The following article was taken from the May 3 issue of the Belgian revolutionary socialist weekly La Gauche. The translation is by Intercontinental Press.]
Until recently, Lebanon was the "quietest" country in the Middle East. After 1958 [when U.S. Marines landed to "restore order"), Lebanon regained its right to the title of the "Switzerland of the Middle East." It was a country of bankers, the treasury of the Arab world. It was one of the few countries in the Third World with an even slightly developed "national bourgeoisie." It was endowed with an extremely complex political system based on mutual neutralization of the various political currents through a delicate game of balancing off the religious tendencies against each other.
The Palestinian resistance has shattered the Lebanese equilibrium. Since the six-Day War, a current of popular support for the Palestinian resistance has continued to deepen. This support became apparent last year during the funerals of the Al Fatah fedayeen [guerrilla fighters] and after the Israeli raid on the
Beirut airport. The current of popular support has been expressed in two principal ways -- organization of concrete aid to the Palestinian resistance groups and creation of armed nuclei in south Lebanon to resist a possible Israeli aggression.
During the first part of 1969, this current of support deepened to such an extent that the bourgeois politicians -- the leaders of the National Liberal party for example -- completely lost control of the situation and found themselves compelled to reject the United Nations resolution of November 22, 1967, on the Middle East crisis.
The left parties found themselves outdistanced by their cadres. If they dia not want to be completely discredited,. they had to go beyond words, and demand, with the support oi the masses, that the restrictions the government nad pLaced or the activity of the fedayeen be lifted. On April 21 the leaders of the seven left parties issued a joint manifesto protesting the limitations on the activity of the Palestinian commandos in Lebanon and calling for street demonstrations throughout the country.
The following parties signed the manifesto: the Progressive Socialist party, the Movement of Arab Nationalists, the communist party, the Lebanese Pro-
Struggle Against Ziongressive front for ism, the Independent progressives, the
Ba'ath party, and the Lebanese Socialist party.
It is to be noted that the Progressive Socialist party is a reformist party that had a representative in the government of Rashid Karami [who was forced to resign April 24, the day after the demonstrations].
The manifesto declared, in essence, that the population was duty bound to give its support to the fedayeen, to aid them in achieving the total liberation of Palestine. The declaration protested Lebanese authorities permitting the Israelis to occupy frontier villages (which they have done since 1948), and preventing the fedayeen from liberating them.
I'he manifesto called for a popular demonstration in support of the fedayeen on Wednesday, April 23, beginning at set the assembly point near
4:00 p.m. It
Forest in Beirut.
the Pine
Even before the demonstration took place in Beirut, there was a Palestinian demonstration in saida in south Lebanon, near the Ain el-Heloue Palestinian retugee camp which houses 30,000 persons. The Palestinian demonstration had been banned. The authorities had made it known that the Palestinians were to limit themselves to sending a delegation...to the authorities! The police could not control the demonstration and fired on it. Armed Palestinians retaliated. People were killed on both sides.
In the afternoon, after the news came of the bloody clashes in saida, the atmosphere in Beirut was explosive. The students of the Arab University of Beirut and the demonstrators responding to the call of the left parties fought furiously against the police, who had to retreat after exhausting their reserves of water and tear-gas grenades.
The situation was soon completely out of the control of the traditional political figures. Former premier
Taffi as well as Kemal Joumblatt, the leader of the Progressive Socialist party,
"conciliators."
sought in vain to act as Joumblatt even went back on his party's decision to support the demonstration and told the paper L'Orient: "I recognize that I made an error. After the demonstration, in which I was said to be implicated, I should have ordered the distribution of a countermanilesto condemning the street demonstrations. I was opposed to the demonstrations because I realized the danger they involved in the present situation."
Neither the state of emergency, the curfew in the main "hot spots, repression, conciliation by the traditional parties, nor anything else can prevent the crisis from deepening.
Lebanon is
ADOLFO GILLY AND OTHERS SENTENCED TO LONG PRISON TERMS IN MEXICO
Ten political prisoners, including the journalist Adolfo Gilly, were given harsh prison sentences in Mexico City April 18. All of the accused had been held without trial since 1966 on a variety of concocted charges, most of which amounted to nothing more than the advocacy of socialist ideas. A number of the defendants are members of the Partido Obrero Revolucionario (Trotskista) [Revolutionary Workers party (Trotskyist)].
Three who were not citizens -- they were from Argentina -- received the longest sentences: Adolfo Gilly, 6 years and 3 months and a 5,000-peso fine [12.5 pesos = US#1]; Oscar José Fernández Bruno,
, 6 months and a 6,000-peso fine; and Fernández' wife,
Eduwiges Teresa Confreta de Fernández, 5 years, 3 months and a 5,000-peso fine.
Others sentenced were Gildardo Islas Carranza, Ramón Vargas Salguero, Marta Elena Vargas de salguero, Leocadio Francisco Zapata Muzquiz, Genaro Jongitud Lara, Tito Armando Dominguez Lara, and Fausto Dávila Solís. All were sentenced to 2 years and 6 months in jail and fines of 5,000 pesos.
Most of the defendants were arrested in April 1966 during a student strike at the National Autonomous University in Mexico City. The arrests were part of a government campaign to smear the student movement. The Mexico City daily Excelsior
The death of Bolivian dictator General René Barrientos Ortuño in a helicopter crash April 27 promised new instability for the oligarchy that rules that small Andean nation. Barrientos was not even buried before rifts began to appear in the constitutional façade of the regime. Vice-president Luis Adolfo Siles Salinas, who assumed the presidency on Barrientos' death, has already come under attack from other sectors of the oligarchy. The May 4-5 Le Monde reported that the Bolivian Peasants Confederation -- a bureaucratic structure headed by Salvador Vásquez, a crony of Barrientos -- gave Siles Salinas an ultimatum to quit the presidency by May 5 because he was not representative of the masses." The con-
THE END OF BARRIENTOS SPELLS TROUBLE FOR THE BOLIVIAN "GORILLAS" THE END OF BARRIENTOS SPELLS TROUBLE FOR THE BOLIVIAN "GORILLAS"
part of the Arab nation, whether its leaders like it or not. The Arab revolution, led by the Palestinian resistance, is beginning to bring Lebanon out of its lethargy.
"Communist Brains, Money and Hands in the
Steen wore egal Orders The Lund to the Department of Justice, served their purpose and the "plot" was allowed to be quietly forgotten while the victims remained in jail.
None of the sensational accusations were substantiated at the trial. Adolfo Gilly, for example, was charged only with "conspiracy, conveniently vague "crime." Under Mexican law the long sentences meted out to the Argentinians makes it impossible for them to be released on bail while appealing the verdict.
The Partido Obrero Revolucionaria is affiliated to a grouping led by J. Posadas, which split from the Fourth International, the world Trotskyist movement, in 1962.
With a dwindling number of adherents, Posadas set up his own "Fourth International on an ultraleft" sectarian program. Iheir isolation made them an easy target for witch-hunting attacks of the Diaz Ordaz regime that were really aimed at the revolutionary student movement. Protest over the injustice done to these revolutionists should be lodged with the Mexican government.
federation proposed General Ovando, the man reputed to have given the order to murder Che Guevara, as a more suitable candidate.
Siles Salinas rejected the ultimatum. At Barrientos' funeral in Cochabamba May 2 he declared, "Whatever the gravity of the situation, I will face all the consequences. They can kill me if they want."
Meanwhile, it was reported that "elements hostile to the late president" had seized the town of Achacachi. The identity of the rebels was not disclosed, but the revolt was said to have been suppressed.