Middle East Cauldron of Anti-imperialist Struggle

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Zinnict lender Reigin with Carter in New York The effects of the libera. tion struggles in Palestine and the anti-imperialist ferment in Iran on the world balance of forces have been seen in developing violence in the entire Middle East region, and in the changes in international politics that come in their train.

The brutal murder on Friday last, 18 April, of privates Barrett and Smallhorne from the Irish army serving with the UN forces has served in some way to bring home the character of the forces. at work in Southern Lebanon at the moment.

The fact that these men were not. only unarmed, "sexually assaulted and thrown into ditch, but were also white Westerners has done something to increase the horror in certain quarters at what has been going on there: However, they have not in any way altered the daily occurance of such murderous incidents.

.. 'Christian militias' The • so-called "Christian militias of Major Saad Haddad which operate in the area are extreme racialists, and reactionary: elements with attitudes openly adopted from European :These people who take on the very phrases and postures of the Spanish falange and the Nazi blackshirts are actually financed, trained and supplied by the Israelis. They could not exist otherwise.

Such collaboration with fascism is of course not new for the Zionist movement.

At this point, however, it tie ine it the desperate efforts Palestine to bolster itself against any pressure by the American imperialists and the Egyptian petty bourgeoisie to compromise with the Palestinians and the Arab bourgeoisie generally.

For Begin the policy of fautonomy for the Palestinians' means setting up in the territories occupied in 1967 elective bodies with rather less power than English local councils.

However, at the moment the Zionist authorities refuse to 'even allow elections of mayors in the area. This is because they know very well that those elected would be the most vigorous opponents of their rule, and supporters of the Palestinian liberation movement.

Such attitudes are typical of the Zionist method of negotiation, particularly when they are under pressure from the imperialists to make concessions to the Arab bourgeoisie.

The Egyptian regime of Sadat, whose ideas about Palestinian autonomy correspond more closely to the form of South African bantustan, is also desperate for some concéssions. from Israel that might appear to show benefits for the Palestinians.

Not only has Sadat become the outcast of the Arab world; there gre definite signs of growing internal opposition to his regime.

The Egyptian authorities within the last week have announced the breaking up of the umpteenth 'communist conspiracy' to overthrow them.

They have shot down students protesting against the presence of the Shah in the country, and handed down prison sentences to those involved 20 months ago in demonstrations against. rising food prices.

For the United States, the stakes are of course much higher. With their apparent impotence in the face of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the hostages crisis in Iran, they have to win support from some sections of the bourgeoisie in the Arab countries.

This they aim to do in part through concessions to the Palestinians-which they cannot easily wring from their Zionist proteges.

• Despite the great propaganda value of the taunting of the might of American imperialism by means of the holding of the hostages, the confused and divided leaders of the Iranian Revolution have consistently shown the political limitations of their stand against imperialism.

At the end of March, they launched yet another bloody assault against the Kurdish part of Iran, in which dozens of Kurdish villagers are said to have been killed.

During. April, a similarly reactionary and chauvinist campaign has been developed by the Iranian authorities on the basis of their traditional rivalries with Iraq.

The sharpening of the propaganda battle against Iraq is in part aimed to deny democrațic rights to the Arab minority in Iran, and in part to bolster the disintegrating unity of the Iranian state itself by whipping up anti-foreign sentiments.

Ba'athist agents

Already a number of violent incidents in Tehran have been attributed to 'Baathist agents' and the General Secretary of the Islamic Republican Party, which has the largest number of seats in the forthcoming Iranian assembly, has provided the following analysis.

"The Bagdad regime, allied to Israel, is nothing but a puppet l manipulated by the United States.

*The Baathists have always used revolutionary phrases to cover up their counter-revolutionary activities.

Already in the 50s and they supported American imperialism against Nasser and Arab nationalism. Today they are trying to provoke the overthrow of the Islamic republic.

Bagdad. has become the centre of all the activities of the supporters of the Shah and their American allies."

The appeal of the Ayatollah Chirazi was clearer: He told anti-imperialist demonstrators that in the dispute with Iraq, Iranians should support the victory of the wishes of God over the forces of the devil.

In Iraq, meanwhile, the reacton has not been any less chauvinist.

The Iraqi regime has its own war with the Kurdish minority and its own internal dissentions.

Recent attempts to assassinate vice-president Tariq AziZ have been routinely blamed on the Iranians, but they may well come from the methods regularly employed by the Baathist governmental clique to settle their own differences.

Meanwhile, the isolation. of Iraq from the so-called 'Steadfastness Front' of Lybia, Syria, Algeria, South Yemen and the PLO has also caused problems for those who do not appear to be doing so much to aid the Palestinians.

Iraq's only response to the recent conference of the 'Steadfastness Front' and its decision to set up a special envoy in Syria has been to expel the Popular Democratic Front from Bagdad.

This section of the PLO, which claims adherence to 'Marxism-Leninism' used to work very closely with the Iraqi authorities.

• Faced with these difficulties the Iraqi regime has built up an anti-Persian campaign which has definite racist undertones.

Not only have there been bellicose noises on the question of islands in the Gulf seized by the Shah in the early 70s. There have also been widespread expulsions from Iraq of many thousands citizens Iranian origin.

Something of the spirit of the Iraqi campaign can be gathered from the statement of President Saddam Hussein on 5 April that the assassination attempts in Bagdad were part of the efforts by the Khomeii regime to avenge the Kaddishieh.

This battle (which took place in AD 663), was a Muslim victory against the Persians.

Similar chauvinist feelings have been built up by the arrest in Iraq of the Shiite Muslim leader Imman Mohammed al Bakr al Sadr.

Large demonstrations and strikes are reported • from Lebanon on 15 April as a result of this arrest; and the consistent but as yet unfounded rumours that Imman al Sadr had been killed.

Considerable difficulties are faced by those who: have decided to support.one or other section of the anti-imperialist petty bourgeoisie.

Of like Gerry Healy's News ne vou have uncritically sup ported all of them, the best way of dealing with the rivalries between them is to ignore them in your paper.

If, on the other hand, you are like the Soviet bureaucracy and can supply them with arms, you can lend your weight to whichever force seems the stronger.-at this point the Iranians.

The anti-colonialist strwggle:

of the Palestinians: and th Kurds and the anti-imperialist mobilisation of the Iranian people continues to scare every imperialist and to upset the calculations of every bureaucrat.

It is only the fight to present the policies of revolutionary socialism and mobilise the working class in these battles that will eventually secure their success.