No to terrorism! No to War! No to Racism!

Despite being expected for some time, the horrifying bombings in London and the terrible death and injury have shocked millions in Britain. Socialist Students totally condemns these attacks as we did those of 9/11, the Madrid bombings and all acts of terror which result in the indiscriminate slaughter of ordinary working people.

Just over two years ago two million people marched through the streets of London to try to stop the war and invasion of Iraq. They had the support of the majority of the population. Without doubt some of the victims of the bombings were amongst those marchers. The main victims of the carnage wreaked in London are not the rich and powerful but working-class people of all ethnic groups going about their daily lives.

Tony Blair and George Bush told us that the war in Iraq would make the world a safer place. Although some supported the war on this basis, millions opposed it from day one as a war for oil, profits and prestige. Socialist Students explained at the time that the brutal invasion and occupation of Iraq, which has resulted in the deaths of as many as 100,000 ordinary Iraqis, would create more of the conditions for terrorism to thrive, and be a recruiting agent for groups targeting civilians in the name of war against US and British imperialism.

Around the world, tens of millions of protesters expressed such concerns and marched against the war. Socialist Students pointed out that in Iraq and elsewhere, war and occupation would also lead to an escalation of terrorism. The CIA itself recently reported that Iraq had become a ‘laboratory’ for terror.

Terrorism also blights the lives of thousands of ordinary Iraqis who, as well as enduring the brutality of imperialist occupation, are daily subjected to horrific terrorist attacks. The warmongers Blair and Bush, far from bringing stability and peace, have made the world a much more dangerous and insecure place where innocent workers and the poor live in fear of attack.

Soon after the London bombings, Blair tried to brush aside the argument that these attacks were to do with Iraq. He pointed out that 9/11 took place before Iraq or Afghanistan was invaded. However, soon after, 85% of people questioned in a poll by Daily Mirror and GMTV made a direct link between the London bombings and Iraq.

It is patronising to try to deny the effect of imperialist oppression of the Arab peoples, which did not begin with the invasion of Iraq or even the brutal subjugation of the Palestinian people over decades, but goes back at least as far as the imperialist carve up of the Middle East and its natural resources almost a century ago. The war on and occupation of Iraq has massively fuelled this anger. Unlike the oppression of the Palestinians, the British government has been directly and unequivocally involved in the occupation of Iraq.

Al-Qaeda, who certainly inspired, and probably directed, these attacks, is repellent to most Muslims. This is not an organisation of national liberation which struggles for the interests of the oppressed peoples in Muslim countries, but is a deeply reactionary organisation that aims to turn the clock back to the seventh century.

Al-Qaeda is backed by rich Saudi Arabians, and its roots lie in US imperialism’s funding of right-wing political Islamic organisations as a bulwark against Stalinism, particularly during the Afghan war. It is no coincidence that Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, two of the main countries in which Al Qaeda has a base, were used by US imperialism for the building of a 50,000 strong mercenary army to force the Soviet Union out of Afghanistan.

The Madrassas (the Islamic schools now being implicated by the press in the London bombings) were set up across Pakistan at this time as part of imperialism’s drive to provide Islamic ‘cannon fodder’ for their proxy war in Afghanistan. Having defeated the collapsing Soviet Union, the jihadis turned their attention to driving out Western imperialism. It is as a result of these processes that Al Qaeda developed!

Since 9/11 New Labour has brought in a series of repressive legislation. Not prevented terrorist attacks, they have instead led to harassment and intimidation of innocent people. Spain has ID cards but the Madrid bombings still killed 191 people! Yet the government is bringing forward the introduction of ID cards, although it has been forced to admit that they would not have prevented 7/7.

The actions of the government in introducing further repressive legislation in the wake of the bombings are likely to alienate Muslim youth still further than at present. As the campaign against the IRA proved in the 1970s, no amount of draconian laws can prevent terrorist attacks.

The anti-terrorist legislation introduced in the wake of 9/11 has already been used several times against anti-war protesters, and against peaceful anti-capitalist protesters outside an arms fair. It has also resulted in the imprisonment of Muslims without any real evidence against them. The latest legislation will not prevent future terrorist attacks, but will be used to attack those who campaign against the government, as well as fuelling the anger of British Muslims.

Last summer’s brutal killing of an innocent man, Jean Charles de Menezes, under the police’s ‘shoot-to-kill’ policy was a horrific demonstration of what can happen if the police and security services are given greater powers with no accountability. Socialist Students campaign for a public enquiry into the shooting under the control of the committees and trade unions.

Despite the fact that unity across ethnic groups has been the predominant mood, and that the attacks have targeted people from varied backgrounds, there has already been an increase in racist attacks against mosques and individual Muslims, particularly but not exclusively outside of London.

Socialist Students campaigns against racism and the scapegoating of Muslims as a result of the tragic events on 7/7. The Muslim community is one of the poorest sections of British society with one in seven Muslims unemployed, compared with one in 20 for the wider population. Social deprivation is particularly high amongst Pakistani and Bangladeshi Muslims. These economic factors are linked to the anger felt by this community, which is facing racism here in Britain and Blair’s foreign policy of oppression in the Muslim world. This oppression affects the Muslim community as a whole and shapes the outlook of its members, including middle-class Muslims.

The number of Asian young men stopped and searched by the police has rocketed. In London, for example, from 2001 to 2002 there was a 41% increase in ‘stop and search’ against Asians by the Metropolitan police. The horror of the overwhelming majority of Muslims in post-7/7 is especially sharp because, in addition to the fear of further attacks we all feel, they understand that the result will be an increase in racism and police harassment against them. In Leeds and Huddersfield, whole communities have been forced to move out of their homes for days or even weeks while searches of properties in their area take place.

A whole generation of Muslims is growing in the post 9/11 era. The occupation of Iraq and the 100,000 civilians killed have had a profound effect on the consciousness of Muslims worldwide. US and British imperialism used 9/11 as a justification to invade Afghanistan and especially Iraq. It stretched its military muscle in the region to increase its prestige in the Middle East and to gain access to cheap oil. For millions of Muslims worldwide, these attacks alongside the US backed Israeli oppression of Palestinians, and the devastation being wreaked in Chechnya, is mistakenly perceived as a war on their religion.

There is no doubt that the vast majority of Muslims want to prevent future bombings, especially in the face of a government which tries to blame Muslims for the atrocities and calls on the Muslim leaders to help integrate their community into ‘British’ society. However, it is not within the power of Muslim individuals to change the circumstances – economic discrimination, poverty, the occupation of Iraq, Palestine – that have pushed a small minority of Muslims down the profoundly mistaken road of terror attacks on ordinary working people.

Socialists have always opposed the methods and ideology of terrorism for all the reasons above, but also because it attempts to substitute the acts of the individual for a mass movement. From all sections of society mistaken and damaging methods of struggle can arise but the only way to combat them is for all working people to unite in opposition and to support a programme that counters the divisive and anti-working class policies of the main capitalist political parties.

Socialist Students called for emergency demonstrations under the banner ‘No to terror, no to war, no to racism’ soon after the London bombings took place. Such a demonstration, mobilising workers and ordinary people under one banner, is crucial in appealing to the already alienated Muslim youth, and showing that it is the workers’ movement that offers a way forward.

Working-class and young people should come together in solidarity to demand an immediate end to war and terror. The trade unions and NUS could play a decisive role in this, calling and organising walk-outs against the cuts in our public services – a direct result of the cost of the British involvement in this imperialist war of at least £7 billion.

In Iraq itself, we call for the need of workers and poor people to unite to establish democratically controlled defence forces, drawn from all religious and ethnic groups, to lead a mass struggle to end the occupation and in defence of the natural resources (mainly oil) being looted by big business at the moment. The Iraqi working class has a strong tradition of organisation, which shows the potential for a new workers' party in Iraq. Such a formation could struggle against imperialism and would serve the interests of the majority in Iraq – the workers, youth, poor farmers and unemployed – not the multinational companies and the Iraqi capitalist class.

War, terror and poverty are the inevitable consequences of a capitalist system. This society is run by the multi-nationals which profit from the inequality, exploitation and wars. Socialist Students is campaigning to replace capitalism with a democratic socialist society where the economy is democratically planned by the majority to meet the needs of the whole of humanity and the environment.