Log in
The 5th Cairo conference is held at a time that is full of potential, but also full of challenges. The war launched by the Zionist military artillery against Lebanon with the support of the US and Europe ended with an unprecedented defeat of the Zionist entity by the hands of the heroic resistance of Hezbollah. However, the battle is not over yet and the siege, which the Zionists and the US administration are trying to impose on the Lebanese resistance with the help of their local agents and their use of the weapon of sectarianism after failure of their planes and tanks means that we are facing major challenges that call upon all of us for the highest level of resistance and conscious struggle against sectarianism.
In Iraq, the fierce resistance against the American occupation has pushed the US administration into a hopeless swamp. There, too, the occupation is using its final card by trying to turn the battle against the occupation into an ugly sectarian conflict between Sunnis and Shiites. The resistance will not be able to liberate Iraq except through failing the trap of sectarianism and turning the resistance into a unified national one, that unites Shiites and Sunnis against the American occupant.
And in Palestine, where the resistance, under the leadership of Hamas, has survived the siege of starvation, without giving up to the American, Zionist and Arab pressures to surrender to the Zionist entity and the Oslo agreements, there too the enemy and its local agents have tried to impose a civil war in order to deviate the resistance from its path and spill Palestinian blood by Palestinian hands. Despite recent agreements and despite the awareness of the resistance to stand up to those attempts, still the challenge facing the resistance is a major one. The lifting of the siege calls for a revival of the Intifada and the weapon of resistance.
Today we also witness the escalation of military threats against Iran and the widespread mobilization by the American administration to launch a fierce air strike against Iran. It is obvious that the deeper the losses of the US administration in Iraq, the more the talk about the Iranian danger and the need to face it. As usual the “moderate” Arab regimes play their role in this agenda, both on the logistic military level and on the level of a media campaign that targets the isolation of the Iranian regime.
A crazy war launched by Bush against Iran will lead to the fall of hundreds of thousands of victims and the region, and probably the whole world, will enter a long period of unprecedented wars and tensions. WE have to join our efforts to stop this crazy war by organizing protests, demonstrations and campaigns all over the world.
While imperialism and its allies are using sectarianisms as a weapon to split and weaken the resistance, European and US governments are using the weapons of racism and Islamophobia as a weapon to justify their colonial aggression and the division of the antiwar movements. It is therefore that the struggle against anti Moslem racism is an integral part of out struggle against war.
In Arab countries, it is no longer possible to separate the struggle against despotism from the struggle against war and the US and Zionist colonialism in the region. Regimes allied to imperialism, especially the Egyptian, Saudi and Jordanian regimes are playing a crucial role in attempting to strangulate and besiege the Palestinian, Lebanese and Iraqi resistance in exchange for the US support for their despotism. It is therefore that any action taken in Arab countries for freedom and justice should be considered an asset to armed resistance; and every victory achieved by the resistance is at the same time an earthquake that shatters the thrones of despotism and corruption in our region.
Also, it is no longer possible to separate between the starvation and impoverishment policies imposed by those regimes on the Arab peoples in the name of capitalist globalization and neoliberalism on the one hand and the regional role played by those regimes on the other. The same regimes that open their territories and waters and airspace for the colonial US army are the same ones that impose economic policies that serve nobody but the giant multinational companies and a small group of local, corrupt businessmen. The price is paid by the majority of the people.
We are facing major challenges. We hope that our conference would constitute a qualitative step forwards on our path to unite efforts between the resistance movements and the national Arab opposition movement, including Islamists, socialists. Arab nationalists and the global antiwar movement.
Facing all those challenges the 5th Cairo conference has concluded with the following recommendations:
I. Supporting the resistance in Palestine Iraq and Lebanon
Iraq
Linking the antiwar struggle in occupying countries (US, UK, etc.) and occupation supporting countries (Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia) and strengthening the pressure on those governments with the aim to:
Closing military bases.
Ending logistic support to US forces.
Closure of ground, naval and aviation passages to US forces.
Call for the formation of a unified national front against occupation and sectarianism.
Strengthening the call for impeachment of the puppet Iraqi government (closure of embassies, banning visits, demonstrations against visits by Iraqi officials).
Call for stopping all forms of collaboration in training of Iraqi military and police under occupation.
Organization of humanitarian aid (food, medicines, etc.) to Iraqi people inside and outside Iraq (Organization of ongoing solidarity missions).
Palestine
Revival of and networking between movements against the wall of racial discrimination.
Organization of campaigns to break the siege imposed on the people and resistance in Palestine.
Organization of demonstrations worldwide against visits by Zionist officials (Bush, Cheney).
Strengthening and linking boycott movements in Arab countries (Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Gulf).
Organization of humanitarian aid to the Palestinian people.
Development of a website of Boycott of Zionist entity, in both Arabic and English languages to introduce and link between committees and organizations working on boycott worldwide.
Organization of an international campaign for the boycott of Israel and organization of an annual demonstration in September in support of the rights of the Palestinian people.
Lebanon
Considering the UN forces in Lebanon as occupation forces and supporting popular movements in the respective countries to withdraw those troops.
Exposure and isolation of Lebanese forces in alliance with the US and Israel and the role of Arab regimes in supporting them.
Joint preparation for strengthening of widest popular movements in case of a new Zionist attack on Lebanon aiming to destroy the resistance.
Supporting the Lebanese resistance against the US-Zionist project.
Organization of an annual international demonstration in July against the aggression against Lebanon.
II. Facing the war threats because of nuclear energy (Iran – Korea)
Uniting positions and efforts against a US attack on Iran, and organization of campaigns against ongoing escalation and siege imposed on Iran. In the case of US war against Iran organization of an international demonstration against this aggression.
Supporting the right of peoples to own nuclear technology for peaceful use.
Exposure of double standards in addressing the nuclear issue (Israel viz. a viz. Iran and Korea).
Nuclear disarmament of the Middle East including Israel
III. Building bridges between the Left and Islamic movements against Imperialism and Globalization
Widening and deepening of collaboration between Islamic resistance movements and the struggles of the Left in the Arab region and internationally (Studying the different experiences in Lebanon, Egypt, Europe, etc.)
Political advocacy against all forms of racial discrimination against Arab and Moslem minorities in the West and linking that discrimination to the imperialist agenda.
Linking the struggle against colonialism and racism on the one hand and the struggle against capitalist globalization and new liberalism on the other. Challenging the notion of clash of civilizations or religions etc.
Linking the rising movements of the left in Latin America with the antiwar movements on the one hand and the resistance movements and nationalist forces in the Arab region on the other.
Call for the organization of a conference that joins the forces of Arab Left and the Islamic resistance movements in the Arab region to coordinate efforts of their national and democratic struggles.
IV. Concerning divisions among resistance movements
Coordination of efforts against the diversion of Iraqi resistance towards a sectarian civil war and exposure of the attempts by US occupation and Arab regimes to feed sectarian conflicts.
Supporting national unity in Lebanon, Palestine and Iraq without compromising the essential basics of resistance. (Rejecting the use of the slogan of national unity to facilitate the US-Zionist agendas).
Rejection of the use of national unity in favor of US and Zionist agendas.
Supporting and strengthening the unity of resistance (Sunni Hamas and Shiite Hezbollah against a united imperial project) and organization of worldwide activities to strengthen this unity and call for a joint conference to face sectarian divisions.
V. Building an international alliance of resistance
Developing strategies of continuous coordination between antiwar and resistance movements in the Arab region and Latin America.
Establishing a network for exchange of experience and information and coordination of activities.
Agreement on international days of protest along the lines of the 15th of February 2003.
VI. Supporting the Democratic Struggles of Arab Peoples
Supporting the struggle against freedom restricting laws under the pretext of fighting terrorism, exposing their racist and despotic nature and linking the despotism of international regimes and the struggle for democracy in the Arab region (Gunatanamo, Abu Ghreib, Egyptian and Saudi prisons, and secret detention centers in Europe).
Linking the rising social movements (workers and professional) in the Arab region and their counterparts in the different parts of the world and creation of mechanisms for solidarity and joint struggle.
Exposing the dictatorial Arab regimes and organization of sit ins and demonstrations against visits by symbols of despotic regimes.
Strengthening international solidarity with democratic movements against dictatorship in the Arab region (Organization of demonstrations against military tribunals, detentions, torture) and exposure of the oppressive regimes and the US and European complicity, and organization of an international campaign against referral of civilians to military courts in Egypt.
