Version imprimableConcrete action against the blockade
The inaction of the "international community" is leading people to look for a way to break the blockade of Gaza. This is what the Freedom Flotilla in which French MEP Rima Hassan and environmental activist Greta Thunberg participated, intended to symbolize. It is also this blockade that the march to Gaza, in particular the Al Soumoud caravan ("perseverance" in Arabic), is trying to break.
Several thousand people from Morocco, Algeria (including feminist groups), Tunisia and Libya were arrested trying to reach Al Arish, the last Egyptian city before Rafah, sometimes beaten and then forcibly deported. Activists, including our fellow MP from the Irish organization People Before Profit, Paul Murphy, have been arrested in Cairo. Other people were attacked in Ismailia (just before the Suez Canal). Part of the caravan was stopped near Sirte, in Libya, using the same methods: repression by the army and police, participation of armed gangs paid by the government. This shows the complicity of the Arab regimes, while the activists all report the solidarity and help of the local people.
A revival of mobilization in France?
The resistance finally seems to be experiencing a new dynamic in France, encouraged by the symbolic action of the Flotilla and by the success of the mobilization against the ban on the solidarity group “Urgence Palestine.” On 4 and 5 June, dockers in Fos-sur-Mer blocked three containers containing cannon tubes made by Aubert and Duval and parts for machine guns produced by Eurolinks.
The demonstrations of 14 June 2025 saw a resurgence of participation everywhere, including in medium-sized and small towns (600 in Angers, 850 in Romans, 200 in Dreux, 1,000 in Gennevilliers and so on). However, there is a lot of work to be done to ensure that this mobilization is not temporary — especially since the attack on Iran is changing the situation again.
New stakes with attack on Iran
We had foreseen this attack when Israel bombed Lebanon last October. There is indeed a logic in this headlong rush: the far-right government wants to achieve Greater Israel, to control — on behalf of the United States — all the regimes around it and to break up all dissent, including Israeli mobilizations such as those that have emerged in recent weeks in Haifa and Tel Aviv for negotiations and against massacres.
And, in an obscene provocation, Macron immediately announced his support for Israel, claiming that the attack on the nuclear sites, the Iranian leaders and the more than two hundred deaths were a “right to defend oneself,” and offering France’s support for the war. It therefore modifies our tasks: we must oppose Israel’s war against Iran, reject French participation, demand Israel’s disarmament, sanctions, and the complete severance of economic, military, commercial, academic, cultural relations and so on.
Mobilization against the Paris Air Show
The next step in this battle is the mobilization against the Paris Air Show at le Bourget on 21 and 22 June. Indeed, with its 2,000 exhibiting companies and 290 delegations, this show is a real market of death. Israel Aerospace Industries, Elbit Systems and Rafael Advanced Defense Systems will exhibit their machines. [1] These companies, with a turnover of billions, manufacture drones, missiles, and combat boats.
Demonstrating against the Paris Air Show, participating in meetings, concerts and demonstrations should allow us to give visibility to the fight for Palestine, against Israel’s genocidal policy and against global imperialist militarism in general — which we also observe with Russia’s attack on Ukraine.
15 June 2025
Translated by International Viewpoint from l’Anticapitaliste.
