National liberation

News has broken that Israel has now followed its sustained air bombardment of the besieged Gaza Strip, which has already killed at least 230 people, with a ground invasion. This weekend, rallies are being held in cities across Australia to rally for Palestine int he face of Israel's carnage (details below).

With news that Israel has now escalated its bloody assault on Gaza, which has already killed at least 230 Palestinians, by starting a ground invasion, new protests are being planned in cities across Australia against Israel's slaughter. It comes after thousands of people joined people around the world outraged by Israel's killing by taking part in rallies last weekend. The details of the actions are below.

Joint statement by Asia-Pacific left organisations In the past week, Israeli military forces have escalated their offensive on the Gaza Strip. Israeli warplanes have increasingly targeted houses, civilian-populated areas and civilian facilities in the Gaza strip. Israeli warplanes have destroyed a number of houses while their residents were inside, without any prior warnings, killing and wounding many Palestinian civilians.

Unite the Union, the largest union in Britain and Europe, has unanimously passed a motion supporting the Venezuelan government of President Nicolas Maduro and re-affirming its support for the Venezuela Solidarity Campaign. The motion was presented during Unite’s June 30 to July 4 policy conference in Liverpool. Commenting on moves towards US sanctions on Venezuela in recent weeks, the mover of the motion said: “One can only conclude that some in the US share the Venezuelan opposition’s aim to oust the Maduro government”.

“David Cameron’s government is responsible for the most aggressive attack for over a century on our public services, our standard of living and on the future for jobs and a decent life for young people,” said the Radical Independence Campaign, which is pushing for a “yes” vote in Scotland's September 18 referendum on independence. “The millionaire cabinet are ruining the chances of a generation. By slashing services and privatising health and education they are driving our young people to despair.”

Scotland will vote on independence from Britain September 18. Despite a strong campaign by establishment figures for a “no” vote, polls showing growing support for independence, although still not a majority. Below, Colin Fox explains why Scottish independence will be a blow to austerity and a win for working people. Fox is the nation spokesperson for Scottish Socialist Party and a former member of Scottish parliament, and sits on the Yes Scotland advisory board.

From the moment three Israeli teens were reported missing last month, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the country’s military-intelligence apparatus suppressed the flow of information to the general public. Through a toxic blend of propaganda, subterfuge and incitement, they inflamed a precarious situation, manipulating Israelis into supporting their agenda until they made an utterly avoidable nightmare inevitable.

As images of children huddled in masses on immigrant detention centre floors along the US-Mexico border make headlines worldwide, the US government is responding with more of the same failed policies that have generated economic and social devastation in Central America spurring migration in the first place. More than 52,000 children have been apprehended at the US border since October 2last year, most of them from El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, and many of them unaccompanied. At least 60,000 minors are expected to cross into the country this year.

Israel briefly deployed troops inside the Gaza Strip for the first time in its current offensive on July 13, as it ignored international calls for peace. Naval commandos were sent in to destroy what Israel claimed was a rocket-launching site. Bout 4000 people later fled from the northern part of the besieged Palestinian enclave after Israel dropped leaflets telling them to evacuate to avoid a “short and temporary” campaign.

The world is focused on Israel's offensive against Palestinians in Gaza, with escalating air strikes and a massing of infantry units along the border for a threatened invasion in the wake of the discovery of the bodies of three teenage settlers. But Israel's use of violence and terror against Palestinians continues in the West Bank and Israel itself.

Days of Israeli bombings had killed more than 100 people in the Gaza Strip by July 11, ElectronicIntifada.net said that day. The dead included many children. It comes after large-scale raids and many arrests in the occupied West Bank. In response to this drastic escalation in “collective punishment” of the Palestinian people, the Palestinian Boycott Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) national committee issued the statement below.

The number of victims of Israel’s merciless bombing of Gaza reached 90 fatalities as of July 10, with several members of individual families among the dead. One such family is that of 75-year-old Muhammad Hamad of the northern Gaza Strip town of Beit Hanoun. Six members of his family were killed when Israel bombed the home of his 30-year-old son Abd al-Hafez Hamad, a commander with the armed group Islamic Jihad, on July 8.