National Executive Committee, Communist Party of Ireland
19 May 2013
The imperialist powers Britain, France and the United States regard themselves as the rightful rulers of the Middle East. With the aim of maintaining their hegemony they have always allied themselves with the most backward and obscurantist forces in the area. Any independent regime in the area is a target for attack—by subversion, by sanctions, or by outright aggression by client-states and local allies, or directly, if necessary.
Taking advantage of local unrest, they unleashed a war on Syria, recruiting for their purpose—as they did in Libya—the terrorist fundamentalist Islamists linked to al-Qa‘ida, the very people against whom they have proclaimed their “war on terror.” These terrorists are directly recruited, financed and armed by the US allies Saudi Arabia and Qatar and facilitated by the US ally Turkey.
These tactics have caused enormous suffering to the Syrian people but have failed to dislodge the government. So the US ally Israel steps in, bombing Damascus. Direct intervention is being prepared, on the claim that the government of Syria has used chemical weapons, when the evidence cited by the UN representative Carla del Ponte implicates the opposition forces. They apparently were carrying out a false-flag operation, prompted by Obama’s “red line,” to provide an excuse for intervention.
Coupled with the threats against Iran and the continued oppression of the Palestinian people, the danger of escalating the conflict into a wider, devastating war should be obvious but does not seem to deter the imperialist powers. They have so far rejected all efforts to facilitate a ceasefire and a negotiated settlement, insisting on impossible conditions.
The removal of these obstacles to a ceasefire and the facilitation of a peaceful settlement to the conflict is a reasonable demand, and one that the Irish government should be pursuing.
Behind the “humanitarian” mask and a pretended concern about democracy the imperialists are as ruthless and criminal as ever. The Communist Party of Ireland calls on all democratic forces and all peace-lovers to reject all these “humanitarian” pretensions and rouse themselves to oppose imperialist aggression against Syria, whether direct or by proxy.
There are those who regard themselves as left-wing, even “anti-capitalist,” who have given support to “humanitarian” wars, in Yugoslavia, Libya, and elsewhere. They should see by now what the imperialist strategy has been and what it continues to be.
