THE news that the Obama regime is demanding the complete withdrawal of Hezbollah fighters from Syria marks a decisive development in the increasingly desperate drive by US imperialism, with the support of Britain and France, to secure regime change in Syria no matter what the cost.
With their allies, the so-called foreign ‘rebels’ facing defeat at the hands of the Syrian army in the battle for the strategically vital central town of Al-Qusayr, the imperialist warmongers are engaging in a nauseating round of moralistic denunciation of ‘foreign fighters’ becoming involved on the side of the Syrian government and its president, Bashar al-Assad.
The US pushed through a motion at a meeting of the UN Human Rights Committee in Geneva this week condemning the intervention of foreign fighters on behalf of the Assad government, with the French foreign secretary claiming indignantly that 3,000 Hezbollah fighters were in Syria.
What he forgot to mention was that it is estimated that 100,000 foreign jihadist fighters have invaded Syria in order to carry out imperialism’s proxy war to overthrow the secular regime of Assad as a necessary precursor to an all-out assault against Hezbollah in Lebanon and war with Iran.
Those under attack are the main supporters of the rights of the Palestinian people to an independent state of Palestine. The tactic of crushing Syria, Hezbollah, and then attacking Iran would achieve the imperialist strategic dream of redrawing the map of the region, placing it and its wealth under complete imperialist control while handing over Palestine to the Zionist state of Israel.
These plans for the grand re-division of the Middle East are coming unstuck thanks to the steadfast refusal of the Syrian masses and army to give in to the imperialist powers and their Islamist servants.
In an interview with Lebanese TV yesterday, Assad confirmed that the Syrian army had secured ‘major victories’ against the rebels and now held ‘the balance of power’ in the conflict. He also announced that the first shipment of anti-aircraft missiles from Russia had arrived, providing the country with the means to defend itself against bombing raids from the Zionists or their imperialist backers.
This resistance by the Syrian people has driven the imperialists into a frenzy, with British foreign secretary William Hague pushing through an end to the EU arms embargo and the US state department issuing threats of pulling out of next month’s Geneva conference – ostensibly called to find a ‘peaceful’ solution – if Hezbollah does not withdraw.
Imperialism has no intention of pursuing any peaceful settlement. As for who are the aggressors, the facts speak for themselves.
Syria has not gone to war despite the fact that Israel invaded its territory and has occupied the Syrian Golan Heights since 1967.
Hezbollah has never carried out military operations outside Lebanon, it has always fought defensively against Zionist occupiers, never in wars of aggression.
The same is true of Iran which, despite being bombed by the imperialists, has never invaded any other country.
It is imperialism, and its client Zionist state, that is responsible for all the wars and killings, and is now set on a war in the region that will set it ablaze and cause hundreds of thousands of deaths, and all to keep a corrupt, bankrupt and historically redundant capitalist system staggering on in its death agony.
The enemy of the Syrian people is the same enemy that is out to crush workers at home. The only way to stop this war on two fronts is to demand of the TUC that any move to send arms or intervene militarily to effect regime change in Syria be met with immediate strike action – a general strike to bring down the government and replace it with a workers government and socialism.
This is the only way to put an end to imperialist slaughter once and for all.