Washington DC, November 4—As the fascist state of Israel continues bombing civilians and advancing into Gaza, millions of workers around the world are holding massive protest demonstrations against the genocide of Palestinians.

Mass protest in D.C.
In Washington, DC, 100,000 or more marchers converged on the White House and the surrounding streets to demand that Israel halt the genocide of Palestinians. “Joe Biden, you can’t hide, we charge you with genocide” rang throughout the march, recognizing the role of the U.S. ruling class in this war against the workers of Palestine. Marching side-by-side with thousands of angry workers, the Progressive Labor Party (PLP) held up the banner for the only strategy that can guarantee liberation-- multi-racial, communist revolution! No nations, no borders, no capitalists!

Chants of Shut It Down! were directed to the capitalists of the U.S. and Israel, while linking the mass movement against Israeli fascism to the racist murders by police in the U.S.--many of whom have been trained by the Israeli army!

PLP workers from Maryland,  Virginia, DC, and New York City organized a bullhorn rally by the so-called Freedom Plaza to address marchers with speeches calling for communist revolution and banners declaring NO WAR BUT CLASS WAR and WORKERS OF THE WORLD UNITE. Our ongoing rally called out capitalism, racism, imperialism, and genocide, reaching thousands of protesters with over 500 CHALLENGE newspapers and a similar number of flyers calling for Arab-Jewish unity for communism.

With our literature table as a base of operations, we engaged 100s of protestors in conversations about the need to crush capitalism, the root of genocidal evil, and to build a revolutionary party to fight for communist revolution.  We met many old friends and made new ones with whom we will work in the coming months to build the PLP.

An independent mass movement Is growing
This rally was different from many large rallies in D.C. such as the women’s march in 2017 after Trump’s election or the gun control rally called after the Florida Parkland student massacre in 2018. Those rallies were supported and organized by the Democratic Party to bolster their electoral base. Today’s massive rally and march was much more like the anti-war protests against the Iraq and Vietnam wars. It attacked the role of the U.S. in its consistent support for the Zionist regime. It led the mass movement away from slavish adherence to the Democratic Party, the organization that kills off working-class movements. No doubt the Democrats will attempt to mislead workers into the election trap, but for now, workers are not buying it!

Despite this positive development, the main strategies advocated by the organizations calling the rally are dead ends. These strategies are for a ceasefire now and the creation of a single or two-state solution. But what kind of state? Nationalism in the region or elsewhere has been shown historically to fail to liberate workers, as capitalists of various nationalities continue to exploit workers even after the overthrow of colonialism.

A Palestinian state with Hamas or a new formation approved by Israel would still be a capitalist enterprise resulting in continued oppression of workers. The continuation of a Zionist state that has oppressed Palestinians and its own working class is also not a solution. Class war against the misleaders in Tel Aviv and Gaza is the only solution to achieve liberation. Seeds of this possibility can be seen in the organizing being done by both Palestinian and Jewish organizations in the U.S. and, in smaller ways, in Israel. Jewish Voice for Peace and Not In Our Name are Jewish organizations that are calling for a ceasefire and protesting side by side with the Palestinian Youth Movement and other Palestinian organizations. In the past month, the almost daily rallies in D.C. have included thousands of these multi-ethnic local residents on the Mall, at the Capitol, and at the White House.

Israel: A vital ally of U.S. imperialism
Israel serves as an enforcer for U.S. imperialism in the Middle East. Its importance to the economic and military goals of the U.S. ruling class is huge. Biden admitted that the $3 billion given to Israel every year is a great defense investment because otherwise, the U.S. would have to establish military bases and troops throughout the region to ensure U.S. power over pipelines, trade routes, and oil. The $14 billion now going to Israel is a further investment for the U.S. financial oligarchs. Of course, Israeli fascism may not be enough to ensure U.S. power in the region. China is strengthening ties with U.S. archenemy Iran and is building strong diplomatic and economic ties with Saudi Arabia.

A single communist state is needed
For workers to build this unity, we communists must stress to other organizers that the reason for wars, displacement, and genocide of multitudes of our brother and sister workers around the globe is capitalism’s drive for maximum profits by seizing markets, resources, and labor. Anti-colonial struggles throughout the 20th century focused on national liberation from settler colonialism and imperialism. This strategy failed to end capitalism and exploitation. PLP has watched and participated in many of these struggles only to see the reversal of whatever gains were made in these battles. Some revolutionaries, like Thomas Sankara in Burkina Faso, Mohammed Babu in Zanzibar and Tanzania, and Walter Rodney in Guyana, aimed at a classless society within national liberation struggles but were not able to get past the new capitalists. We must not lose again! A communist strategy can achieve and preserve workers’ power!

CHICAGO, November 5 -- The spirit of communist revolution was strong tonight at Progressive Labor Party’s (PLP) annual Bolshevik Revolution celebration. Over fifty multiracial, multigenerational workers and their families attended. We participated in discussions centered around the profit-based slaughter of workers and children in the Middle East and the role of U.S.  imperialism in that part of the world. We also built small models of the pro-worker bus stops that were built in the Soviet Union.  These bus stops were developed by the Soviet government to highlight multiethnic working-class culture and artistry, in contrast to the anti-communist lie that revolutionary society was bleak and barren of color.

The evening was highlighted by several dynamic speakers, including a Ford auto worker, fresh off the picket line, a worker from the Steelworkers Union, and a young PLP leader who gave the keynote address. The Ford worker talked about how he looked to the Party for leadership during the auto worker's strike. He first met the Party in high school, and more recently on the picket line. We look forward to inviting this auto worker to a study group and helping build the revolutionary movement in the auto industry.

The steelworkers’ union member stood at his union meeting to propose that their local support the auto worker's strike by sending a thousand dollars and organizing activities in support of their strike. Both proposals were approved. He explained how the concept of internationalism is so important, and that nationalist wars only benefit the capitalists:

"To me, when you look at the Ukrainian and Russian war, and the Israeli genocide, you see working people being slaughtered. It shows the terrible consequences when we let nationalism get the best of us. You see farmers killing farmers, miners killing miners, students killing students, unemployed killing unemployed. It's really oligarchs fighting oligarchs.  These wars are all about fighting for profits--from oil, raw materials, cheap labor, and markets. So, like striking, it takes guts to take internationalism and antiracism seriously. We have to look past phony borders that have been created to keep workers divided. Workers' lives have always improved when they have stuck together!"  

The keynote speaker gave reasons why we celebrate the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 in 2023.  "We celebrate the Bolshevik Revolution because it was the first time the working class seized state power and liberated one-sixth of the world's land mass, and every worker in it from the grips of feudalism and capitalism.  We celebrate because the bosses want us to forget our working-class history.  We celebrate because sometimes it feels like we won't win. We celebrate because we need to remember that our class made a revolution before, and WE WILL DO IT AGAIN.  The Bolsheviks showed us that if we truly commit ourselves to our class, and follow the plan, we can free our class from this misery.  The Bolsheviks were a tiny Party in 1905, and twelve years later, they led the working class of Russia to victory!"

We are on the cusp of a historical shift from liberal "democratic" capitalism to war and fascism throughout the world. The racist Zionist bombardment on Gaza and the war in Ukraine is symptomatic of the inter-imperialist rivalry between the U.S. and its rivals, China and Russia.  The PLP is building an alternative movement for communist revolution and worker liberation. Join us.

Conflicts at our transit union meeting have been really heating up. For the past three meetings attendance has doubled and pushback against the union's deceptions is sharp. Our union representatives (reps) and chairperson had to answer why there was no meeting the past two months (July and August) during the finalization of a new contract and a general pick (where all workers in one department must choose a new job title, hours, and location) looming over our heads. This union meeting we made them answer us which resulted in the longest union meeting we've had, which was three hours. With this added anger and frustration with the union, we're learning how to strike back by declaring motions (creating a new rule). We have no illusions about the union's rules or laws to support the workers. Workers in the Progressive Labor Party (PLP) understand that these attempts at reforming the union are mainly a way to create opportunities to show our base the limitations of the union when the union fails to offer a real solution which is communism.

The first motion we made was in June, right after the union got our summer meetings canceled by having their pawns show up and vote to cancel the summer meetings. This was during the contract negotiations where we, the workers, had no idea what was being discussed at the bargaining table at the board meetings with the transit bosses. The chairperson in our sector of the union used to be on the board but got voted off by the other board members. And someone is supposed to report on the minutes (topic of discussion) from the board. So a worker asked, "So there's nothing we can do about this?" The chairperson replies, "Yes, you can make a motion". So then, we made a motion to remove elected officials who are at the board meetings but don't attend our monthly meetings to report on the minutes of the board meetings. We felt proud that we had accomplished something after years of not knowing how to provoke change in the union. Nevertheless, we knew this wasn't the end of our union struggles but a pathway to the right track of base building.

Our last union meeting was in September where we learned that our motion had to be voted on by the workers who went to morning meetings as well. So be it. The more workers know about the motions the better. It was the workers who made other meetings and shared ideas of more motions to make. So we made three more motions that night. The first was to prevent future summer meetings from being canceled, the second was to provide every new union official with the phone and emails of the other union leaders so they could stay in contact which was another excuse they gave to not have an answer to our questions. The third was to grant the board members a minimum of 48 hours to fully read a new proposal before voting on it. Our chair said: ‘They only get 15 minutes to read a motion or rule before voting on it.’ The union misleaders always have an excuse as to why they don't know something or why they couldn't find an answer to our questions, which is just code for leave us alone, stop asking us questions and we're not here to help the workers. But these motions will help bring their lies to light. So we will find out the results from the board at our next meeting, said the chair.

Our last meeting in October was when we learned that not only did the board members not vote on our motions, but they hadn't seen them at all. Not even surprising. The union reps said, "it was a timing issue." Immediately the workers looked hopeless. We should've planned better to combat their lies and deceptions. But we have another strategy to unite workers which is to create an antiracist committee to support workers affected by racism which we would connect to workers in Gaza. Even if it won't be approved by the union misleaders, comrades and transit workers will take leadership over it. Especially if workers respond to this calling.

We know this is a small start, and it's not an active fightback, but it's a way for workers to begin to reclaim their power, to have the workers talk publicly about racist conditions on the job and overseas. Most workers want to take action but when we have union leaders that shut down our concerns it makes us feel like there's no changing the system. It would really be awesome to get the workers in a room to brainstorm about combating racist attacks on our class. Stay tuned for the next update on this struggle.