FAISALABAD, Pakistan, May 6 — Today, thousands of workers were here to welcome home seven power loom workers who were released from the Central Jail after serving four-and-a-half years.  The workers led a mass march through the main streets and industrial sections of the city, from 10am to 8pm, ending in a mass rally with militant chants to welcome the freed workers home.

Six others remain in prison. In all, 14 workers were convicted by the Anti-Terrorist Court (ATC) and sentenced to a total 490 years on various charges. Their only crime was organizing power loom workers to demand a government wage increase in all Faisalabad industries, especially for low-wage power loom workers. One young leader, Raja Arshad, went underground to escape arrest, and experienced many hardships. He died three months ago of a massive heart attack.
The conviction was challenged in Higher Court soon after the ATC draconian order. After a long legal battle, the court ordered the immediate release of the workers but refused to waive the fines against them. So far, we have raised enough money to win the release of these seven. We are on a campaign to collect enough money to pay for the release of the remaining six or they will face another 17 months in jail. We decided to first win their release, and then challenge the fines in the Supreme Court.
This is a significant victory, and shows that workers will not be terrorized into submission. Workers here have been caught in the crossfire of US imperialism’s “War on Terror”, and are about to find themselves in the midst of the inter-imperialist rivalry, as China challenges the US for influence here. The only way for workers to meet the challenges of fascist terror and imperialist war is to build a mass PLP and fight for communism. We will have more news of workers’ struggles in future CHALLENGEs.

OAXACA, MEXICO, May 1 — Among the thousands of workers that participated in the May Day march in Oaxaca today, the presence of our Party, the communist Progressive Labor Party (PLP) stood out.  
This was because of our militancy and the messages of the communist slogans we chanted as a group and with great energy such as: “For a Communist and Proletariat May Day!” “We Must End Electoral Farce!” “We Struggle, We Win, Power to the Working Class!” “In Our Communist Struggle, Capitalist Criminal, You’re in Our Crossfire!” “The Crisis of the System Has No Solution, the Only Solution is Revolution!” “One Class, One Party, Workers of the World Unite!” and “Long Live Communism, Death to Capitalism!”
We distributed 2,000 flyers to the CNTE teachers that belong to Local 22. A PLP member, with the help of some of his friends, distributed 500 flyers to a group of health care workers. The flyer denounced the fascist policies of the Mexican ruling class oppressing working class under the guise of structural reforms and it exposed the electoral farce. It also invited workers to join PLP and explained the need for a communist revolution to overthrow the capitalist class that controls the world. We are taking advantage of the approaching imperialist war to build a communist society, which is the only answer for the interests and needs of our class.     
We carried the red flags that represent the international working class and a banner calling for workers to join PLP to destroy the corrupt and criminal capitalist system with communist revolution.
These activities and the fighting attitude against the policies of the corrupt, oppressive and criminal capitalists motivate and inspire us to continue our revolutionary communist work with full commitment. The current labor stoppage by the health care workers and the strike that some trade unions and organizations are planning, represent opportunities we must use to promote the growth of PLP.

Newark, NJ, May 1 — Fifty people, chanting “Power to the working class, kick the bosses in the ass”, “Jobs yes, racism no, police brutality has got to go”, and “Baltimore means, we got to fight back” marched along Broad Street here in the second annual May Day march in this city. The chanting was loud and continuous. Several workers joined in as we passed by. Progressive Labor Party members distributed over 150 CHALLENGEs to the marchers and and passersby.
The period leading up to march saw worsening conditions for the working class in this area. As more and more workers have come under attack by the capitalist system, especially since the financial crash of 2008, we have seen skyrocketing evictions and foreclosures. The end of unemployment benefit extensions, and time limits on emergency assistance for shelter and rent payments have driven unemployed workers into the street. Small “tent cities” have sprung up in numerous urban areas in New Jersey. These tent cities are inhabited by unemployed and employed workers who simply don’t have money to pay rent anywhere.
This past winter in the Northeast was particularly brutal. Because local shelters and warming centers were only open when night-time temperatures were expected to go below 15 degrees, tent city residents were frequently sleeping outside in below-freezing temperatures. One of those residents, who had mental health issues, and been recently cut off Medicaid. One January night, she died.
Wages for workers in many New Jersey jobs are at, or barely above, the minimum wage of $8.38 per hour. The mainly Black and Latin airport workforce, in particular, has been fighting back against these low wages. Meanwhile, hundreds of millions in tax credits have been given to Prudential Insurance company and other corporations who are gentrifying downtown Newark.
The organizers of the march highlighted the connection between low wages, unemployment, racism and homelessness. The themes of the march were, “We are One Paycheck Away From Homelessness” and “We fight to End Racism and All Forms of Oppression.” A tent-city resident spoke at the opening rally and thanked the marchers for coming out in support of their homeless brothers and sisters. He vowed that we would not forget our sister who died, and that we would continue to expose the conditions of homeless people.
Another speaker from a group advocating a $15 per hour minimum wage said the real problem facing workers involved in all of these struggles is the capitalist system itself. He said we should fight back against all the attacks, but also said winning higher wages or other reforms alone will never solve the problems faced by the working class.
Several speakers said that the recent actions to fight police murder in Baltimore, Maryland was rebellion against racism. One said that the charges against the cops involved in the murder of Freddie Gray would not have come without that uprising. One spoke about the growing movement in Newark to fight poverty and racism in the midst of corporate gentrification. The speaker said we had taken one of the punches that the bosses threw at us and redirected that punch “back to them with force”.
The day ended with a song, “The Internationale”, introduced as having been written by a transport worker condemned to death by the bosses after the crushing of what was then the biggest worker uprising in history, the 1871 Paris Commune. Many marchers joined in proudly singing, in both Spanish and English, this anthem to the working class. We in PLP will continue the struggle with our fellow workers to win them to fight for a communist world that would abolish homelessness, wage slavery, racism and poverty.
   

TEL-AVIV-JAFFA, May 16 — Within days of workers and youth rebelling against racist cops in Baltimore, U.S., thousands of Ethiopian-Jewish workers protested in the streets of Tel-Aviv against apartheid. Like Ferguson and Baltimore, Black workers here lead the way in fighting racism.
They battled the cops and were not deterred by tear gas and stun grenades. While in the West Bank these weapons are used on a daily basis, this was the first time these “riot control” weapons were used in Tel-Aviv proper. Police cars were turned over. More than 23 cops were injured, and over 40 protesters were arrested.
Unlike the largely peaceful protests connected to the worldwide Occupy movement of 2011, this time workers fought with all their might against the racist cops. The protestors blocked the Ayalon Highway for three hours and resisted the cops’ attempts to remove them. Many other white Jewish and a few Palestinians workers united in fighting the violent cops. Thousands of Ethiopian workers and youth demonstrated in front of the Israeli Police Headquarters in Jerusalem.
The reason for this protest was to fight racist violence against Ethopian workers. The trigger was on April 27, when two policemen beat up and arrested Damas Fikadeh. He is a young Ethiopian who serves as an Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldier in Holon, a city south of Tel-Aviv. What is Damas’s crime? He is a Black worker under capitalism. Israeli police thrive on racist violence against Black, Arab, and migrant workers.  
The State of Israel brought many Ethiopian Jews here in the 1980s and ‘90s as a source of cheap labour for Israeli bosses to employ in minimum wage and dead-end jobs. Racism is the order of the day for Black workers in Israel. Ethiopians are forced into slum neighborhoods and are targets of police terror. While Ethiopians are 2 percent of the population, they make up 30 percent in juvenile jails. Over 41 percent live in official poverty. Unemployment is twice as high among Ethiopians compared to other Jewish Israelis. The racist system that segregates Black youth into racist housing and schools is the same system that controls the Black population by forcibly injecting Ethiopian women with birth control. The Israeli blood bank also rejects or dumps blood donated by Ethiopians. The tremor of rebellion here is about the systematic racism against Black workers.
The Baltimore KKKonection
The link between the U.S. and Israel is one of racism and fightback. Whether it’s Baltimore, Ferguson, Holon, or Jerusalem, Black workers suffer the brunt of racist attacks from the ruling class. From one imperialist country to another, Black workers are a key revolutionary force. Whenever the most exploited sector of the working class fights back, it serves as an example for workers everywhere. There is also another connection between Baltimore and Israel: the racist cops are trained by the same forces. Nearly every major police department in the U.S. gets training from Israel, the experts of Apartheid and racist occupation. Among them were Baltimore kkkops who learned “crowd control” strategies, “gathering intelligence” lessons and other methods of domination. These Israeli-trained kkkops terrorize Black workers throughout the United States.
Black Workers Lead the Way
These Ethiopian workers and youth showed the working class the way forward to crush the racist system that oppresses us all — not by peaceful protest, but by open rebellion against racism. Surrendering to police demands and listening to misleaders who call for “peaceful protest” will not end racism. The only way to end police terror is by confronting the class enemies — the cops and their racist lords, the big bosses — and fighting them on all fronts. The cops have guns, stun grenades and tear gas, but we the workers greatly outnumber them. We must overcome the racist divisions the bosses put upon us and unite based on class. If Palestinian, Jewish, and Black workers unite, workers can become a force capable of defeating capitalism and replacing it with a system of equality for all ethnicities—communism.
Another lesson from this important struggle is that when workers fight back, they are violently attacked. No matter how much the police chief apologizes for individual abuses of power by rank-and-file cops, it is not just “a few rotten apples” but the whole rotten system.
However, this system is not without weakness. The police command prevented Ethiopian cops (many of whom are Border Guard soldiers, essentially enlisted soldiers pressed into the police) from working at the protest locations. The cops fear that many of these soldiers will switch sides and fight for their families and friends, not for the bosses.
Need Multiracial Unity and Red Leadership
The struggle continues and there will be more demonstrations. As communists, PLP here know from similar cases in history that limited to ethnic liberation struggle alone, the Israeli bosses will be able to suppress this struggle or buy off its leaders. The protest needs two things to grow into a revolutionary movement.
First, the fightback must be multiracial and include all oppressed workers suffering from apartheid, like African refugees and Palestinians. It must also include white Jewish workers. Workers from Palestine to Israel must unite to see that we are part of one struggle for justice, which means a world without racist bosses, whether it is here in Israel or in the U.S.
Second, this struggle needs communist leadership that will be able to move it from a struggle against police terror to a struggle against the racist system of capitalism itself. While we are modest PLP branch in this country, we will fight for these politics in everywhere.