[Marxism] 5th Cairo conference links to no US bases campaign

[Greg McDonald <sabocat59@xxxxxxx>]

The International Campaign against US and Zionist Occupation
5th Cairo Conference
"Towards an International Alliance against Imperialism and Zionism"

Conference Declaration

The 5th Cairo conference is held at a time that is full of potential,  
but also full of challenges. The war launched by the Zionist military  
artillery against Lebanon with the support of the US and Europe ended  
with an unprecedented defeat of the Zionist entity by the hands of  
the heroic resistance of Hezbollah. However, the battle is not over  
yet and the siege, which the Zionists and the US administration are  
trying to impose on the Lebanese resistance with the help of their  
local agents and their use of the weapon of sectarianism after  
failure of their planes and tanks means that we are facing major  
challenges that call upon all of us for the highest level of  
resistance and conscious struggle against sectarianism.
In Iraq, the fierce resistance against the American occupation has  
pushed the US administration into a hopeless swamp. There, too, the  
occupation is using its final card by trying to turn the battle  
against the occupation into an ugly sectarian conflict between Sunnis  
and Shiites. The resistance will not be able to liberate Iraq except  
through failing the trap of sectarianism and turning the resistance  
into a unified national one, that unites Shiites and Sunnis against  
the American occupant.
And in Palestine, where the resistance, under the leadership of  
Hamas, has survived the siege of starvation, without giving up to the  
American, Zionist and Arab pressures to surrender to the Zionist  
entity and the Oslo agreements, there too the enemy and its local  
agents have tried to impose a civil war in order to deviate the  
resistance from its path and spill Palestinian blood by Palestinian  
hands. Despite recent agreements and despite the awareness of the  
resistance to stand up to those attempts, still the challenge facing  
the resistance is a major one. The lifting of the siege calls for a  
revival of the Intifada and the weapon of resistance.
Today we also witness the escalation of military threats against Iran  
and the widespread mobilization by the American administration to  
launch a fierce air strike against Iran. It is obvious that the  
deeper the losses of the US administration in Iraq, the more the talk  
about the Iranian danger and the need to face it. As usual the  
“moderate” Arab regimes play their role in this agenda, both on the  
logistic military level and on the level of a media campaign that  
targets the isolation of the Iranian regime.
A crazy war launched by Bush against Iran will lead to the fall of  
hundreds of thousands of victims and the region, and probably the  
whole world, will enter a long period of unprecedented wars and  
tensions. WE have to join our efforts to stop this crazy war by  
organizing protests, demonstrations and campaigns all over the world.
While imperialism and its allies are using sectarianisms as a weapon  
to split and weaken the resistance, European and US governments are  
using the weapons of racism and Islamophobia as a weapon to justify  
their colonial aggression and the division of the antiwar movements.  
It is therefore that the struggle against anti Moslem racism is an  
integral part of out struggle against war.
In Arab countries, it is no longer possible to separate the struggle  
against despotism from the struggle against war and the US and  
Zionist colonialism in the region. Regimes allied to imperialism,  
especially the Egyptian, Saudi and Jordanian regimes are playing a  
crucial role in attempting to strangulate and besiege the  
Palestinian, Lebanese and Iraqi resistance in exchange for the US  
support for their despotism. It is therefore that any action taken in  
Arab countries for freedom and justice should be considered an asset  
to armed resistance; and every victory achieved by the resistance is  
at the same time an earthquake that shatters the thrones of despotism  
and corruption in our region.
Also, it is no longer possible to separate between the starvation and  
impoverishment policies imposed by those regimes on the Arab peoples  
in the name of capitalist globalization and neoliberalism on the one  
hand and the regional role played by those regimes on the other. The  
same regimes that open their territories and waters and airspace for  
the colonial US army are the same ones that impose economic policies  
that serve nobody but the giant multinational companies and a small  
group of local, corrupt businessmen. The price is paid by the  
majority of the people.
We are facing major challenges. We hope that our conference would  
constitute a qualitative step forwards on our path to unite efforts  
between the resistance movements and the national Arab opposition  
movement, including Islamists, socialists. Arab nationalists and the  
global antiwar movement.
Facing all those challenges the 5th Cairo conference has concluded  
with the following recommendations:

I. Supporting the resistance in Palestine Iraq and Lebanon

1- Iraq
A- Linking the antiwar struggle in occupying countries (US, UK, etc.)  
and occupation supporting countries (Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia) and  
strengthening the pressure on those governments with the aim to:
-       Closing military bases.
-       Ending logistic support to US forces.
-       Closure of ground, naval and aviation passages to US forces.
-       Call for the formation of a unified national front against  
occupation and sectarianism.
-       Strengthening the call for impeachment of the puppet Iraqi  
government (closure of embassies, banning visits, demonstrations  
against visits by Iraqi officials).
-       Call for stopping all forms of collaboration in training of  
Iraqi military and police under occupation.
-       Organization of humanitarian aid (food, medicines, etc.) to  
Iraqi people inside and outside Iraq (Organization of ongoing  
solidarity missions).
B- Organization of an annual demonstration in March against US  
occupation of Iraq.

2- Palestine
-       Revival of and networking between movements against the wall  
of racial discrimination.
-       Organization of campaigns to break the siege imposed on the  
people and resistance in Palestine.
-       Organization of demonstrations worldwide against visits by  
Zionist officials (Bush, Cheney).
-       Strengthening and linking boycott movements in Arab countries  
(Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Gulf).
-       Organization of humanitarian aid to the Palestinian people.
-       Development of a website of Boycott of Zionist entity, in  
both Arabic and English languages to introduce and link between  
committees and organizations working on boycott worldwide.
-       Organization of an international campaign for the boycott of  
Israel and organization of an annual demonstration in September in  
support of  the rights of the Palestinian people.

3- Lebanon
-       Considering the UN forces in Lebanon as occupation forces and  
supporting popular movements in the respective countries to withdraw  
those troops.
-       Exposure and isolation of Lebanese forces in alliance with  
the US and Israel and the role of Arab regimes in supporting them.
-       Joint preparation for strengthening of widest popular  
movements in case of a new Zionist attack on Lebanon aiming to  
destroy the resistance.
-       Supporting the Lebanese resistance against the US-Zionist  
project.
-       Organization of an annual international demonstration in July  
against the aggression against Lebanon.

II. Facing the war threats because of nuclear energy (Iran – Korea)

-       Uniting positions and efforts against a US attack on Iran,  
and organization of campaigns against ongoing escalation and siege  
imposed on Iran. In the case of US war against Iran organization of  
an international demonstration against this aggression.
-       Nuclear disarmament of Israel
-       Supporting the right of peoples to own nuclear technology for  
peaceful use.
-       Exposure of double standards in addressing the nuclear issue  
(Israel viz. a viz. Iran and Korea).

III. Building bridges between the Left and Islamic movements against  
Imperialism and Globalization

-       Widening and deepening of collaboration between Islamic  
resistance movements and the struggles of the Left in the Arab region  
and internationally (Studying the different experiences in Lebanon,  
Egypt, Europe, etc.)
-       Political advocacy against all forms of racial discrimination  
against Arab and Moslem minorities in the West and linking that  
discrimination to the imperialist agenda.
-       Linking the struggle against colonialism and racism on the  
one hand and the struggle against capitalist globalization and new  
liberalism on the other. Challenging the notion of clash of  
civilizations or religions etc.
-       Linking the rising movements of the left in Latin America  
with the antiwar movements on the one hand and the resistance  
movements and nationalist forces in the Arab region on the other.
-       Call for the organization of a conference that joins the  
forces of Arab Left and the Islamic resistance movements in the Arab  
region to coordinate efforts of their national and democratic struggles.

IV. Concerning divisions among resistance movements

-       Coordination of efforts against the diversion of Iraqi  
resistance towards a sectarian civil war and exposure of the attempts  
by US occupation and Arab regimes to feed sectarian conflicts.
-       Supporting national unity in Lebanon, Palestine and Iraq  
without compromising the essential basics of resistance. (Rejecting  
the use of the slogan of national unity to facilitate the US-Zionist  
agendas).
-       Rejection of the use of national unity in favor of US and  
Zionist agendas.
-       Supporting and strengthening the unity of resistance (Sunni  
Hamas and Shiite Hezbollah against a united imperial project) and  
organization of worldwide activities to strengthen this unity and  
call for a joint conference to face sectarian divisions.

V. Building an international alliance of resistance

-       Developing strategies of continuous coordination between  
antiwar and resistance movements in the Arab region and Latin America.
-       Establishing a network for exchange of experience and  
information and coordination of activities.
-       Agreement on international days of protest along the lines of  
the 15th of February 2003.

VI. Supporting the Democratic Struggles of Arab Peoples

-       Supporting the struggle against freedom restricting laws  
under the pretext of fighting terrorism, exposing their racist and  
despotic nature and linking the despotism of international regimes  
and the struggle for democracy in the Arab region (Gunatanamo, Abu  
Ghreib, Egyptian and Saudi prisons, and secret detention centers in  
Europe).
-       Linking the rising social movements (workers and  
professional) in the Arab region and their counterparts in the  
different parts of the world and creation of mechanisms for  
solidarity and joint struggle.
-       Exposing the dictatorial Arab regimes and organization of sit  
ins and demonstrations against visits by symbols of despotic regimes.
-       Strengthening international solidarity with democratic  
movements against dictatorship in the Arab region (Organization of  
demonstrations against military tribunals, detentions, torture) and  
exposure of the oppressive regimes and the US and European  
complicity, and organization of an international campaign against  
referral of civilians to military courts in Egypt.


The Cairo conference organizing committee invites all groups, public  
figures, popular committees and civil society organizations  
struggling against Imperialism, Zionism, War and globalization in  
Egypt, the Arab world and worldwide to the Cairo social forum to be  
held between the 27th and 30th of March 2008.
The Egyptian organizing committee will form an Egyptian and  
international coordinating committee to prepare for the event.


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