INTERNATIONAL DELEGATION FOR SOLIDARITY TO LEBANON
FROM GREECE-TURKEY-CYPRUS (Departing August 18th)
DEMONSTRATION AGAINST THE INVOLVEMENT OF THE GREEK GOVERNMENT IN THE
WAR, THURSDAY AUGUST 24th, Syntagma Square 7pm
On Friday, August 18th, a delegation of solidarity made up of Stop
the War Coaltion, Campaign Genoa 2001 and the newspaper Workers
Solidarity departs for Lebanon. In Beirut we will meet with sister
delegations coming from Cyprus and Turkey. From Cyprus,
representatives of the party of Ecologists-Environmentalists,
organisation Workers Democracy will come from the South, while the
Turkish-cypriot party New Cyprus sends a delegation from the North.
From Turkey a big delegation of trade-unionists and anti-war movement
is also coming.
In Lebanon we will meet with representatives of the movements of
Resistance. We will meet militants who fought against the Israeli
aggression and continue fighting for the day-after together with the
ordinary people of Lebanon. We will visit the places where the
Israeli army has left its grim mark, the levelled areas and houses,
the desolated families.
But we will go to share not only the grief and the anger for the
Israeli brutality but also the cheers because we are a few days after
the first defeat of such a scale in the history of the state of
Israel.
The Israeli Defence Forces have taken for the first time a
lesson, recently learned also by Bush and Blair in Afghanistan and
Iraq. They have learned that it may be ?easy? to kill and maim
thousands of civilians, to level poor neighbourhoods using air force,
but you cannot win and break down a force of Resistance based on
massive support and participation.
Israel?s plans for a swift and sweeping victory have been
defeated by the power of this Resistance. And this defeat is another
blow to the wider plans of the USA for a ?New Middle East?. The
defeat of Israel is a victory for the anti-war movement, because it
derails the planning for an attack to Iran and Syria.
The diplomatic game after the Resolution of the Security
Council is taking place in the setting of the military defeat of
Israel. But now what they haven?t achieved with the tanks and the
bombardment they are trying to achieve using blackmail and threats.
The UN Resolution is an unjust resolution supporting clearly
the Israeli aggression.
The multinational UN force will be an occupation force wrapped
as ?peace-keeping?.
We, the activists and trade-unionists who will be in Lebanon the next
days, condemn this lie. We are opposed to the deployment of any
military force in Lebanon. The anti-war movement will not allow the
blockade of libanese port and airports to go on, this time under the
cover of the UN.
Hizbullah must not get disarmed. Hizbullah?s power along with the
support of the ordinary people in Lebanona managed to rumple
the ?unbeatable? Israeli army for the first time. Any pressure on
Hizbullah is a green light to Israel to restart the carnage.
The greek right-wing government of New Democracy has decided
to join this brutality. It has announced the dispatch of a frigate
and a landing ship taking part in the naval blockade aiming to
strangle Lebanon and the Resistance.
The anti-war movement is ready to escalate the action. On Thursday,
August 24th, the next step is organised, with a demonstration in
Syntagma Square, 7pm, endorsed by the trade unions, the libanese, the
muslim and the Pakistani communities.
The last week of September 23-30, has been already fixed as a co-
ordinated week of anti-war action by the international anti-war
movement.
At the same time when our delegation will be in Lebanon, a
representative of the Stop the War Coalition departs for Cairo.
There, a meeting of the ?Cairo Conference against the US and Zionist
aggression? is taking place, a conference uniting the movements of
Resistance throughout the arab world. They are planning for an
international meeting of all peace and anti-war movements in Beirut,
in late October.
Get in touch with the delegation:
Petros Constantinou +30-6932828964
Nikos Loudos +30-6934406834