Fight State Repression and Defend Peoples’ Struggle!
Joint Statement of the International League of Peoples’ Struggle - US, Palestinian Youth Movement, National Students for Justice in Palestine, BAYAN USA, National Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression
The US is an imperialist power in decline. In its dying years, and in its desperation to remain the world’s superpower and halt the rise of its competitors, it lashes out in provocative wars of aggression around the world and widespread attacks against marginalized peoples and those resisting its power at home.
The US-Israeli genocide against the Palestinian people is one of the most egregious outcomes of US imperialism’s unchecked attempts to maintain the power of its big business ruling class. At the same time, the only power keeping the forces of genocide at bay is the Palestinian resistance. All over the world, from Palestine to the Philippines, India, Kurdistan, Western Sahara, Niger, Burkina Faso, West Papua, and many other nations, it is through the unity of the people to sacrifice everything for self-determination that imperialist state repression is resisted.
As pro-people organizations in the US, we understand our role in combating the attempts of US imperialism to spread its violence and plunder overseas, and one of our strongest weapons is our own fight for the liberation of our homelands, be they far away or right here on Turtle Island, North America. In the US, the working class is losing more and more of its livelihood through deregulated labor laws, plummeting wages, rising inflation, and attacks on unionization. Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities experience traumatic and often fatal police violence rooted in the structures of settler colonialism and white supremacy that are propped up by imperialist rule. Women and people of marginalized genders have their freedoms and dignity stripped to control and manage families for the conservative agendas of ruling elites. Whether we are fighting for our peoples’ freedom on Turtle Island or overseas in our homelands, our struggle is just and necessary!
US imperialism is the biggest threat to our people, and our unity is the biggest threat to US imperialism. It is by calling us “terrorists” that the state tries to justify its attacks against us, through Federal programs hypocritically named “Countering Domestic Terrorism” and “Countering Violent Extremism.” Under these programs, corporations are given the power to surveil and crack down on union organizing, schools and universities are given the recourse to ban student organizations and punish student organizers, border forces are given the blank check to disappear undocumented activists, and much much more. In particular, Arab, Muslim, and migrant communities still hold fresh memories of the all-out war waged against them following the launch of the so-called “War on Terror” and the passing of the Patriot Act. Together, we continue to face the brunt of these fascist attacks. Now is the time to fight back against these programs and defend peoples’ struggle!
There is a substantial need to fight back to decisively end imperialism so that its attacks against the people stop. In its attempts to maintain its parasitic existence, the US state relies on fascism at home and its unbridled war machine around the world, demonizing all those who resist. The so-called “counter-terrorism” doctrine is an ideological campaign waged to paint human rights defenders and freedom fighters as criminals to keep the masses divided, confused about who the true common enemy is, and vulnerable to attack. Racist police violence and the prison system are local manifestations of this while the international relations enshrined in counter-terrorism programs ensure collaboration with allied and puppet regimes in targeting overseas chapters of national liberation movements.
In short, so-called “counter-terrorism” programs exist only to protect the imperialist ruling class and its near-unlimited access to finance capital. They are used to repress whatever political power working class and oppressed people try to express in their daily lives and their fights for a better tomorrow. To win a future where all share access to land, life, and dignity, we must unite to resist these programs and fight to end US imperialism!