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Lebanon

Changing the Rules of the Game? Let it Be!

A Statement

Tuesday 25 July 2006, by Revolutionary Communist Group - Lebanon

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By their attempt to kill a large number of unarmed civilians, and to destroy infrastructure that has been previously destroyed many times, the current Zionist government, in response to “The sincere promise” operation that the fighters of Hezbollah lately performed, aims at changing the rules of the game, making the Lebanese people pay a very high and recurring price.

To achieve this, the Zionist government doesn’t only count on its sweeping military power, but also on official Arab and international collusion, which is extremely disgraceful and flagrant. This collusion is performed by different governments in Europe and America, particularly, but also the Arab governments, primarily the Saudi, which held the Islamic resistance “fully responsible” for “uncalculated adventures” and that “it should face, alone, the consequences of the conflict it created”!! This disgraceful position was later taken also by the Egyptian president Mubarak and the Jordanian King Abdullah the Second in a joint statement.

The current situation is open to numerous possibilities, and it requires taking into consideration the following visions, conclusions and tendencies:

First: “The sincere promise” did not come like lightning in a clear sky. Israel has been making daily aggressions, by sea and air, against Lebanese sovereignty; there are still many Lebanese detainees in Israeli prisons; tens of martyrs’ bodies are not returned to their parents. The Israeli army continues bombing the Gaza strip, killing Palestinian civilians and assassinating activists and militants in Gaza and the occupied West Bank, on the pretext of retrieving the soldier Jelaad Shalit who was previously kidnapped by Palestinian organizations on the borders of the strip, for the purpose of trading him for detainees in the Israeli prisons.

The latest operation, during which the fighters of Hezbollah succeeded in kidnapping two Israeli soldiers, was faced with a disgraceful official Arab position (the same previously faced by the Palestinian operation). It represents, in fact, (almost) the only shining solidarity movement with the struggle of the Palestinian people and for the easing of its pains and miseries. At the same time it expresses loyalty to the cause of the Lebanese detainees and their Palestinian and Arab comrades in the Zionist prisons.

Second: Facing the respect for human dignity with which this operation, which only targeted soldiers, was characterized, we cannot but notice the mean spirit that we hear from the local right wing, tied to world Imperialism, which is very cautious to avoid any form of confrontation with Israel, looking only to its material interests, and to the billions of dollars that were expected within the tourism sector during this summer. It is a mean spirit that was expressed in statements by many of the figures of what is called the 14 March coalition, and specifically by the Prime Minister Fuad Saniora and his government. These statements and speeches not only distanced themselves from any solidarity with the operation, but also seemed to condemn it and its participants, calling for the completion of the Lebanese army’s control of all Lebanese areas, with what that implies concerning the disarmament of the resistance, putting an end to its role in confronting the occupation, and implementing the remaining items of Resolution 1559. This at a time when the country needs the utmost solidarity and unity in the face of the destructive war that Israel is launching against the Lebanese people. It is the same story being repeated again and again, the story of the Trojan horse, ready for use at the right moment to complete the reversal of the political, social and economic balances in its favour and the favour of its masters outside the country.

To answer all this, requires continuous work to gather the largest political and popular front - in solidarity with the heroic act that the fighters of the resistance accomplished; not submitting to the local and Arab and international pressures; refusing to hand over the two kidnapped soldiers except under the conditions which the secretary general of Hezbollah announced. It is essential to defeat the current Israel war aims and open the road to what the military analyst in Israeli Haaretz newspaper Zeif Shev expected, “if Israel loses this confrontation”... “its strategic and military stance in the region will change, and its deterrence will be shaken against the guerrilla fighting and the rocket weaponry”.

Third: The current and almost absolute capability of Israel to continue its destruction of vital installations and infrastructure, and in committing wide massacres, is specifically due, to the absence of necessary artillery against its military air force. This requires the attempt, starting now, and in any possible ways, to provide this type of weapons, especially through friendly forces in the world.

Fourth: This current battle won’t be the only one which our peoples will find themselves obliged to fight against the Israeli aggression, behind which are the allies of Israel in the Imperialist west. This calls, above all, for the surpassing of the current confessional face of the resistance, towards the retrieval of its general national face, and which is accomplished through the entrance of the broadest scope of national and progressive forces once again into the resistance, in an atmosphere of deep collaboration and agreement with the Islamic resistance.

Fifth: Concerning the complaint to the United Nations, whatever the reality of the balance of powers inside the security council is, and the almost absolute American hegemony inside it, Lebanon has to insist on the immediate and unconditional halt of the Israeli aggression, on the one hand, and for full compensation by Israel for the human and material losses that this aggression caused, on the other hand.

Sixth: Furthermore, there is an utmost need to respond to the collaborating and weak stand of the official Arab regimes, and specially to the Saudi stand which is flagrant in its hostility towards the resistance, and in its actual collaboration with the Israeli aggression, by calling for the Arab masses, in all their nations, to hit the streets, and express their condemnation and anger against their governments’ positions, and in sincere solidarity with the resistance of the Palestinian and Lebanese peoples against the Zionist occupation and aggression.

They must develop their activity to force the Egyptian, Jordanian, and Mauritanian governments to withdraw their recognition of Israel and completely cut their relationships with it, and to force the other governments which have various kinds of ties and agreements and normalization acts with Israel, to put a final end to them.

The inaction of the Arab regimes must not excuse the Syrian regime, whose officials only gave verbal meaningless support so far, without giving any direct actual support to the Lebanese people in its current fierce confrontation.

Seventh: The struggle against Israel is an essential part of the struggle against all the forces of oppression and hegemony and exploitation. Starting from this understanding, requires of the free people of the world and forces opposing capitalist globalization and war to build serious and active solidarity with the Lebanese and Palestinian peoples, and against Israel and the current war that the generals of Tel Aviv are launching. It is a fight which can begin to deepen the bloody dilemma that the occupying and aggressive state of Israel faces, and to initiate a start to its ending, in as much as a global and genuinely international front is formed to show solidarity with the two peoples and their struggle for liberation, sovereignty and just peace. In this context, the rules of the game might really change, but this time not for the interest of Israel!

15-07-2006