Weekly Worker 699 Thursday November 29 2007 Subscribe to the Weekly Worker

Truth versus slurs

On November 21 Hands Off the People of Iran held a successful launch meeting in Manchester despite sectarian attempts to undermine it from the Socialist Workers Party. Ken Browning reports

The meeting was attended by 40 people, from many different backgrounds and political affiliations. Most were from Manchester, but a few travelled in from Preston, Liverpoo and elsewhere.

The three weeks of activity building up to the meeting were not without incident. The SWP engaged in a campaign of lies, calling us islamophobic, pro-imperialist, divisive and even implying that we were supporters of the shah! Leading SWPer Rob Owen, former president of Manchester student union (UMSU), claimed that Hopi supports a two-state solution for Palestine - no doubt a damning indictment in his opinion. In actual fact Hopi, based as it is on opposition both to imperialist plans to attack Iran and to the Tehran theocratic regime, does not take any position on an Israel-Palestine settlement, although it is resolutely opposed to Israeli aggression and expansion.

The SWP organised a counter-meeting, called under the banner of the student Stop the War group - although it had not been planned at the previous Stop the War organising meetings, attended as always by Hopi supporters. At our street stall a few days earlier Andrew Cunningham (SWP member and student union campaigns officer) remarked with unconcealed sarcasm, as a group of women wearing headscarves were signing up to the Hopi statement: “They really look like they’re against the theocracy.” Presumably he thought this would be enough to stop them in their tracks - as if being muslim must make you a supporter of a tyrannical and murderous regime. Muslims are already painted as terrorists by the media - we do not need the left to jump on the bandwagon of unfounded stereotypes.

The meeting was addressed by Ewa Jasiewicz (Hands Off Iraqi Oil) and Yassamine Mather (Workers Left Unity Iran). They were followed by PCS union militant Dave Vincent, who argued that, while the STWC deserved praise for its work in mobilising people in 2003, its actions in excluding Hopi from affiliation were disgraceful and they should be “shamed” into accepting us. The final speaker of the evening was Nigel Roland from the Green Party, who stressed his party’s opposition to any war and support for Hopi.

During the discussion from the floor Martin Ralph from Liverpool said that the exclusion of Hopi was being discussed by members of the anti-war movement and that if we let actions like this pass by without opposition there is no hope for the movement. He stated that, as someone who works with Iranian refugees on Merseyside, it is ludicrous to pretend that the Iranian regime is not repressive.

No doubt that remark was just what Katan Alder (SWP) had in mind when he argued that we were dividing the movement and watering down its strength. He made the outrageous claim that by supporting Iranian workers we were somehow aiding American imperialism and, what is more, Hopi is a CPGB front in any case. That must have come as news to the previous speakers. Comrade Mather explained that Iranian working class and social movements that opposed the regime were “the most consistent fighters against imperialism”, while Ste Monaghan of Industrial Workers of the World argued that not to criticise a regime that hangs people for being homosexual can only weaken the anti-war movement.

At the end of the meeting a provisional steering committee for the North West was established, made up of comrades from the IWW, Permanent Revolution, CPGB, Communist Students, Iraq Solidarity Campaign and even the SWP! The Green Party and Revolutionary Communist Group will discuss sending representatives along to committee meetings.

The following day (November 22) was the national student day of action against war on Iran. Hopi supporters in Manchester both helped to build this event and mobilised on the day, but unfortunately it seemed that the SWP had put more effort into making sure they had a counter-meeting in opposition to our launch than building for the day of action themselves. Despite the low turnout of around 40 on the demonstration, it was lively enough. We held a short rally at the BBC building and handed out lots of leaflets advertising Hopi’s founding conference on December 8. We now have enough signatures to launch a UMSU Hopi society.

On Saturday November 24 Hopi supporters also joined the demonstration in Manchester calling for the reinstatement of sacked mental health nurse, SWP member and Unison militant Karen Reissmann. Around 700 people attended this impressive demonstration despite the cold, rainy weather with union banners from as far afield as Glasgow and London. Once again we distributed large numbers of leaflets, and some people took bundles away to distribute in their own town or city.

Sheffield solidarity

Communist Students Sheffield hosted a meeting on ‘Iran and the threat of war’, attended by about 20 people, on November 22.

Ben Lewis of the CPGB spoke, stressing that, while US imperialism is the main enemy, the Iranian state is no friend of democracy. He pointed out that many in Iran were shocked at the STWC’s apologetic attitude to the Tehran regime. By contrast Hopi and Communist Students are forthright in condemning the theocracy, which apparently makes us accessories to imperialism.

When the meeting was opened to contributions, Mike Martin said that we should take heart from the experience of the Vietnam Solidarity Campaign, which had started “with fewer people than are in this room”. Daniel Randall of the Alliance for Workers’ Liberty said that the fundamental problem of the anti-war movement had been its cross-class nature. He wanted to know why Ben Lewis had stressed work in the STWC rather than trying to create a separate political pole. He also wanted to know what Hopi was going to do practically to solidarise with Iranian activists. In response, comrade Lewis reported that, in appreciation of our efforts, the Iranian organisation Socialist Students has changed its name to Communist Students.

Sam Durk (SWP) said that talk of workers’ struggle would “scare people off” and our approach should be to build a “broad” force. He nevertheless stated that, despite our differences, he disagreed with the exclusion of Hopi from the STWC. In his summing up, comrade Lewis welcomed Sam Durk’s comments and said it was now incumbent upon him to challenge his organisation’s leadership over their support for the exclusion of Hopi and CS.

The Sheffield Hopi steering committee is still being finalised, and interested comrades in the Sheffield area should get in touch with me at lauriemc@fastmail.fm. We will be sending a delegation down to the Hopi founding conference and looking to coordinate regular actions with other groups locally.

Laurie McCauley

Read on: Hands Off the People of Iran Weekly Worker archive

Print this page