Holocaust in Thi

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WILL ADAMS reports on what the WILL ADAMS reports on what the Palestinians face as the Israeli army Palestinians face as the Israeli army surrounds, bombards and stages 'mock' surrounds, bombards and stages 'mock' United Nations Partition Plan GULF GULF OF SUEZ A Gulf of Aqaba THINK OF FALLING IN • NOPE WHILE the world's attention was distracted by the war in the South Atlantic, Israel decided to launch an invasion of Lebanon.

The excuse given was that it was an act of revenge for the shooting of an Israeli ambassador in London but it was clear that the invasion had been planned for many months. Already over 10,000 Israel citizens and Palestinian refugees in Lebanon have been killed during the Israeli invasion and over half a million have Beirut LEBANN been left homeless.

The British press blandly reports the invasion, presfor a Jewish State in 1947 enting it as a conflict between evenly matched powers when in fact Israel has one of the largest, Territories seized by Israel !RL most ruthless military in 1947 and 1.948 machines in the world. The Lebanese National MoveTerritories seized by Israel ment and the Palestine Liberation Organisation are in June 1967 fighting a heroic struggle against the odds, relying only on themselves and the Territory ceded back to Eg pt power of international under Camp David deal solidarity.

In Lebanon a civil war broke out in the mid70s. On one side were the largely Christian militias, Mediterranean Sea Jerusalem often fascists, racist and pro-imperialist. On the other side was the Lebanese National Movement; consisting of the mainly Muslim militias and leftwing organisations, and the Palestinians.

Invasion In the course of the JORDAN invasion the Zionists and imperialists want to wipe out the Lebanese National Movement and the Palestinian Liberation Organisation which has been using Lebanon as a base, and CAIRO establish a suitably rightwing government in Lebanon that will act in the interests of imperialist policy in the region.

Israel was set up by e • rited Nations partition of Palestine in 1947. Control SAUDI of Israel was given to the ARAB small population of Jews EGYPT within its borders, many of whom were recent immigrants.

The workers of the native Arab population who were the majority in Palestine were ignored both by the UN and by the state of Israel.

The partition was followed by war between Israel Red Red Sea and the Arab states, the Arabs rightly, resisting the partition of their land.

NIPOUT AND The Zionists occupied the CATCH THE LAST area granted to them by HOST WILL YOU the 1947 partition and also part of what the UN had granted the Palestinians.

The Jordanian regime snatched the rest. Existing amongst Arab countries justifiably hostile to it, SUCCESS Israel has been forved to semitism. Zionists argue that it is not safe for Jews to live among non-Jews and so it was necessary to establish a separate state for Jews. In this Zionism is clearly a racist ideology: In its beginning Zionism was a minority ideology among Jews, even though Britain in 1917 recognised that a Jewish homeland would be established in Palestine, regardless of the wishes of the Palestinians. It was only after the extermination of six million Jews in Hitler's gas chambers that Zionism gained the support of large numbers of Jews. In other words, the Arab people are being told to compensate the Jews of Europe for the crimes committed against the Jews by the imperialists.

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In the fighting that followed the partition of their land, many Palestinians fled or were driven out of their homes. Some fled to Arab states and established camps on Israel's borders - unable to return.

Others, who moved from one part of Palestine to another to escape the fighting found that they were prevented by the Israelis from returning to their lands.

Most of this land was given to Jews. The expulsions of Palestinians did not stop in 1947-8, however. Today, there are massive refugee camps in Lebanon and other areas where Palestinians live, struggling for the right to return to their homeland.

In the 1967 war, Israel invaded the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, the Golan Heights and the Sinai. Israeli Jews were organised to go and establish settlements in these areas, again expelling some of the Palestinian population.

Discrimination

Palestinians within Israel face open, systematic discrimination. Palestinians get worse jobs, lower wages and poorer housing than Jews. Palestinian workers are not allowed to form their own trade unions, but are only allowed to join the Arab section of the Histadrut, the Israeli ''Federation of Labour", which besides being a major force for Zionism (it used to organise widespread boycotts of Arab products in favour of Jewish products) is also one of Israel's major employdenies the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes. Israel tries to deny that the Palestinians are a nation and forbids the flying of the Palestinians are a nation and forbids the flying of the Palestinian flag.

But the Palestinians have not lost their national identity, despite being dispersed over the. Middle East. If anything, their desire to live as a nation has been strengthened by the creation of Israel. The overwhelming majority of Palestinians support the Palestine Liberation Organisation, an umbrella organisation • of groups fighting for a Palestinian homeland, and wish to have this organisation representing them The hypocrisy of the Zionists is clear: they claim that Israel is a haven for Jews fleeing the genocide of Nazi gas chambers, yet they are presently carrying out genocide against Lebanese and Palestinian people; they claim that Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East, bur full democratic rights are only given to the Jewish population.

As socialists we fully support the fight of the Palestinians for a secular democratic state in PalesRally This is a recruiting the Army - post Falklands episode.

Youth in Britain have had imperialist war drive can d South Atlantic. They dug and got their imperial tas Even on the way they wer mere £11,000 a shot... f war being conducted at ho with all those who might of Every night on TV we age, making us teel someho who were dying. The Sur boys all the way.

But why should we ba schemes that offer us £25 1 The detention centres tha back against the Tories al security snoopers who say dole? Thatcher for throwi the dole queue?

The truth is that we Britain'. Most of us can't never supported Thatcher | can we betray her?

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air attacks on Beirut. air attacks on Beirut.