Egyptian organizations gathered together in a conference for Palestine on Saturday, 16 July, held at the headquarters of the Karama Party in Cairo, Egypt’s capital. Jaldia Abubakra of Samidoun España spoke on behalf of the Palestinian Alternative Revolutionary Path Movement (Masar Badil), where she called for an “Arab and international alliance to support the Palestinian resistance and confront normalization and imperalism, spearheaded by the NATO alliance headed by the United States.”
In her speech, Abubakra affirmed that “The Egyptian people have never accepted normalization with Zionism,” urging “unity with all workers and nations as a first step for the liberation of Palestine.” The conference was convened to reject U.S. President Joe Biden’s visit to the region and his effort to boost military alliances and normalization between Arab reactionary regimes, the U.S., and Israel, the Zionist project in the region.
This comes as over 125 international organizations have signed on to a collective statement of rejection of Biden’s visit and the so-called “Jerusalem declaration,” affirming support and commitment to action to build the boycott and support resistance for return and liberation in Palestine.
The conference was convened by a number of Egyptian organizations, including the Karama Party, the Nasserist Arab Democratic Party, the Socialist People’s Alliance Party, the Egyptian Socialist Party, BDS Egypt, the Egyptian Women’s Front for Change, the Bread and Freedom Party, the Constitution Party, the National Accord Party, the Egyptian Communist Party and the Egyptian Popular Movement Against Zionism, among others.
BDS Egypt issued a statement condemning Biden’s visit to the region, translated below:
The visit of U.S. President Joe Biden to the region aims to reap the fruits of more than two years of an accelerated pace of normalization and agreements of betrayal and to inaugurate an economic/military alliance between the countries of the region and the occupying Zionist entity, as an attempt to integrate it further into the region and normalize the presence of the occupation, simultaneously with the revelation of the mass grave of heroic Egyptian soldiers on the land of occupied Palestine, who were exposed to incendiary bombs after violent confrontations in the 1967 war.
In the past days, we have followed the statements of the U.S. president and the prime minister of the Zionist occupation about their fears of the growing calls for boycott around the world, and harnessing the capabilities of the two countries to fight it together under a slogan of combating “anti-Semitism,” the argument invoked by the bloody occupation whenever its crimes against the steadfast Palestinian people and the people of the region are revealed.
The so-called “Jerusalem Declaration” signed by the U.S. President not only ignores the historical rights of the Palestinian people to return to their homes and lands and fails to condemn any of the crimes to which they are constantly exposed, but also condemns the Palestinian resistance, including the boycott, considering efforts to achieve liberation and return to be crimes requiring penalties.
In the continued pursuit of activating the path of normalization, which some Arab regimes and their representatives became involved with in the economic workshop in Manama, the recent “Negev summit,” and attempts to impose a military alliance between the Gulf states and the enemy, this aims to serve the interests of the occupation and make it a leading state exploiting the resources and wealth of our looted region, mired in chaos.
Because of our belief in the importance and effectiveness of the boycott, to the extent that it became an obsession for the enemy, so it commits a significant portion of its own plans to fight it, we rely on the awareness of the free Arab peoples of the feasibility of the boycott as a means of resisting colonialism historically as well as its effective role in the Palestinian cause. We urge all Arab popular frameworks to engage in boycott campaigns and movements.
We also affirm that the final word in our struggle with the Zionist enemy is for the steadfast struggle of the Palestinian people, the Arab people and the free people of the world against the occupation and its crimes, and we affirm our full and unconditional support for the choice to resist it by all possible means. We affirm our efforts for the Palestinian people in their struggle by working to besiege the enemy with a boycott and call for the imposition of sanctions upon it until the liberation of all of Palestine and all occupied Arab land.
The Egyptian Popular Campaign to Boycott Israel (BDS Egypt), 17 July 2022.
The Conference in Cairo, the National Committee in Support of Palestine, also issued a final statement emphasizing these key points:
Towards an Arab front of resistance: No to the military alliances of colonialism and Zionism
Sixty years ago, the colonial forces tried to establish the “Baghdad Pact” under the pretext of protecting Arab and Iranian oil (in the era of the Shah) from the communist tide of the Soviet Union. Egypt worked to bring it down, exposed the policies of military alliances in service of colonialism and supported the Arab and African national liberation movement.
Today, the American president returns to the region, like every weak American president attempting to create a success to boost his popularity, by attempting to secure oil and gas resources to face the crisis caused and reproduced by the U.S. policy in Europe. This comes amid rumors of plans to form a “Middle Eastern NATO” with the participation of the Gulf States, Egypt, Jordan, Iraq and the Zionist entity to confront the “Iranian threat”!!
The Egyptian forces are aware of the miniscule likelihood of success for the “Middle Eastern NATO,” as it runs contrary to the movement of history, but the cost, as usual, is borne by the people of the region. The American star is in decline, the role of the Gulf states is receding and the “indomitable” Zionist army sends its soldiers to Lebanon, Gaza and Jenin, to return crying and in shock. The advancement of its security technology did not prevent the Palestinian resistance’s missiles from lighting the sky of Yafa (“Tel Aviv”), nor did it prevent Palestinian prisoners from breaching its strict security systems and escaping from its prisons, and it became clear that the fragmentation of the united Palestinian people is merely an illusion with the declaration of the unity of the entire land of Palestine on the day of comprehensive general strike throughout all of Palestine.
This alliance aims to perpetuate colonial exploitation of peoples, plunder their wealth and support the authority of the princes of the ruling classes. Through the experiences of the path of settlement and normalization and its bitter harvest, we have become eyewitnesses to the magnitude of the losses of “peace” that exceeded the cost of war. Biden began his recent visit with the enemy, emphasizing his biases, and together they issued what was called the “Jerusalem Declaration,” which included a U.S. pledge to expand and deepen the path of normalization and ensure the continuation of Zionist military and technological superiority, and to tighten the screws on resistance and boycott movements. That is, he pledged to burden the Arab people with the cost of the occupation, attempting to force them to accept it and submit to it without resistance.
As we declare our rejection of U.S. policy in the region and the world and our total rejection of any relationship with the enemy, we recall the following:
First, nationalism is based on independence and the opposite of dependency, and therefore the enemy of any Egyptian national project is U.S. imperialism and its agents, represented in the Zionist enemy and Arab reaction.
Second, the combat doctrine of the Egyptian army is known to include the rejection of alliances and the policy of regional military alliances, and the Egyptian military doctrine has firmly established hostility to the Zionist occupation.
Third, the Arab unity we desire is a unity that enables the independence of the Arab people from colonial domination, preserving and utilizing Arab wealth in the service of the people. It is not a unity of regimes and ruling classes in the service of the American master or the security of the Zionist entity.
Fourth, Egypt’s historical leading role has come from Egypt’s leadership in the liberation movement and its support for liberation movements around the world and in the Arab region in particular, whether at the level of the state or the national movement.
Fifth, the time has come to form the broadest Arab resistance front to defend the nation and its people, with words, positions and arms in the fields of confrontation.
Sixth, coordination between all parties, movements and national public figures in rejecting normalization and supporting the struggle of the Palestinian people is necessary to activate their role.
Seventh, we urge the formation of a committee of all political parties and blocs whose role is to monitor normalization efforts and those involved.
Eighth, we demand the formation of an international investigation committee into the Zionist war crime against the 1967 prisoners of war and all prisoners of war, and the documentation of all the crimes of the occupation.
And because a clear position is a weapon, we call on the Arab masses to join the campaign to reject the Arab-Zionist coalition by issuing statements and publishing the hashtags:
#Arabs_against_normalization
#No_to_Arab_NATO
#No_American_Domination
#Normalization_is_shame_and_betrayal
#عرب_ضد_التطبيع
#لا_لحلف_ناتو_عربي
#لاللهيمنةالأمريكية
#التطبيع_عاروخيانة
