I received these statements this week; they are posted on Facebook. The four images might not appear below. Slightly edited:
The Necessity of Solidarity Among Iranian Women Fighters with Women in the Region, Especially Palestinian Women
Happy March 8th, International Women's Solidarity Day,!
Today, the fate of Iranian women is intertwined with the fate of women in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Yemen, Syria, Bahrain, and especially Palestine, as well as other women in the region. This is why the demands for the rights of Iranian women and the fight against the capitalist regime of the Islamic Republic will be empty and regressive without a consciously tie it to the struggle against imperialist and Zionist aggressions. One cannot be an advocate for the rights of Iranian women while supporting the military invasion of Gaza and the genocide in this Palestinian enclave, or passing by indifferently. This reactionary and imperialist policy, which is theorized and promoted under the guise of fighting "political Islam," "fundamentalism," and opposition to Hamas, is a Zionist trick with its roots in Tel Aviv. How can one claim to defend women's rights and equality while remaining silent in the face of genocide and mass murder of women in Gaza?
As long as imperialism, Zionism, and class reaction rule the world, any notion of liberation from exploitation and economic and social inequality is nothing but an illusion.
Happy March 8th, International Women's Solidarity Day, to all combatant women and men around the world!
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The Necessity of Struggling for the Unity of the Iranian Working-Class
Class-based and capitalist governments fear worker-strikes. We saw an example of this during the 1979 Revolution, when the potential collective power of workers created significant changes. They were able to send the regime of Mohammad Reza Shah to the dustbin of history with their nationwide strike, hoping that their living conditions, job security, rights, and fair demands would be met, that they would have the right to strike, and that they would establish their own trade un-ions. The governments that came to power after the revolution, which came under the guise of supporting the underprivileged, were aware of this immense power of the working class and saw its ability to organize as a factor that could destabilize the economic foundations and political structures of the country. With their class instincts, they feared the unity of Iran's labourers and sought, through various means, to prevent workers from forming their own trade unions.
At the onset of the revolution, labour law considered many of the workers' rights, as this achievement of the revolution was imposed on the post-revolutionary government by the working class through its struggles and its decisive role in the revolution. However, after the eight-year war with Iraq, Rafsanjani's mafia government, under the pretext of rebuilding Iran and compensating for the damage of the war, followed the economic orders of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund and adopted a neoliberal policy that aimed at looting Iran. It sacrificed Iran's economy through privatization, the suppression of workers' struggles, and the violation of their legal rights, benefiting the large bourgeoisie of Iran. This destructive policy continues to be implemented in Iran.
The first stumbling block in the path of the Iranian workers' struggles is the absence of an independent labour union whose primary responsibility is to improve the living conditions of workers, not to wage anti-exploitation war or to overthrow the capitalist system.
A labour union in Iran cannot be based on religious or ethnic affiliations. Ethno-national chauvinists in Iran want labour unions to be established on the basis of ethnicity, which in practice aims to destroy the unity of action among workers and create division among them. Naturally, these demands, if not outright suspicious, are deeply reactionary and anti-workers, and they must be fought against in the same way as the "leftist" demands for the creation of worker-soviets instead of independent labour unions. Iranian workers must struggle to establish a unified and independent labour union that enjoys public support. This class-based, democratic demand, which serves to democratize Iran's political space, must be supported. Therefore, supporting the “70% wage increase” movement and the efforts that have been underway in recent years is a positive matter, and we must focus on strengthening it.
[This is the 899th post on DS.]
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