping the Houthis? No,” responded Biden, quite frankly. “Are they going to continue? Yes.”
Biden’s comments recall years of indiscriminate US bombings of countries in the Global South, including Afghanistan, Iraq, and Vietnam, which resulted in millions of deaths with little to no progress regarding stated US political goals for those regions.
The US government is attempting to portray the airstrikes as defensive. “We are not at war with the Houthis,” said Sabrina Singh, Pentagon spokesperson. “The Houthis are the ones that continue to launch cruise missiles, anti-ship missiles at innocent mariners… What we are doing, with our partners, is self-defense.”
Ansar Allah activities against Israeli shipping in the Red Sea have registered zero casualties. Meanwhile, US attacks against the group previously have resulted in the deaths of 10 Houthi fighters.
Massive marches took place across Yemen in reaction to US-UK aggression, as well as the US’s designation of Ansar Allah as a terrorist organization. Marchers defiantly chanted “steadfast with Palestine, and America is the mother of terrorism.”
Peoples Dispatch, formerly The Dawn News, is an international media project with the mission of bringing to you voices from people’s movements and organizations across the globe. Since its establishment three years ago, it has sought to ensure that the coverage of news from around the world is not restricted to the rhetoric of politicians and the fortunes of big companies but encompasses the richness and diversity of mobilizations from around the world.
A large banner that says ‘Biden Ceasefire Now’ is displayed as activist Isra Chaker places rose petals over symbolic white body bags, representing those killed by Israeli bombs, in front of the White House, Nov. 15, 2023, in Washington. | Andrew Harnik / AP
The Republican nominee for the presidency will be the 90-times-indicted rapist Donald Trump unless court rulings, guilty verdicts, or acts of God prevent that from happening. Depending upon who you believe, either the anti-MAGA majority will come through again and Biden will win or Trump himself could actually end up re-entering the White House. One thing’s for sure: Neither candidate will get there without a determined electorate marching to the polls on their behalf.
If we listen to the White House, Trump has been beaten often before and it will happen again. They have a point, of course, but they ignore much of what has been behind many of the anti-Trump victories—the struggles of labor and all its allies for a progressive people’s agenda.
It is those mass struggles that are reflected in all the initial victories for the people that took place in the Biden administration. Those victories by the movements and Biden’s willingness to carry them out, together with Democratic majorities in the Senate and the House, resulted in many real, tangible improvements in the daily lives of Americans.
As many of those things were accomplished, however, the Biden administration began to shoot itself in the foot with a series of horrific foreign policy initiatives.
From Ukraine to Gaza to Yemen, President Joe Biden’s disastrous foreign policy choices are eclipsing his domestic policy achievements and endangering his re-election chances. | Evan Vucci / AP
A combination of Cold Warrior instincts and his own extreme Russophobia resulted in Biden listening to those who told him he should not respond positively to Russian President Vladimir Putin, who wanted assurances that the United States would not push for Ukraine’s entrance into NATO. There is no way to tell for sure but that, and a few other reasonable moves by the U.S., might have prevented Putin from launching his invasion of Ukraine.
Although the invasion cannot be justified regardless, one cannot deny that the Biden administration, rather than cooling tensions before it happened, actually made things worse.
At the end of last year, we learned that an end to the war was possible in March 2022, one month after the invasion of Ukraine began. High-ranking members of the German military and Russian and Ukrainian diplomats who participated in the talks disseminated the terms of the deal to the press in Europe. It was mostly ignored in the U.S.
Big foreign policy mistake number one for the Biden administration was its decision to enlist the U.K. and NATO in sabotaging the deal.
Biden has never really supported peace talks between Russia and Ukraine, even though, as this is written, peace talks between them are happening. The leading generals on both sides are negotiating prisoner release deals, as they have in the past, but without the support of Biden or even Ukraine’s President Zelensky, who has become increasingly willing to march in lockstep with the Biden administration.
As he continued his disastrous Ukraine policy, Biden moved on to back a war by Israel on the people of Gaza. His support for the Israeli bombing of Gaza, with its genocidal results, is shocking to so many opposed to how they see Trump but who have seen Biden as a decent human being.
Biden, despite protestations about backing humanitarian aid to Gaza, has continued the flow into Gaza, not of medicine, food, and water, but of deadly weapons and bombs used by Israel. The U.S. weapons have already been used to kill tens of thousands of Palestinians.
He has opened the door to Republicans who are temporarily opportunistically blocking more weapons for Israel until they get draconian immigration policies on the Southern border. The aid is supposed to be approved by Congress and not used, under international law, for anything like the massive killing of civilians. Bernie Sanders in the Senate and Barbara Lee in the House are leading fights to make that point.
Biden has made no specific demands for a ceasefire to Israel’s leader, Benjamin Netanyahu. He continues to stubbornly hold on to his refusal to bend his policy of essentially supporting anything Israel does.
Biden’s view of his foreign policy responsibilities is that it is ok for him to include bullying, threats, sanctions, and even bombings to protect so-called “American interests” abroad.
“I know we have our divisions at home,” Biden said. “We have to get past them. We can’t let petty, partisan, angry politics get in the way of our responsibilities as a great nation. We cannot and will not let terrorists like Hamas and tyrants like Putin win. I refuse to let that happen.”
To carry out his quest for what he sees as “supporting democracy” abroad, he asked Congress for a $100 billion foreign aid appropriation that included some funding for Israel but the bulk, more than $60 billion, for Ukraine.
Ordered in the Navy
And now, he has dispatched the U.S. Navy to attack the Houthis of Yemen, who have been firing missiles for weeks at ships entering the Red Sea. The Houthis, in a now-expanded war resulting in major part from Biden’s awful foreign policy, say they will not stop until the bombing of Gaza is stopped by the U.S. and Israel and until food, water, and medicine, rather than bombs, start flowing into Gaza.
Didn’t anyone in the Biden administration bother to check with their autocratic pals in Saudi Arabia before bombing Yemen? The Saudis have long understood that the Houthis are not simply a proxy for Iran. They are close allies of Iran, but they have a much more extreme fundamentalist ideology. Among their leaders are some whom they consider to be more important than any of the top clerics in Iran.
The Saudis failed to defeat the Houthis even after seven years of war against them, a war they fought also with U.S. weapons. They started that battle, with the full backing of the U.S., in 2015.
The Saudis constantly carpet-bombed and fired missiles at Yemen, killing tens of thousands for those seven years but essentially got nowhere in their attempt to defeat the Houthis. The U.S. was fully on board in that war, supplying weapons, intelligence, air defense systems, and modern fighter jets.
Despite the constant barrage of Saudi and U.S. attacks, the Houthis held on. The U.S. and the Saudis finally backed down, not because they had won, but because the Houthis were beginning to threaten Saudi and international oil cartel capacity in the south of Saudi Arabia.
So, here we are in yet another war with a Biden administration unsure of what it can really accomplish. What does Biden think he can do in Yemen that the U.S. could not do in seven years of warfare there already?
Big shipping companies have already opted to take the extra week or two and expend the extra fuel to go around the continent of Africa and bypass the Houthi blockade of the Red Sea. If oil prices rise as a result and prices come up again at the pump in the U.S., we will have yet another major impediment to Biden’s re-election.
Biden’s Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, inspects weapons as he tours a Ukrainian military base near Kiev, Sept. 7, 2023. Ukraine is losing the war against Russia, according to most credible reports. Biden is still trying to funnel a further $60 billion or more in new weapons to the Zelensky government. | Brendan Smialowski / Pool photo via AP
Getting back to Ukraine, it should be clear to Biden that he has big problems even if he “succeeds” in Yemen—a virtual impossibility because his administration has no plan there other than bombing to try to open the Red Sea passage. And that seems already that it could be failing.
Perhaps the administration hopes a war in Yemen might deflect attention from the losing battle in Ukraine. Whatever Biden does in Yemen, however, is unlikely to undo the political damage he has done to himself by backing what is now a losing war in Ukraine and a genocide in Gaza.
On another front, the president has a youth problem that has nothing to do with his own age. Millions of youth are angry about the war on Gaza, and he needs them if he is to win the election in November. Large Arab-American voting blocks in the key swing state, Michigan, are no small problem, either.
There are reports of a fight within the Biden administration, with many, including the president himself, thinking that he has to stay the course on his foreign policy in order to win a second term. Others say this is not the case, and there are reports that some fundraisers are saying some “givers” are thinking about holding back on their money. At this point, however, Biden has a lot more money stockpiled than anyone else.
It would be best for him, the nation, and the world if he reversed his disastrous foreign policies. Reversal would boost the fight against fascists, including Trump, in the elections in November.
Regardless of what the Biden administration does, however, millions in America who constitute the anti-MAGA and anti-fascist majority have our work cut out for us between now and November.
It’s tough when the alternative to an open fascist is a president who pursues a foreign policy unbecoming of a democracy.
We hope you appreciated this article. At People’s World, we believe news and information should be free and accessible to all, but we need your help. Our journalism is free of corporate influence and paywalls because we are totally reader-supported. Only you, our readers and supporters, make this possible. If you enjoy reading People’s World and the stories we bring you, please support our work by donating or becoming a monthly sustainer today. Thank you!
John Wojcik is Editor-in-Chief of People’s World. He joined the staff as Labor Editor in May 2007 after working as a union meat cutter in northern New Jersey. There, he served as a shop steward and a member of a UFCW contract negotiating committee. In the 1970s and ’80s, he was a political action reporter for the Daily World, this newspaper’s predecessor, and was active in electoral politics in Brooklyn, New York.
UN Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, has said the onslaught on Gaza by Israel over more than 100 days “has unleashed wholesale destruction and levels of civilian killings at a rate that is unprecedented” during his tenure.
Speaking to the press on Monday, Guterres said “Nothing can justify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people.”
The humanitarian situation in Gaza, Guterres stressed, “is beyond words. Nowhere and no one is safe.”
The UN chief criticized the flow of humanitarian assistance into the besieged enclave, saying “Life-saving relief is not getting to people who have endured months of relentless assault at anywhere near the scale needed.”
“The long shadow of starvation is stalking the people of Gaza — along with disease, malnutrition and other health threats,” Guterres warned.
He said he was “deeply troubled” by the “clear violation of international humanitarian law that we are witnessing.”
Security of Utmost Importance for Aid Delivery
Last week, Under-Secretary-General Sigrid Kaag began her work as Senior Humanitarian and Reconstruction Coordinator for Gaza — in line with the Security Council resolution that demands “the safe and unhindered delivery of humanitarian assistance.”
Guterres appealed to all States and parties to the conflict for their full cooperation as Kaag works with members of the Security Council and regional actors to deliver on the mandate set in the resolution.
152 @UN staff members have been killed in Gaza since 7 October – the largest single loss of life in the history of our organization.
Still, aid workers, under enormous pressure and with no safety guarantees, are doing their best to deliver inside Gaza. pic.twitter.com/2crouB2FqO
He explained that an aid operation in Gaza requires certain basics, foremost being security. Therefore, “the United Nations and our partners cannot effectively deliver humanitarian aid while Gaza is under such heavy, widespread and unrelenting bombardment.”
“We need an immediate humanitarian ceasefire. To ensure sufficient aid gets to where it is needed,” he said.
Only 7 of 29 Missions to North Gaza
Since October 7, 152 UN staff members have been killed in Gaza, “the largest single loss of life in the history of our organization — a heart-wrenching figure and a source of deep sorrow.”
Guterres also criticized the “significant hurdles” at the Gaza border, saying that vital materials, including life-saving medical equipment have been rejected with little or no explanation.
He also said the aid operation faces major impediments to distribution within Gaza, including “repeated denials of access to the north”, where hundreds of thousands of Palestinians remain.
Since the start of the year, just 7 of 29 missions to deliver aid to the north have been able to proceed, he stressed.
“Large stretches of agreed routes cannot be used due to heavy fighting and debris, with unexploded ordnance also threatening convoys.”
He called for the release of hostages to be facilitated, warning that “the longer the conflict in Gaza continues, the greater the risk of escalation and miscalculation.”
Concerned about “a broader escalation between Israel and Lebanon” which could affect “regional stability,” Guterres concluded that “We cannot see in Lebanon what we are seeing in Gaza. And we cannot allow what has been happening in Gaza to continue.”
According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health, 24,285 Palestinians have been killed, and 61,154 wounded in Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza starting on October 7.
Palestinian and international estimates say that the majority of those killed and wounded are women and children.
The Palestine Chronicle website was established in September 1999 and has grown in its importance and scope of coverage mostly because of the support it received from socially conscious and progressive scholars, writers, activists, readers and communities around the world.
A British Typhoon aircraft returns to base in Cyprus after participating in a bombing raid in Yemen Friday, Jan. 12, 2024. | U.K. Ministry of Defence via AP
WASHINGTON—With tens of thousands of ceasefire activists poised to converge on Washington and London this weekend, the Biden administration and the Sunak government in Britain teamed up to let loose a wave of punishing airstrikes on Yemen Friday.
The bombing raids signal a major escalation and expansion of Israel’s war in Gaza, something President Joe Biden has claimed he seeks to avoid. Supporters of peace in Palestine on both sides of the Atlantic immediately condemned the attacks for raising the danger of an even bigger conflict.
“We fail to understand why President Biden would rather risk a regional war by bombing Yemen instead of simply stopping the Gaza genocide that is fueling conflict around the world,” Nihad Awad, executive director of Council on American-Islamic Relations, said. CAIR is one of organizers of the Jan. 13th March for Gaza in D.C.
Rep. Cori Bush, D-Mo., the lead sponsor of a Gaza ceasefire resolution in the U.S. Congress, accused the president of “violating Article I of the Constitution by carrying out airstrikes…without congressional approval.” In a post to X, she declared, “The American people are tired of endless war.”
Communist Party USA Co-Chair Joe Sims in the party’s New York office Friday morning, just before his departure for Washington, D.C., to join the national March for Gaza. | People’s World
On his way from New York to D.C. for the Saturday rally, Communist Party USA Co-Chair Joe Sims called the decision to bomb Yemen a “dangerous escalation” of the tense situation in the Middle East. “This is a moment when negotiations and diplomacy are needed, not more bombs,” he told People’s World.
“The administration should be using its power to push for a ceasefire to stop the killing in Gaza, not looking for fresh targets to expand the fighting,” Sims said.
Dangerous escalation
In the U.K., the Stop the War Coalition and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament—major leaders of the British ceasefire movement—issued a joint statement blasting Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Biden. They said the recent battles in the Red Sea are a “direct consequence” of the U.S., Britain, and their allies’ support for Israel’s three-month assault on Gaza.
At least 73 separate raids were carried out late Thursday night and early Friday morning by U.S. and British forces, which included jet bombers, guided missiles, submarines, and the U.S. aircraft carrier group stationed in the region. The targets were reportedly munitions depots, launch sites, and command centers operated by the Houthi movement, which controls Yemen.
For weeks, the Houthis have been harassing the shipping lanes of the Red Sea in an attempt to disrupt cargo ships bound for Israeli ports. Biden said Friday that the bombings were proof that the U.S. “will not tolerate” any interference with shipping in the area.
“I will not hesitate to direct further measures to protect our people and the free flow of international commerce as necessary,” he said.
Speaking from Ukraine, where he’s visiting President Volodymyr Zelensky, Sunak called the strikes an act of “self-defense,” even as he tried to tamp down critics back home who slammed him for not consulted with parliament before sending the military into combat.
The global capitalist economy has been feeling the effects of the Houthis’ actions. Nearly 15% of global seaborne trade passes through the Suez Canal and the Red Sea, including 12% of sea-traded oil, 8% of the world’s liquefied natural gas trade, and 8% of the global grain trade. Oil tankers and giant containerships are avoiding the route, forced to instead go all the way around the African continent.
The diversion is costing some of the world’s biggest corporations billions in extra shipping costs and delaying deliveries; oil prices have been steadily climbing higher for weeks as the U.S. issued fresh ultimatums and reports indicated that strike plans were being finalized.
While the U.S. and the U.K. could not be moved to take action in defense of Palestinian lives these past months, their retaliation on behalf of corporate commerce came swiftly.
Immediately after the bombings, Russia requested an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council, calling the actions “irresponsible.” Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan furiously denounced the strikes, accusing the U.S. and Britain of turning the Red Sea into a “sea of blood.”
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning called on nations “not to escalate tensions” in the Red Sea. An Italian government official anonymously told the press that Italy had refused to take part in the raids or to support them, preferring to pursue a “calming” policy in the Red Sea.
Rather than a calming approach, however, Israeli government figures and several right-wing leaders in the U.S. are pressuring Biden to go even further than just bombing Yemen. They are advocating a full-blown war with Iran—an outcome that would cement the U.S. and Israel together in a deadly gamble.
Since the Houthis (like Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza) have the support of the Iranian government, the latter must be overthrown, according to the war hawks.
Former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett went public in his advocacy for a war with Iran, writing in a widely-circulated Wall Street Journal opinion piece recently, “It’s time for the U.S. and its allies to target its head, Tehran, and bring down its regime.”
John Bolton—former Trump cabinet member and one of the architects of the U.S. war in Iraq—made the same argument in late December. He’s rallying neocons in the U.S. to squeeze Biden, declaring the U.S. has “no option but to attack Iran.” Ever since President George W. Bush declared Iran to be part of the “Axis of Evil” over 20 years ago, Bolton and his allies have been angling for a fight with that country.
In Yemen, meanwhile, Houthi spokesperson Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree announced in a radio address that the strikes would “not go unanswered or unpunished.” The U.S. Navy warned all ships flying American flags to stay out of the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden for the next 72 hours.
Holding the line for a ceasefire
Back around the globe in Washington, progressive lawmakers are not letting up in their attempt to push Biden away from supporting more war.
Rep. Ilhan Omar, DFL-Minn., is heading up a global petition of lawmakers from multiple countries to press their governments to stop supporting the genocidal war against Palestinians. Over 450 parliamentarians from over 30 countries have so far added their names.
“We can hold two things in our heads at once: that the attacks by Hamas on October 7 were a war crime, and that Israel has responded by committing crimes against humanity—crimes that the United States, and much of the West continue to let happen, despite our professed support for international law,” Omar said this week.
Democratic Representatives Jamaal Bowman (New York), Cori Bush (Missouri), André Carson (Indiana), Greg Casar (Texas), Jesús García (Illinois), Hank Johnson (Georgia), Summer Lee (Pennsylvania), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (New York), Ayanna Pressley (Massachusetts), Nydia Velázquez (New York), and Bonnie Watson Coleman (New Jersey) have all become signatories.
Outside the Capitol, ceasefire activists started arriving by bus, train, plane, and automobile to D.C. Friday. Ending Israel’s war in Gaza, participants, would get to the root of what now threatens to become a major Middle East war.
“We’re past three months of constant killing,” Mohamad Habehh, development director of American Muslims for Palestine—lead organizer of Saturday’s march—told the press on Friday.
“We feel that it is important for us to come on this holiday weekend in the spirit of MLK when he said that ‘injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere,’ that we stand up against the injustice that’s going on in Gaza right now, and stand up against the atrocities that are being supported and being promoted by our government.”
We hope you appreciated this article. At People’s World, we believe news and information should be free and accessible to all, but we need your help. Our journalism is free of corporate influence and paywalls because we are totally reader-supported. Only you, our readers and supporters, make this possible. If you enjoy reading People’s World and the stories we bring you, please support our work by donating or becoming a monthly sustainer today. Thank you!
C.J. Atkins is the managing editor at People’s World. He holds a Ph.D. in political science from York University in Toronto and has a research and teaching background in political economy and the politics and ideas of the American left. In addition to his work at People’s World, C.J. currently serves as the Deputy Executive Director of ProudPolitics.
The measures are part of a “decree” announced by the far-right president in December.
The Argentine judiciary has granted a request from the National Confederation of Labor (CGT), the country’s main trade union center, and suspended the effects of the labor reform provided for in the “decree” launched by the government of ultra-right Javier Milei last December. The court decision published on January 3 is a precautionary one, i.e. it suspends the measure.
The decision was taken by the National Chamber of Labor Appeals, the first instance in the Argentine judiciary for appeals on labor issues. The court argued that there was no proven need or urgency to make the decision without consulting the Argentine Congress, which is responsible for legislation.
The “decretazo” is formally called the Decree of Necessity and Urgency (DNU), and is provided for in the Argentine Constitution. However, the executive branch can only issue this type of decree when there are exceptional circumstances and it is not possible to wait for Congress to meet.
Among other measures, the Milei government’s labor reform extends the probationary period for new employees from three to eight months (thus increasing the period in which employers can fire new workers without paying severance pay).
It also authorized the dismissal of workers who take part in picket lines or occupy workplaces during stoppages or strikes, as well as changes to overtime compensation systems.
According to Argentine newspaper La Nación, Wednesday’s court decision came as a surprise to the government. Clarín, another daily in the country, said that the government will appeal to higher courts to overturn the injunction issued by the Labor Appeals Chamber.
This article was translated from an article originally published in Portuguese onBrasil De Fato.
COMMUNIST PARTY OF MAINE 