Mid East Sell Out Prepared

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1 The red carpets in MidEast airports must have worn thin in recent weeks with th series of visits from UN Secretary General, Waldheim, from th to 12th February and new US Secretary of State Cyrus Vance from 15th to 21st.

These trips have been designed to take another step to 'peace' on terms dictated by the imperialists through re-convening the Geneva talks on the Middle East.

The imperialist powers and their negotiators are operating now in a new situation following the defeats inflicted on the Palestinians in Syria and the coming to power of a new administration in the United States.

The Syrians: with the connivance of the Soviet Union, have continued to stamp with an iron heel on Lebanon.

Just before the arrival of Vance they moved back from the Lebanese border with Israel after protests from the Zionist government. They have done this in order to tur their attention to those areas of the Lebanon that are still controlled by leftist and Palestinian FIERCE FIGHTING The movement of Syrian 'peacekeeping' troops away from the border led on February 13th to fierce fighting between Syrians and liberation forces in the area of Tel Nabla.

65 deaths were reported after two days of fighting in which Lebanese fascists were also involved on the side of the Syrians. Since then several more clashes have been reported.

The Zionist government, whose own internal problems have not been resolved by the re-election of Rabin 'as Labour Party leader, tried to portray this event as a 'diplomatic coup' on their part in preparation for the Vance tour.

In fact its purpose was to force back the Palestinians and to try to find a formula for their involvement in Geneva "peace" talks.

Such involvement is essential for the success of the taiks, and the Americans, who have begun to taik about "recognising the rights of the Palestinians' are more aware of this than anybody.

Various other preparations for bringing about Palestinian participation in a sell-out of their cause have also been made.

Thus on the same day as the fighting in South Lebanon, 13th rebruary, a letter appearea I Arbeiter Zeitung, paper of the Austrian Social Democratic Party led by Chancellor Kreitsky.

This unsigned letter, alleged to be from a leader of the Palestine Liberation Organisation, talked of possible reciprocal arrangements' with the Zionists, and of making concessions, presumably including the acceptance of the Zionist state, in return for a client state for the Palestinians on the West Bank of the River Jordan, currently in Israeli hands.

As usual the Israelis, who seem to be the worst judges of their own best interest, rejected all this as a trick, and insisted that the Palestinians• could only join Geneva "peace' talks in the baggage train of the Jordanians.

This talk has even led to rumours about further concessions by the Palestinian leadership.

In the week after the Vance trip they opened talks with King Hussein of Jordan on the possibility of an independent Palestinian state on the West Bank.

The Fateh leadership were compelled by all these developments to issue a statement on 16th February which denied the existence of "any document delivered to any party which recognised Israel in any way whatIt reaffirmed "its firm stand in rejecting all the capitulationist projects which the imperialist and Zionist forces are trying to impose on the region with the support of the USA"

However, some doubts will remain about this after Yassir Arafat's own visits to various Arab capitals.

in a press conference given in Kuwait on 20th February he denied any agreement with Vance or the US imperialists, but nevertheless expressed his continued support for the idea of a West Bank state.

Talks with the Jordanians then began along with reports about possible efforts within the Palesttinian leadership to exclude those opposed to the West Bank state, possibly at the meeting of the enlarged Palestine National Council which opened last weekend.

Finally on March 8th there was the much publicised reconciliation' in Cairo between Arafat and Hussein, the butcher of the Palestinians in "black September' of 1970.

The need for firm and resolute leadership of the Palestinian Revolution was never greater than now and a rejection of all the "great power" solutions being suggested to them is clearer than ever before.

For this the Palestinians will have to look not to the Arab governments, but to the Lebanese workers who supported them against the Syrians, and to the Egyptian masses who recently erupted into. the streets in the 200,000 refugees to return to their land in Turkish occupied territory.

The Stalinist AKEU and the Socialist Party (EDEK)-neither of which did anything to stop the coup before the 1974 invasion, who did nothing to mobilise the Cypriot toilers, and who supported the Turkish invasion, continue their betrayals.

They are now supporting Makarios' position in these talks, while the Soviet Union simply calls for the negotiations to take place at the United Nations.

Meanwhile US envoy Clifford and UN Secretary General Kurt Waldheim have correctly pointed out that the future of the negotiations depends on the outcome of the coming elections in Turkey.

This is particularly true because of the opposition within the National Front coalition government to any concessions to the Greek Cypriots over land or the return of refugees.

These opposition forces are demanding the lifting of the US embargo before any concessions in The lies that were put out at the time of the Turkish invasion-that Turkey would protect Turks and give them land and jobs has proved completely false.

On the contrary, the Turkish bourgeoisie has extracted tons of goods from the occupied territories and transferred them to Turkey.

UNEMPLOYMENT

But now sharpening struggles have opened up against unemployment and inflation.

A few weeks ago 3,000 public sector workers took strike action demanding wage increases linked to prices. And peasants have begun to struggle pursuing demands for land.

The recent talks and the further talks to come on Cyprus will do nothing for the Cypriot masses.

Both Greek and Turkish toilers must unite in struggle against imperialism and for an independent *For an independent Cyprus!

*All troops out of Cyprus now!

*For the unity of Turkish and Greek toilers against the capitalists