On the 85th Anniversary of the Bombing of Geurnica

 

                         Guernica- Pablo Ruiz Picasso

During the Spanish Civil War on the afternoon and early evening of Monday, April 26th, 1937,  the German and Italian fascist air forces destroyed the  sacred city of Basque People, Guernica in a raid lasting three hours. The war crime was ordered by the Spanish nationalist military leadership and carried out by the Congor Legion of the German luftwaffe and the Italian Aviazone Legionairre. Designed to kill  or main as many civilians as possible, Operation Rugen was deliberately chosen for a Monday afternoon when the weekly town market would be at its most crowded. Guernica, in the Basque  country where revolutionary sentiment among workers was deep, was defenceless from the bombers, which could fly as low as 600 feet.

The prototype of all future bombing raids, the Junker and Heinkel bombers of the Legion Condor visited a hell on earth in the form of bombs weighing up to 1000lbs across the town of 10, 000 people.  Heinkel fighters, according to press reports, machine gunned the fleeing crowds as they sought escape into the surrounding fields.
The airplanes made repeated raids, refuelling and returning to drop more bombs. Waves of explosive, fragmentary, and incendiary devices were dumped in the town. In total, 31 tons of munitions were dropped between 4.30 in the afternoon and 7.30 in the evening. In the aftermath of the raid, survivors spoke of the air filled with the screams of those in their death throes and the hundreds injured. Civilians fleeing the carnage in the fields surrounding the town were strafed by fighter planes. Human and animal  body parts littered the market place and town center, a horror soon immortalised by Pablo Picasso's Guernica.
Guernica was effectively wiped of the map. From a population of 5,000 some 1,700 residents were killed and a further 800 injured. Three quarters of the buildings were raised to the ground. Farms four miles away were flattened.

The savage and barbarous attack was a deliberate attempt to terrorise and intimidate the workers of Republican Spain. Spanish nationalist general Emilio Mola had spoken of destroying the industry of Barcelona and Bilbao in order to cleanse the country. In other words, the Nationalists would endeavour to destroy the industrial proletariat. As the historian Paul Preston wrote  in Spanish Holocaust, the Nationalist forces had launched a scorched earth policy during their rapid advance through Spain, most notably in Badajoz, where many hundreds of revolutionary workers were machine gunned to death in the city's bullring.
The fascist government of Berlin and Rome were only to glad to assist Franco in his 'cleansing' of the Spanish population, as both a geo-political necessity and as a test for their military command, new military technology and fighting forces. At his trial for war crimes at Nuremberg, the leading Nazi Hermann Goering would tell the tribunal that he had urged Hitler to send German forces to stem socialism in the Iberian theatre and to test out the Luftwaffe.We should never forget. 

 Franco, who ruled Spain as a fascist dictator for nearly forty years, from 1936 until his death in 1975, claimed the attack on Guernica never took place. They tried to blame the Basques, but the truth is Germany deliberately bombed the town to destroy it and observe in a clinical way the effects of such a devastating attack, practicing a new form of warfare, where only civilians were the targets.In October 1937, a Nationalist officer told a Sunday Times correspondent: 'We bombed it, and bombed it, and bombed it and Beuno why not. ' 

Pablo Ruiz Picasso's picture still resonates with clarity, capturing the full terror and horror of this terrible moment in history.The work was an order of the government of the Second Spanish Republic during the period of the Civil War in 1937. The work commissioned to Picasso would be exhibited in the Pavilion dedicated to Spain at the International Exhibition in Paris of this same year. The aim of the artwork was to use the art to spread the horror that Spanish society was living during those years of war.

It seems that Picasso was going through a inspiration crisis, he had not advanced in the project for months, but he suddenly found a theme for his work when receiving the news of the bombings on the 26th of April of 1937 by the German Condor Legion on the Basque village of Guernica. Picasso ended his artwork in just 7 weeks.

The commander of this legion was Colonel Wolfram von Richthofen, cousin of the famous I World War aviator Manfred von Richthofen, known as the Red Baron, who would also recognize the cruelty of the bombing.

It is said that in the middle of the creative process in his studio in Paris, a group of Gestapo officials knocked on Picasso’s door and got stunned with the Guernica. Staring at the magnificent work and the horror that it spread, they asked him: Have you done THAT? To that question, Picasso answered, full of hate: “You did THAT, Nazis”.

Picasso never wanted to give his own explanation about the artwork and so, many theories have arisen trying to explain the symbolism of the painting and the intentions of the artist.

What can be assured is that the painting symbolizes the barbarism and terror produced by the war. It became the emblem of the harrowing conflicts of European society of the early twentieth century as well as the premonition of the suffering caused by the Second World War.

Guernica , massive in size, composed in mixture of black and gray and white, is a picture of an air raid, and all it's horror. It is twenty-fivee and a half feet long and more than eleven and a half feet in height. 

Concerning the symbolism of this cubist work, we find several elements worthy of analysis. The work is divided into two groups: the one of the animals and the one of the human beings. At the center of the composition horse stands trampling on a warrior. This is a symbol of the European totalitarian regimes and the repression exerted by their dictators – Franco, Hitler and Mussolini. The horse is a clear allusion to death, as its nose and teeth forms a skull.

 

Detail of the skull in Guernica.

The warrior holds in his right hand a broken sword, a symbol of defeat. In it, a hidden flower can also be found. It represents the renewal of life, which would be a neccesary but tough and not so clear period for the victims.

Detail of the flower and sword in Guernica

The mythological figure of the Minotour, half bull half human, perfectly reflects the struggle between the human and the bestial side of the war.
Regarding the people depicted in the painting, the protagonism of one women stands out.  In spite Picasso was married to one woman and expecting a child from another one,  When Picasso painted Guernica, he was maintaining a relationship with the French artist Dora Maar, whose face appears holding a candle in the painting, reflecting  with this the little light that illuminated the life of Picasso in that tragic moment. As an allusion to his sentimental situation, they also appear in the picture.

Alleged portrait of Dora Maar in Guernica

Dora photographed the entire creation process leaving by doing it a very important document for the history of Art.

Pablo Ruiz Picasso painting Guernica

The photographs published by the press of the bombing over Guernica and its brutallity were the inspiration of Picasso and the reason for the lack of color in his work. It is a symbol of the darkness of that terrible period of the Spanish history. 

 From 1937, it was exhibited in Europe and the US to raise money for Spanish refugees. Then in 1939, Picasso entrusted his masterpiece to  New York's Museum of Modern Art, where it stayed more than 40 years.

 The painter gave the museum clear instructions - the canvas belonged to the Spanish people and would only be given back "when they have recovered the freedoms that were taken away from them."
Finally in 1981, the painting arrived in Spain, which was transitioning to democracy after the death of Franco. 
It was first put up for show in an annex of the Prado Museum, behind explosion- and bullet  proof glass to protect it from possible harm in a country still struggling to deal with its very recent, dark past. Now at the Reina Sofia, it has become the star attraction.

The prophetic description of anonymous warfare, the blankets of darkness and death dropped over civilian populations still resonate. To the degree we realise the truth expressed in this work, Guernica stands as possibly the greatest painting of the 20th Century.

The atrocity that was Guernica  horrified the world and helped shift public opinion towards the Spanish Republican Cause, but shamefully the British Government stuck steadfastardly to its non intervevention line. The fascists hated liberalism and humanity, their ideology was one of evil destruction, 'Long Live Death' they cried.  Guernica represented their creed, with one of the Fascist Generals declaring " Like a resolute surgeon, free from false sentimentality, it will cut the diseased flesh from the healthy body and fling it to the dogs. And since the healthy flesh is the soil, the diseased flesh, the people who dwell on it, fascism and the army will eradicate the people and restore the soil to the sacred national realm... Every socialist, Republican, every one of them, without exception, and needless to say, every Communist, will be eradicated, without exception.' An ideology of unfettered hate, and evil., an  ideology that is still trying to tear the world apart.

The attempts by the Francoist rebels for many years to make the world believe that this war crime, this crime against humanity, was the work of the democratic Basque authorities was fortunately rendered useless by foreign correspondents, such as George L Steer and Noel Monks, who told the world the truth about what happened.  Following this first attempt, more have followed, even to today, to downplay its historical importance and reduce the number of victims.

The destruction of Guernica was part of Franco's wider, brutal campaign against the existence of the Spanish Republic. This campaign led not just to widespread destruction of property, but thousands of civilian casualties too, as well as widespread displacement. Many sought refuge abroad, as many as 3,800 Basque children were evacuated to England and Wales for the duration of the war. The British Government at the time callously refused to be responsible for the children, but  throughout the summer children were dispersed to camps throughout Britain. Eight of these colonies were here in Wales. They were received with a mixture of hostility and kindness, but they had all managed to escape the grips of Franco's fascist Spain.
After Guernica , George Steers eyewitness account in The Times described what he saw as 'without mercy, with system', words that remain tragically pertinent to the bloody legacy of carpet bombing in conflicts ever since. Conflicts that continue across the world, that allow humanity to descend into darkness.Guernica represnted the first instance of a new kind of war. The Blitz followed it, then Dresden and the fireboming of Tokyo. Then Hiroshima, followed by the saturation bombing of Vietnam, on to the tragedies of Afghanistan, Iraq, Temen, Somalia, Syria, Palestine, Ukraine etc.

So we must remember Guernica ,and  its legacy, we must make sure the fascists are stopped in their tracks, we must not let them pass., we must carry on singing no pasaron to whatever disguise they dress themselves up in, because today , throughout Spain and Europe, there is an ideological current that feeds into the same hatred and misery and ' principles' that guided the births of fascist, nazi, Francoist totalitarians.

Since the bombing, Guernica has become a symbol for peace. The town has a pace museum and a peace park. and survivors  of the air raid have over the year joined forces with others from Dresden and Hiroshima to campaign against war.

Sirens symbolically blare across Guernica today at the precise moment when fascist  warplanes  carpet-bombed it during the Spanish Civil War. We should never forget.It is important to remember for future generations, so that horrors like this never happen again.We much continue to be enraged by crimes against humanity, and together we should try to work together for  peace

Extract from poem written by Paul Eluard, a surrealist poet and friend of Picasso, in August, 1937.

Lovely world of cottages
Of the night and fields
Faces good in firelight good in frost
Reusing the night the wound and blows

Faces good for everything
Now the void fixes you
Your death will serve as a warning

Death the heart turned over

They made you pay your bread
Sky earth water sleep
And the misery of your life.

 
Guernica - A.S Knowland

Irun- Badajoz - Malaga - and then Guernica

So that the swastika and the eagle
might spring from the blood-red soil,
bombs were sown into the earth at Guernica,
whose only harvest was a calculated slaughter.
Lest freedom should wave between the grasses
and the corn its proud emblem, or love
be allowed to tread its native fields,
Fascism was sent to destroy the innocent,
and, goose-stepping to the exaggerated waving
of the two-faced flag, to save Spain.

But though the soil be saturated with blood
as a very efficient fertiliser, the furrow
of the ghastly Fasces shall remain barren.
The  planted swastika, the eagle grafted
on natural stock shall wither and remain sere;
for no uniformed force shall marshall the sap
thrilling to thrust buds into blossoms, or quicken
the dead ends of the blighted branches;
but the soil shall be set against an alien crop
and the seed be blasted in the planting.

But strength lies in the strength of the roots.
They shall not pass to ruin Spain!

Reprinted from
The Penguin Book of
Spanish Civil War Verse (1980)

Further Reading:-

The Spanish Civil War - Hugh Thomas
Penguin (1965)

They Shall Not Pass:
The Spanish People at War
-Richard Kissh (1974)

Guernica: The history and art of:-

 

 

Guernica - Paul Eluard - P Picasso  - Victory at Guernica
Music: Richard  Wagner and Herbert Von Karajan

Mumia Abu Jamal : Prisoner of Injustice

 

Mumia Abu Jamal was born in Philadelphia on 24 April 1954, and was given the slave name Wesley Cook. From an early age, he became politicized. In high school, after beginning a Swahili class, he followed in the tradition of Muhammad Ali and dropped his “slave name”, or the name he inherited from enslaved ancestors. He took the name Mumia, meaning “Prince”, and which was also the name of an anti-colonial freedom fighter from Kenya. 

In 1968, in one of Mumia’s first forays into politics, he and his friends decided to attend a George Wallace campaign rally in Philadelphia. Wallace, who had previously served as governor of Alabama, was one of the most unabashedly anti-Civil Rights politicians and was running for president. Mumia and his friends, outraged that such a notorious racist was coming to their city, disrupted the rally with shouts of “Black Power!” Mumia and his group were soon attacked and beaten by the white attendees of the rally. Mumia described his experience in an interview in the documentary Mumia: Long Distance Revolutionary: 

“The police surrounded us, you know, in a matter of moments, and escorted us, rather roughly I should say, out of the [venue of the rally]. There were people spitting on us, n***er this, n***er that. I remember being pummeled and being beaten to the ground. I remember looking around and I saw a pant leg. It was blue and had a stripe on it, so it told me this was a cop. So doing what I was taught to do all my life I said, ‘Yo, help, police,’ you know? And I remember the guy walking over very briskly, and his foot going back and kicking me in the face. I’ve always said thank you to that cop because he kicked me straight into the Black Panther Party.”  

Mumia, as a 14-year-old enraged at the systematic mistreatment and oppression of Black people by police, became a young Black Panther. Mumia quickly rose to the Minister of Information in the fledgling Philadelphia chapter of the Black Panther Party, gaining revolutionary journalistic experience. His articles, serving a catalyzing purpose beyond the distribution of information, often ended with a call to action: “Do Something, N***er, [Even] If You Only Spit!”

 

Philadelphia Police illegally stripped searched Black Panthers after raiding their office. After this attack, Police Commissioner Frank Rizzo publicly threatened the Panthers.

It was also around this time that the FBI, as part of its illegal counterinsurgency operation against the Panthers (COINTELPRO), began to keep tabs on Mumia. The police were part of this operation, and the Philadelphia Panthers became the victims of several raids of their Party office by the police. Police commissioner Frank Rizzo emerged as a key enemy of the Panthers. After a particularly harsh and illegal raid, in which police forced the Panthers to strip in the streets, Rizzo remarked, “They were humiliated. We took their pants off them to search them…only brave when they outnumber people…if they break our law, we’ll be there. The police, we’ll be there, and we’ll see who wins.”

As described by researcher, author and journalist Todd Steven Borroughs, “More than 600 sheets of paper would be compiled on Cook [by the Federal Bureau of Investigation] from 1969, when he had turned 15, until about 1974, the year of his 20th birthday.” Much later, when COINTELPRO documents began to be released to the public, supporters discovered a photograph of Mumia, obtained from the FBI, which had the word “Dead” scrawled across the back. 

Mumia left the Black Panther Party in 1970 at the age of 16 and he continued his studies, which he had put on pause to be a full-time Panther. He went on to use his experience as Minister of Information to become a radio journalist.   

Yet he never abandoned his revolutionary politics. In his career, he relentlessly pursued the truth, no matter how that pursuit challenged those in power. After the Black revolutionary MOVE organization was systematically persecuted and framed by the Philadelphia police for the alleged murder of an officer, Mumia became one of the only journalists in the city to cover MOVE sympathetically.

The Move Organisation   founded by an African American named John Africa was a black back to nature group  with an anarcho primitist outlook that rejected  the system. It's members and supporters faced a daily onslaught against them for a number of years, being systematically targeted for their beliefs and on numerous occasions faced violent retribution from the state.

His support of this organisation and his reporting of unpopular causes  which included exposing the violence of the state, as it manifests in entrenched poverty, endemic racism, police brutality and celebrating a peoples unending quest for freedom led him to lose his job as a radio journalist,  so he took up taxi driving in order to provide for his family.

On  Dec 9th 1981 he had just dropped a client off  when he heard gunshot and saw people running.He then he saw a police officer aiming a gun at him, he was shot and beaten, and later was charged with the murder of Officer  Daniel Faulkner who had died from gunshot wounds only a feet away from where Mumia himself had fallen. Mumia himself remained in critical condition for a period of time, but his case was rushed to trial  within 6 months .A trial that Amnesty International condemned as failing to meet even the most minimal standards of fairness, and that is an understatement.The trial was a farce with witnesses constantly changing statements, vital evidence being buried,  proceedings marked by judicial bias, prosecutorial misconduct, racial discrimination in jury selection, police corruption, and tampering with evidence to obtain a conviction–  and to cap it all a bigoted  and prejudiced judge. There was no way that Mumia was going to get the justice he deserved, and he was found guilty and sentenced to death.

One of the key prosecution witness was a prostitute with a long history of arrests and her testimony contradicted previous statements and that of other witnesses. A man was with dreadlocks was seen running from the scene, Mumia has dreadlocks, there are so many doubts. Several prosecution witnesses from his trial have since recanted their testimony , furthermore another individual Arnold Beverly has since subsequently confessed to killing Faulkner. Mumia has always maintained his innocence.What came later was a global movement. Abu-Jamal became an international symbol for institutional racism and judicial abuse and a cause celebre for anti-death penalty advocates. His face was a prominent image at anti-death penalty rallies, progressive gatherings and music concerts. 

By the1990s, his name had become a shorthand for injustice and racism within America. In doing so, his supporters turned Abu-Jamal from a man into a myth. .

 Mr. Abu-Jamal’s supporters have rallied international support and many prominent supporters to his cause. His 1982 trial is widely criticized as unfair due to misconduct by police and prosecutors, and pro-prosecution bias by the trial judge, who was accused of “polluting” Mr. Abu-Jamal’s 1995 appeals hearing.

Many have come to believe that he was a victim of a miscarriage of justice who  had been systematically targetted by the police and the authorities in order to beget his silence.According to human rights group Amnesty International, “After many years of monitoring Mumia Abu-Jamal’s case and a thorough study of original documents, including the entire trial transcript, the organization has concluded that the proceedings used to convict and sentence Mumia Abu-Jamal to death were in violation of minimum international standards that govern fair trial procedures and the use of the death penalty. Amnesty International, therefore, believes that the interests of justice would best be served by the granting of a new trial to Mumia Abu-Jamal.” 

Philadelphia police organizations and their supporters claim Mumia received a fair and just trial.

Despite his continuing imprisonment Mumia has not been silenced even with   the U.S Governments best efforts to do so, he is is still writing, still speaking out, with a powerful artuculate voice opening up the eyes of the people to the injustices of the system that imprisons him, his  books and writings in venues as diverse as the Yale Law Review, Forbes, The Nation, and street-papers for the homeless, have led many to hail him the voice of the voiceless, and a champion of the oppressed. Becomming a potent iconic figurehead for many. 

While behind bars he has written a series of widely-read books, including Live from Death Row (1995), Death Blossoms (1996), and a history of the Black Panther Party entitled We Want Freedom (2004). In December 2001, His revolutionary spirit intact, his books and writings in venues as diverse as the Yale Law Review, Forbes, The Nation, and street-papers for the homeless, have led many to hail him the voice of the voiceless, and he has become a potent  figurehead for many.You can imprison somebody but you cannot kill their spirit. Now he's off death row but he is still in prison, so the movement  to free Mumia continues and all others suffering from miscarriages of justice.

Mumia: Long Distance Revolutionary is an inspiring portrait of a man whom many consider America’s most famous political prisoner – a man whose existence tests our beliefs about freedom of expression. Through prison interviews, archival footage, and dramatic readings, and aided by a potent chorus of voices including Cornel West, Alice Walker, Angela Davis, Ruby Dee, writer Tariq Ali, author Michelle Alexander, and others, this riveting film explores Mumia’s life before, during and after Death Row – revealing, in the words of Angela Davis, “the most eloquent and most powerful opponent of the death penalty in the world…the 21st Century Frederick Douglass.”

 

  

For 40 years—30 of them on death row—Mumia a prisoner of injustice was locked in the dungeons of Pennsylvania, framed by the cops and judicial system, for a crime he didn’t commit. The current Philadelphia DA, “progressive” Larry Krasner, repeats the lies of the cops and blocked Mumia’s recent legal appeal for a new trial, which had been granted by the first African-American judge to hear his case. Other anti-racist and anti-imperialist political prisoners have spent decades imprisoned, are also aging, ill, and serving life without parole—on slow death row. 

Since Mumia’s conviction, the movement to free him has won significant victories. In 2001, Mumia and his supporters succeeded in vacating his death sentence. Mumia has suffered various health struggles while in prison, but his successful struggle for Hepatitis-C treatment set a precedent in improving treatment for the disease for other prisoners. Media projects such as Prison Radio successfully promote Mumia’s political commentary and written works, ensuring that the state never succeeds in silencing his powerful voice. Both Mumia and his supporters continue to protest in the streets and fight for appeals  to win his release.

In addition to chronic heart condition, Mr. Abu-Jamal suffers cirrhosis of the liver caused by Hepatitis C, hypertension and a severe skin condition.  And in late February,2021 he was also diagnosed with COVID-19.  Mumia’s doctor, Dr. Ricardo Alvarez, says the only appropriate treatment is freedom

On his 68th birthday I urge people  to join  in the call for the liberation of all prisoners that are being held on political grounds, including Mumia Abu-Jamal, the remaining prisoners of the Move group imprisoned now for over 40 years, and the remaining Black Panthers who still sit in jail decades after being imprisoned, as well as Julian Assange, held in a British jail at the behest of the U.S. government, for telling the truth about the killing of civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq.
 

 ' Another Nameless Prostitute Says The man is Innocent'
                              For Mumia Abu -Jamal
 

By Martin Espada

The board-blinded windows knew what happened;
   the pavement sleepers of Philadelphia, groaning
in their ghost-infested sleep, knew what happened;
                    every black man blessed
        with the gashed eyebrow of nightsticks
                     knew what happened;
      even Walt Whitman knew what happened
             poet a century dead, keeping vigil
    from the tomb on the other side of the bridge

                  More than fifteen years ago,
        the cataract stare of the cruiser's headlights
                the impossible angle of the bullet,
                the tributaries and lakes of blood,
Officer Faulkner dead,suspect Mumia shot in the chest,
       the nameless witnesses who saw a gunman
       running away, his heart and feet thudding.

               The nameless prostitute know,
       hunched at the curb, their bare legs chilled.
           Their faces squinted to see that night
     rouged with fading bruises. Now the faces fade
Perhaps an eyewitness putrifies eyes open in a bed of soil,
       or floats in the warm gulf stream of her addiction,
         or hides from the caged whispers of the police
                   in  the tomb of Walt Whitman         
                  where the granite door is open
                  and fugitive slaves may rest.

         Mumia: the Panther beret, the thinking dreadlocks,
dissident words that swarmed the microphone like a hive,
            sharing meals with people named Africa,
singing out their names even after the police bombardment
                    that charred their black bodies
         so the governer has signed the death warrant.
       The executioner's needle would flush the poison
                   down into Mumia's writing hand
              so the fingers curl like a burned spider;
        his calm questioning mouth would grow numb,
and everywhere radios sputter to silence, in his memory.

                   The veiled prostitutes are gone,
             gone to the segregated balcony of whores
But the newspaper reports that another nameless prostitute
says the man is innocent, that she will testify at the next hearing.
   Beyond the courthouse,a multitude of witnesses chants,
 pray, shouts for his prison to collapse, a shack in a hurricane.
                   Mumia, if the last nameless prostitute
                 becomes an unravelling turban of steam,
                if the judges' robes become clouds of ink
                      swirling like octupus deception,
                if the shroud becomes your Amish quilt
            if your dreadlocks are snipped during autopsy,
                 then drift above the ruined RCA factory
                             that once birthed radios
                         to the tomb of Walt Whitman
                         where the granite door is open
                           and fugitive slaves may rest.

Philadelphi, PA/Camden, NJ, april 1997

Visit www.prisonradio.org and www.lovenotphear.com to hear Mumia’s voice and support his release.

  http://www.freemumia.com/

Happy birthday Mrs Windsor.

 

 

Today the Queen otherwise known as Mrs Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor, turns 96,  a long life indeed, she happens to share a birthday with my own grandson who himself turns 10 today, so salutations to him as well. 

Gun salutes will mark Mrs Windsor birthday today, although the monarch herself was expected to mark the occasion with little fanfare after a troubled year hit by health concerns.

Royal officials released a photograph of the horse-loving head of state with two of her fell ponies, as family members wished her well.

Her grandson Prince William and his wife Kate called her "an inspiration to so many across the UK, the Commonwealth and the world."

In the British capital, 62 gun rounds will be fired later from the Tower of London and 42 in Hyde Park, where a military band will also play "Happy Birthday."

Royal tradition since the 18th century has also seen the monarch have a second, official birthday, typically celebrated in warmer weather in June.

This year's official birthday coincides with four days of public events from June 2 to 5 to mark the queen's record-breaking 70th year on the throne.

No official engagements are planned for today and the queen is spending time at her late husband Prince Philip's cottage on her Sandringham country estate, where he lived after retiring from public life in 2017.

The trip is being seen as a "positive step", given the queen's recent health problems, British media reported.

Since an unscheduled overnight stay in hospital last October, she has cut down massively on public appearances on doctor's orders.

A back complaint and difficulties standing and walking have seen her cancel a number of engagements, including recent church events to mark Easter.

A bout of Covid-19 in February left her "very tired and exhausted", she admitted earlier this month.

But William's brother Prince Harry told US broadcaster NBC in an interview aired on Wednesday that she was "on great form" when he saw her last week.

The queen was last seen in public at Westminster Abbey in central London on March 29 at a memorial service for Prince Philip, who died last year aged 99.

The queen's enforced retreat from public life in her Platinum Jubilee year has increased attention on the succession and future of the monarchy.

Her eldest son and heir, Prince Charles, has assumed more of his mother's responsibilities in preparation to take over the throne.But a fair few believe Charles, 73, should step aside for William, who turns 40 in June.

Aside from questions about the queen's health and the succession, the royals have rarely been out of the headlines due to a succession of scandals.

Last month there was controversy after the queen's disgraced second son Prince Andrew supported her at Prince Philip's memorial service.

In February, he settled a US civil claim for sexual assault that had earlier seen him stripped of his honorary royal military titles and charitable roles.Andrew’s self-inflicted humiliation has shone a withering spotlight on a spoilt stupid man who has lived a life of unimaginable privilege without having to do anything to earn it. Let Prince Andrew be the very last of the royal freeloaders sunning their bloated bellies on some dodgy billionaire’s yacht.

The palace is said to be bracing for fresh revelations about royal life from Harry, who is due to publish his memoirs later this year.

The former British Army captain quit the royal frontline last year and moved to California with his American wife Meghan Markle.

From there, the couple accused the royal family of racism, while Harry claimed his father Charles and brother William were "trapped" within the system of the British monarchy.

The future of the royal family's global reach is also far from assured.

The queen is head of state of Britain and 14 other Commonwealth countries around the world. But Barbados became a republic last year and a number of other Caribbean countries, including Jamaica, have since indicated they want to follow suit.

Many of Mrs Windsor's subjects instead of joining in the sycophantic celebrations that will be taking place later this year  would instead actually like to have a debate about Britain's future. After all no-one should be head of state for decades without any elections.

A long life is not an excuse in itself for a long reign. The fact that the Queen is now the longest reigning monarch I do not see in itself as a cause for celebration, but an opportunity and reminder of how much we  need real radical democratic reform. Millions of us are simply not interested anymore in royal milestones, in times of austerity,facing a crippling cost of living crisis, harder times, a winter of discontent,  who  as usual are being denied the opportunity to hear any real debate about the future of the monarchy. 

Anti-monarchy group Republic is set to launch a "Not Another 70" campaign, aimed at calling for an end to the monarchy.The campaign will coincide with the run up to the Queen's Jubilee, and will culminate in a conference on the weekend of June 2nd.

Graham Smith, speaking for Republic, said :

"While a vocal minority will want to celebrate the Queen's seventy year reign, we must all start looking to the future. The prospect of King Charles is not a happy one, and there is a good, democratic alternative on offer."

"It's time to have a serious debate about our constitution, accept that Charles is not the best the country has to offer, and that as a nation we are quite capable of choosing our head of state."

"It's time to reject the nonsense arguments about tourism, stability and widespread affection for the royals, and take a more sensible look at what the monarchy really is, and what it really costs the country."

"That cost isn't just financial, it is a cost to our democracy, to our status as citizens and to our principles."

"In just twelve months the royals have been accused of racism, climate change hypocrisy, abuse of public funds, secrecy, cash-for-honours, cash-for-access and all the various things associated with Prince Andrew, including sheltering him from justice."

"This is a shabby institution that does not deserve to continue. It is set against our nation's deeply held democratic principles, it is corrupt and secretive and it is bad for British democracy."

"Now is the time to look to a democratic future, a future without the monarchy."

Details of the "Not Another 70" campaign will be released in due course.

It's about time  we held a referendum on the future of the British monarchy after the Queen's death. Is it not the case that as long as we remain subjects not citizens, of our country, our political and social attitudes will continue to retain an archaic flavour that is harmful equally to our image  of ourselves and attitude of others towards us. Until we turn our back on  hereditary  power at the top of our political, military and religious institutions we have little chance of shaking of the mentality of society defined by class that serves to prop up the same elitist status quo.

Prince Charles  is next in line to the throne. But public opinion suggests that he is not the most popular member of the Royal family, Given that he did have an affair with none other than Duchess Camilla while he was married to the late Princess Diana. 

Not only that, but reports also suggested that Prince Charles was the one who had expressed reservations about Prince Harry’s son Archie’s skin color.

Once Mrs Windsor has gone the future of the monarchy looks very bleak.

How can the Royal family survive? How can we continue to tolerate a hereditary monarch representing the feudal society of medieval England in a modern democratic state. How is it is still acceptable that the British taxpayer still has to pay £75,000,000 a year to support one of the richest families in Britain ( wealth accumulated and robbed from people during previous centuries) when people are made homeless, forced to sleep on the streets, how can we justify spending this on relics that serve no purpose while 13 million of us are in poverty and 913,000 of us are having to rely on foodbanks.The monarchy like slavery , sexual and class discrimination and colonial exploitation is a throwback to our shameful past and an impediment to a bright future.Increasing numbers of people are now finally starting to see the unelected, parasitical Royals for what they are. 

So happy birthday Mrs Windsor, she's had a long 'glorious' reign. but please let the British public decide now whether we want her or not. For some she remains a strong figurehead as our head of state,steadfast, constant, dutiful, regal, wise and respectful,  an an image carefully orchestrated by PR and media, but for others a constant  reminder that  she is nothing more than an undemocratically elected individual who  has succeeded only in serving the monarchy and the status quo whilst robbing the taxpayers money for  her and her greedy family.  

It is now time for the country to look to the future. The monarchy is outdated and does not serve our modern needs, just an irrelevent drain on our society. It's time to end this symbol of privilege once and for all .Viva republic. No pictures of Mrs Windsor with ponies, here's one of my grandson instead.

http://republic.org.uk/ 

 

Palestinian Prisoner's Day 2022

 

Today marks Palestinian Prisoners Day, a day that also serves to express solidarity with the thousands of Palestinian political prisoners held in Israeli jails. It is also used as a means to illustrate the Israeli army's excessive and often lethal use of force against peaceful and unarmed demonstrators throughout the West Bank and Gaza, 

A day for Palestinian people and supporters of justice and liberation for Palestine worldwide to express  their support to Palestinian political prisoners of freedom.Commemorated since 1974, when , Mahmoud Hizazi  was freed in a prisoner exchange with the Palestinian resistance, Palestinian Prisoner Day was founded to remind the world of the thousands of Palestinian political prisoners imprisoned in Israeli  occupied  prisons or detention centers without charge or trial for extensive periods of time. It is a day to demand their freedom.

In Palestine, political imprisonment is a central feature of Israeli Apartheid with over 20% of Palestinians facing imprisonment in their lifetime.Since Israeli began its military occupation of the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) and the Gaza Strip in 1967, more than 800,000 Palestinians have been abducted and imprisoned by Israel.  This figure represents 20% of the total Palestinian population and 40% of the Palestinian male population. 

 In 2010, Israel issued Military Order 1651 which imposes a 10-year sentence on anyone who attempts to influence public opinion in the West Bank in a manner which they deem to harm public order or publishes words of praise for a hostile organization which it defines as incitement

 For years, the Israeli army has used such broad military orders to intimidate and arrest Palestinian human rights activists who engage in non-violent protests. This essentially allows Israel to criminalise resistanncetance to an occupation that is illegal under international law.

A core part of what sustains the Israeli occupation is a military judicial system characterised by violations of international law. This dual legal system that Palestinians face is reminiscent of apartheid South Africa.

Currently, there are 4,450 Palestinians incarcerated by Israel, including 160 children under the age of 18, and 32 female prisoners, including one female minor. The vast majority of Palestinian prisoners are imprisoned in Israeli prisons inside the Green Line, amounting to acts of forcible transfer from the occupied territory, in violation of Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention (1949).

Palestinian prisoners in Israeli prisons continue to face systematic ill-treatment and torture. Currently, more than 600 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli prisons suffer from a wide range of illnesses and lack of access to proper medical care, 200 of them have been diagnosed with chronic diseases, including 22 who have been diagnosed with cancer.

The most serious case is that of Naser Abu Hamid, who is in a critical condition and suffering from lung cancer.

Additionally, Israel is holding 530 Palestinian under administrative detention, a procedure whereby Israel incarcerates Palestinians without trial based on ‘secret information, in violation of the right to due process and a fair procedure under Articles 9 and 14 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and a war crime under Article 8 (2)(a)(vi) of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.

Since January 2022, Israel has arrested more than 2,140 Palestinians according to a joint statement issued by prisoners’ organizations. These arrests have particularly intensified since March and the start of Ramadan, with sweeping raids and arrests taking place in Jenin and Jerusalem.

On Friday morning April 15th, the Israeli Occupying Forces (IOF) raided the Al-Aqsa mosque and conducted mass arrests of more than 450 Palestinians from the Al-Aqsa compound after having attacked worshippers prior to the dawn prayer.

This year alone, Israel has issued approximately 400 administrative detention orders against Palestinians, most of which are renewals of previous detention orders. Administrative detainees are prohibited from their right to a fair trial, including the reasons for their arrest. The detention periods are usually issued for six months periods subject to renewal and Israel’s military courts may extend their detention indefinitely on this basis.

On 1 January 2022, around 500 Palestinian administrative detainees launched a campaign to boycott Israel’s military courts in protest against their arbitrary arrests by Israel’s apartheid regime.

This collective disobedience intends to highlight the inhuman and degrading punishment of Palestinians based on ‘secret information.

Palestinian Prisoner Day was founded to remind the world of the thousands of Palestinian political prisoners imprisoned in Israeli prisons or detention centers without charge or trial for extensive periods of time.who continue to be subject to wide-ranging violations of their rights and dignity.. The number of Palestinian detainess increases as Israeli occupying forces continue to wage campaigns of arbitrary arrests and detentions against thousands of Palestinians.

Investigations have revealed that prisoners are regularly subject to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, including poor detention conditions, in violation of Israel's obligations under international human rights and humanitarian law. 

Detention facilities and prisons in Israel have long been criticized  for overcrowding, unsanitary conditions, and inadequate access to healthcare. The majority of Palestinians in Israeli custody are defined as “security” prisoners by the Israeli Prison Service (IPS), which entails special restrictions that regular criminal prisoners do not face, such as the denial of phone calls.

Since the beginning of the year, apartheid Israel’s occupation forces have inflicted a campaign of collective punishment via violent mass arrest on the city of Jenin in the north of the illegally occupied West Bank. More than 200 of the city's residents have been arrested, with 100 arrests taking place in March alone. According to the Palestinian Prisoners Club there are approximately 500 Palestinian political prisoners from Jenin in Israeli jails, including three women and around 10 children. 

On March 2022, the UN Human Rights Committee called on Israel to “immediately put an end to the widespread practice of arbitrary arrests and detention, including administrative detention, of Palestinians, in particular children.

It should ensure that Palestinian detainees, including those held in administrative detention, are provided with all legal and procedural safeguards, including the rights to be informed of the reason for their arrest and detention, to access legal counsel, and be brought promptly before a judge, and to notify a person of the choice of their detention, in line with article 9 of the Covenant”.

Every day, Palestinian prisoners are on the front lines of struggle, facing torturous interrogation , nighttime raids, solitary confinement, and relentless attacks on their rights at the hands of Israeli occupation forces.

In a period when violence and arrests against Palestinians are being escalated, we should support the international communities efforts to ensure the immediate and effective measures to ensure that Israel releases all unlawfully detained  Palestinian political prisoners from the Israeli jails, and ensures that conditions of arrest are consistent with international human rights and humanitarian law.

As the rights of 4.500 Palestinian prisoners are violated, and the Israeli occupation army continues to arrest Palestinian children and teenagers and imprison them in barbaric conditions. We should especially urge for the immediate liberation of around 160 child prisoners, as well as of women, sick and disabled prisoners.

 Further information and resources are available at:

• Addameer (Prisoner Support & Human Rights Association)
• Samidoun (Palestinian Prisoners Solidarity Network)
   
   Prisoner of Palestine- Seize the Day  
• 
  
• 
  
  

The Tories Rwanda asylum plans are racist, cruel and inhumane.

 

The Tories want to shamefully deport tens of thousands of refugees seeking safety in Britain to Rwanda. Home secretary Priti Patel signed the £120 million deal on Thursday with the east African country, thousands of miles from Britain. Any refugee who’s forced to come to Britain through an “illegal route”—such as crossing the English Channel in a boat, will have a “one-way ticket” to Rwanda. The move will make Britain’s brutal and racist immigration system even worse,and lead to more deaths of people fleeing war, poverty and dictatorship. The plan has been met with outrage,.with U.K. opposition politicians and refugee groups condemning the move as inhumane, unworkable and a waste of public money.

Among these are the United Nations who said it raised “a number of human rights concerns.” with it's regigge coincil declaring it to be " unaxxeptable " and in breach of international law.

The Refugee Action charity said, “Offshoring people 5,000 miles away is a grubby cash-for-people plan and a cowardly, barbaric and inhumane way to treat people fleeing persecution and war.” 

Stand Up To Racism said, “We condemn the disgusting, racist and inhumane move to ‘offshore’ those seeking asylum to Rwanda, and support the emergency protests that have been called, so far in London and in Glasgow. This despicable policy is part of a wider intensification of the racist ‘hostile environment’.” 

 Steve Valdez-Symonds, refugee director at Amnesty International U.K., said the British government’s “shockingly ill-conceived idea will go far further in inflicting suffering while wasting huge amounts of public money.” 

The UK Government’s racist plans is not the way to treat people seeking safety and sanctuary.This is nothing more than a cynical distraction from the Prime Minister’s law breaking. 

People need to stop saying that refugees will be sent to Rwanda for ‘processing’. The policy is to send them there forever - there is no return. It is grotesquely cruel, immoral,shameful and orwellian. This is people trafficking by the Government. They are bribing Rwanda with development funds. It breaches the Refugee Convention.and the anti-trafficking conventions we have signed up to, Which we helped draft when we were still a civilised nation.

The Rwandan government said the agreement would initially last for five years, and Britain had paid 120 million pounds ($158 million) up front to pay for housing and integrating the migrants. Rwandan Foreign Affairs Minister Vincent Biruta said the agreement “is about ensuring that people are protected, respected, and empowered to further their own ambitions and settle permanently in Rwanda if they choose.” He said his country is already home to more than 130,000 refugees from countries including Burundi, Congo, Libya and Pakistan. 

What he did not say is that Rwanda has a horrendous human rights record where people 'disappear' on a regular basis, Lewis Mudge, Central Africa director at Human Rights Watch, said the claim Rwanda was a safe country “is not grounded in reality.” “Arbitrary detention, ill-treatment, and torture in official and unofficial detention facilities is commonplace, and fair trial standards are flouted in many cases,” Mudge said.

.In 1998 the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda for the first time in inter. criminal law found that rape was a form of genocide in the Akayesu case.Tutsi women were systematically raped and killed. It takes decades for such scars to heal. Rwanda isn't a place for refugees.

What about the Rwandan refugees who had their visa applications accepted by the U.K. Home Office last year who deemed Rwanda as a humanitarian concern great enough to grant sanctuary to hundreds of people fleeing persecution. Tories staying tight lipped on that naturally. We are sending people to a state from which we are receiving refugees.It defies all logic and reason. And on top of this the UK recently condemned Rwanda for human rights abuses and now has shamelessly signed a deal to set up Concentration Camps fpr Refugees who are mostly coming from countries that UK/US destroyed mercilessly. As LGBT individuals have faced persecution in Rwanda, how can the UK justify sending LGBT refugees to the country for processing.

The British establishment's real crime is creating those refugees in the first place by bombing, sanctioning and plundering their countries. The blood of millions on their hands. 

Nothing can be more heartbreaking than having to flee the place you have been born and brought up in,

70 million people are currently displaced from their homes on account of persecution, conflict, violence or human rights violations, of these, approximately 25 million are refugees, over half of whom are children under the age of 18, having being forced to leave their home country and take perilous journeys to cross international and national boundaries in search of safety elsewhere. A far larger number of people are displaced within their own country (internally displaced) or displaced for reasons which go beyond persecution and conflict, including drought, hunger, environmental disasters and the effects of climate change. The language used to discuss this Refugee/Rwanda issue is monstrous. BBC reporters asking Rwandan govt: ‘How much money do you want per refugee?’. And ‘outsourcing refugees’. These are people. This is the language of selling fellow human beings. We’re in evil, hellish territory.

Australia, infamous for 'offshoring' refugees, to Papua New Guinea and the tiny inlet of Nauru, vowing that none would be allowed to settle in Australia.is the inspiration for heroic war leader Boris Johnson's grotesque plan to send refugees, who brave the Channel, to Rwanda. The policy was widely criticized as a cruel abrogation of Australia’s international obligations. and described as 'torture' by the UN.

Israel sent several thousand people to Rwanda and Uganda under a contentious and secretive “voluntary” scheme between 2014 and 2017. Few are believed to have remained there, with many trying to reach Europe. It is almost certain that the relocation plans will face legal challenge if or when they come into operation with lawyers saying the set up breaches several articles of the refugee convention.

The Refugee Convention prohibits contracting states from imposing penalties on those entering illegally. Arguably sending asylum seekers to Rwanda does amount to a penalty and will be found unlawful. Imagine taking a private plane you painted in 🇬🇧 flags at taxpayer expense for a PR stunt in Rwanda because you plan to spend billions processing migrants there whilst Ukraine refugees give up on the UK because you made it so hard to get in.. All done by the daughter of migrants.

This ghastly,evil fascist fiend was actually smiling as she talked about her new plan to send refugees to Rwanda concentration camps, for processing . When the dust has settled and everyone has woken up,I trust these disgusting Tory Ministers and sycophant MPs will be whisked off to prison as quickly as they send refugees to Rwanda.

What has this country become? Sending vulnerable refugees to Rwanda is an ugly racist policy. It will cost a shit load more than being a decent society, that treats human beings with dignity, not like rubbish to be dumped wherever will take our cash. 

 The UN, amnesty international and the refugee council have all stated this will endanger lives I have never been more ashamed of being British. People claiming they stand with Ukraine yet approve a measure that could see desperate Ukrainian refugees sent to Rwanda by the British government they themselves support is a great example of cognitive dissonance. A small minority outraged. Many racists delighted. The majority more interested in Strictly, Bake off, East Enders, Champions League, Top Gear et al. As Ian Kershaw said"The road to Auschwitz was built by by hate, but paved with indifference." 

We can’t let this cruel and dangerous plan go ahead, it is unethical, unworkable and, most importantly for the Tory's voter base, unaffordable. The UK will be pouring untold amounts of money into this ludicrous scheme while citizens in this country are unable to afford their gas and electricity bills unsupported by the government. It must ne fought at all costs.

It robs people of their dignity, flies in the dace of British values of compassion and decencyns . We have heardaout the horrific conditions for asylum seekers who are placed in barracks and hotels in the IK and the physical and mental problems they cause.

People fleeing for their lives from war and persecution  should be treated with kindness not like criminals. Whatever our differences, we have to recognise our fundamental human obligation to shelter those fleeing from war and persecution, Richer nations must acknowledge refugees for the victims they are, fleeing from wars they were unable to prevent or stop. History has shown that doing the right thing for victims of war and persecution engenders goodwill and prosperity for generations, And it fosters stablity in the long run.

The Tories’ much maligned Nationality and Borders Bill is currently stuck between the House of Commons and Lords. Returning to the Commons next week, after being defeated twice by the Lords, the bill would criminalise any refugee crossing the channel with a penalty of imprisonment of up to four years. It must be vehemently opposed. 

The Rwanda plan is a dead cat to deflect from Boris Johnsons lies and criminality, we must not allow them to allow this to happen. Today and tomorrow we must continue to stand up for refugees, and say.they are welcome here, and to help refugees restore their lives,be treated with respect and dignity and allow their voices to remain visible and heard, yo continue to build bridges not more obstacles or borders. As Tories plan to dump asylum seekers in Rwanda, let us remember Tony Benn’s words "The way a government treats refugees is very instructive because it shows you how they would treat the rest of us if they thought they could get away with it."

Boris Johnson must resign !

The first serving PM in British history to be fined is clinging grimly to office. The question is not whether Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak should resign after breaking the law and the Ministerial Code - of course they should. A Prime Minister who breaks the laws his Government makes and then lies about it isn't fit for office.

Families made huge sacrifices and obeyed the law. Many said their last goodbyes to loved ones on the phone while the Prime Minister partied. Remember  when Boris Johnson said he was "furious" to see footage of staff joking about holding illegal parties in Downing Street. All the while he knew he had attended them himself.

Boris Johnson  and Rishi Sunak have broken the law and repeatedly lied to the British public.With more than 50 people now having been fined over Downing Street parties during lockdown the widespread criminality over which he has presided whilst in office is breathtaking they must resign to immediate effect . Johnson is a bare-faced liar and  screw-you law-breaker who’s made utter fools of us all. The Prime Minister’s position is completely untenable. There simply cannot be one rule for the Tories and another for the rest of us. 

The question is what can we do when they refuse and the PM is the only one with the power to police it? We can't go on like this. The claim that Johnson can't resign during a war is beyond ridiculous.  The UK is not at war. The  French are currently having a presidential election. A war in Ukraine should not be used as an excuse for letting that slime ball Johnson squat in Downing Street.

The fact that this government is using victims of war as a morally unacceptable excuse to keep this creep in power while denying the victims refuge and.Tory politicians are taking to social media and the airwaves to downplay  Boris Johnson  and Rishi Sunak’s lawbreaking and lying, whilst also cynically using the blood of dead Ukrainians as a shield, is one of the most revolting episodes I’ve witnessed yet. A political and moral sewer. Edwina Currie,  Jacob Rees-Mogg, Grant Shapps, Nadine Dorries, Priti Patel are just  some of the Tories who have come out in defence of them and Tories wonder why people call them Tory scum? 

I'm sure the UK can find a temporary substitute PM until an election 'can be held to oust the Tories for good. They just don't want to, because they know that public opinion of them now is as low as it's ever been. Other PMs have resigned at times of far greater crisis. How many more lies and ministerial code breaking are to be tolerated because it's 'the wrong time or relatively trivial'. One thing is for sure, cultural and moral values won't change under his leadership. He is obliged to go and until he does, I cannot see how, in these circumstances, the UK can be said to be a functioning democracy, at this moment in time the Conservatives are totally unfit to govern. Please don't turn on Sky news, it would be a  huge mistake! It's a Boris Johnson love-in.  All said and done we need fundamental system  change, but shame on anyone and everyone who votes Tory at the May elections.  Fucking shame on them.