Stop The War has repeatedly shut out Syrian voices. It is time for public figures linked to Stop The War, such as Michael Rosen who has shown great concern for refugee rights, to now distance themselves from this bullying behaviour.
The Assad regime’s chemical attack on the town of Khan Sheikhoun drew condemnation from across the world, but no major action from the Stop the War Coalition, which opposes any action including sanctions against the criminal Assad regime.
Stop the War says that it is against all UK and US military intervention in Syria. But when the US bombed Syrian civilians in the al Jina mosque in Aleppo province in March, where were the protests from Stop The War? When the Coalition bombed displaced people sheltering in al Badiya school, west of Raqqa, where were the protests from Stop The War? Now that Assad’s airfield is hit, they take to the streets. Their actions suggest that they have greater care for preserving Assad’s killing machine than for protecting civilians.
They say ‘Don’t Bomb Syria.’ It seems they really mean ‘Don’t bomb Assad.’
It is time for all honourable anti war campaigners to separate from Stop The War.
Lionised by the Morning Star newspaper, Assad apologist Vanessa Beeley denied hospital bombings in Aleppo and smeared White Helmets rescue volunteers.
Beeley addressed an ultra-Stalinist cult meeting in Bristol, ridiculing Syrian health workers.
When a Syria Solidarity UK member questioned Beeley on hospital bombings, he was put in a chokehold by meeting organisers and ejected.
On 17 February Vanessa Beeley, associate editor of 21st Century Wire and a frequent guest of the far right conspiracy blog InfoWars, http://www.infowars.com/ gave an illustrated talk in Bristol, billed as a challenge to mainstream media reporting of Syria, particularly of the fall of Aleppo. Four members of Syria Solidarity UK—including myself—went along to join Bristol members who were leafleting the meeting outside.
The hosts were ‘Bristol Open Inquiry into the Bombing of Syria,’ a CPGB-ML front aiming to ‘end sanctions on Syria; stop arming terrorists.’ The CPGB–ML (Communist Party of Great Britain–Marxist Leninist) is an ultra-Stalinist cult, expelled from Arthur Scargill’s Socialist Labour Party, and from Stop the War Coalition, for openly supporting Assad and Ghaddafi.
The meeting was attended by 70-90 people, not necessarily CPGB–ML members or supporters. According to the people around me, many had been informed about the event by STWC. Beeley was introduced by Mehraz Shahabi, an open supporter of the Iranian regime, who passionately defended Syrian ‘sovereignty’ against imperialism.
Vanessa Beeley spoke for a full two and a half hours on her recent trips to Aleppo as a self-styled independent journalist. She presented video clips which she claimed were interviews with escapees from the ‘jihadist prison’ of East Aleppo, taken mainly around the Jebrin Registration Centre from 14 December onwards. She did not explain how she obtained access, nor who her interpreters were, nor why the interviews were conducted in public. They were vox-pop snippets on the street, with the interviewees praising the Syrian Arab Army for giving them food and denouncing jihadists for giving them none. There were no detailed or in depth interviews—they needed extensive commentary from Beeley to yield the sense she wanted. But to someone uninformed about Syria, or willing to view mainstream coverage of Aleppo as propaganda to support an imperialist project of regime change, they could be effective.
Interview with Syrian activist Lina Al Shamy while she was still in Aleppo, 19 December.
By Amr Salahi
Last week, as Assad’s forces and their foreign militia allies closed in on the last remaining opposition enclave in East Aleppo, the horrific crimes being committed during their assault became headline news across the world. In one massacre alone as many as 82 people were reported killed, and there were reports of children being burned alive.
Activists and civil defence workers in Aleppo uploaded photos and videos, and gave interviews to international media, telling the world that they were trapped and completely surrounded in East Aleppo. Nearly 100,000 people were herded by the Assad regime and its allies into an area of less than two square kilometres. The people in this tiny enclave were deprived of food, medicine, and electricity while cluster bombs and barrel bombs dropped by the Russian and Syrian air forces rained down on them.
Eventually, what was called an ‘evacuation’ agreement was signed. This was a misnomer. The people remaining in East Aleppo were being given a choice: either a horrific death at the hands of the regime and its militia allies, or permanent forced displacement from their city to other opposition-held areas of Syria—where they would be subject to continued aerial bombardment by Russia and the Assad regime.
In the age of digital media, it is very difficult to prevent photographic evidence of such atrocities or to silence the voices of those trapped in conflict zones. However, there is a concerted effort by some advocacy groups and some sections of the media to do just that. Other articles have dealt with the efforts of Russian media and activists associated with them to misrepresent the situation in Aleppo. This article will look at what was said in the United Kingdom, examining statements published on the website of the Stop the War Coalition and an article by Patrick Cockburn, a journalist who has been widely and misleadingly quoted as an authoritative source on Syria.
Stop the War: War Crimes are Fine as Long as We Don’t Get Involved
One would expect that an organisation called ‘Stop the War’ would have something to say about the killing, starvation, and siege of civilians in Aleppo. It would be easy for them, for example, to publish links to some of the English-language video reports uploaded to YouTube and Twitter by Syrian media activists trapped in Aleppo. But there was no mention of these, even though Stop the War does have a lot to say about Aleppo.
In two articles on Stop the War’s website, the organisation’s National Convenor, Lindsey German, took the greatest pains to make sure the attention of Stop the War supporters was drawn away from the atrocities taking place there. One of these, entitled ‘Aleppo Debate: MPs in Denial Once Again,’ began with the sentence ‘The usual stench of hypocrisy is oozing from the Palace of Westminster’ and attacked ‘right wing Labour MPs’ for daring to suggest that intervention in 2013 would have prevented what German herself admits is a ‘terrible situation’ in Aleppo.
German justified this by saying that the ‘ongoing catastrophe’ in Libya since 2011 was ‘solid proof that western bombing and intervention only makes things worse.’ Apparently, no matter how hellish a situation is, no matter how many people are being slaughtered, and no matter how much intervention there is from non-Western countries (there are reports now that the foreign Shi’i militias fighting for Assad in Syria now actually outnumber his own forces) any intervention anywhere by Western countries will ‘only make things worse.’
She misleadingly said that 30,000 Libyans died as a result of NATO intervention in the country, when this often quoted figure in fact applies to all casualties of the war, including those killed by Qadhafi. (Human Rights Watch confirmed a minimum of 72 civilians killed by NATO’s Libya intervention.) German could have looked at the speeches Qadhafi made about what he was going to do to the ‘rats’ and ‘cockroaches’ who rose up against him in Benghazi in 2011, or she could have compared the 2016 death tolls documented by Libya Body Count to those in Syria documented by the Syrian Network for Human Rights to see whether Western intervention had led to the worse outcome. But who is she to let facts get in the way of a good argument?
In the rest of the article she went on to blame the UK government for its alleged support for the opposition. This apparently, is the reason for what’s happening in Aleppo. Assad and his allies are killing and starving people in a besieged enclave, but it is all the West’s fault for supporting his opponents. Once again it doesn’t matter that Syrian rebels have complained of a lack of meaningful support from the West since 2012 and have not received any weapons capable of changing the game in their favour in Syria. Nor does it matter that they are hopelessly outgunned and that the regime and its allies continue to have a monopoly on aerial power and heavy weaponry in Syria. For German it is the MPs criticising inaction who are in denial, and the stench of hypocrisy is so strong she can’t actually smell where it is coming from.
Patrick Cockburn: Anyone reporting from Aleppo is Al-Qaeda
In The Independent, Patrick Cockburn went much further. His article began with the words ‘There was a period in 2011 and 2012 when there were genuinely independent opposition activists operating inside Syria, but as the jihadis took over these brave people were forced to flee abroad, fell silent or were dead.’ Reading the rest of the article, the last part of the sentence sounds more like an aspiration than a statement of fact.
According to Cockburn, the reason Western journalists can’t make it to Aleppo is because the ‘jihadis’ hold power there. Never mind the fact that East Aleppo is surrounded and besieged by Assad’s forces and his (religiously motivated) Iranian-run militia allies, never mind the fact that Turkey has closed its border with the rebel held areas of northern Syria, making it impossible for journalists to enter, Cockburn has decided that the reason he can’t go and investigate what’s going is because ‘al-Qaeda type jihadis’ are in control. These same people, he informs us, have kidnapped and killed Western journalist journalists and this is a ‘smart move,’ all part of a conspiracy to control the flow of information to the West and make sure that anyone reporting from East Aleppo or uploading images to the Internet from the city, from seven-year-old Bana al-Abed to members of the Syrian Civil Defence, are jihadist sympathisers and fellow-travellers.
The threat to Western reporters is ‘very real,’ Cockburn points out: ‘James Foley had been ritually beheaded on 8 August 2014 and Steven Sotloff a few days later.’ Cockburn conveniently omits to mention that these journalists were murdered by ISIS, and that ISIS were driven out of Aleppo by the very same ‘jihadists’ who are now in control of Aleppo. The majority of the rebels who controlled East Aleppo until last week in fact owed their allegiance to the Free Syrian Army, which is motivated by a nationalistic opposition to the Assad regime, rather than by Islamism. Fighters from Jabhat Fatah al-Sham, a group which was previously affiliated with Al-Qaeda, accounted for no more than 900 people or 11% of opposition fighters in the city, and may have been much fewer. Like Western journalists, rebel fighters have been ritually murdered by ISIS and their deaths have been even more brutal—they have been publicly crucified in the ISIS stronghold of Raqqa.
But none of this is important when you’re out to prove that everyone being targeted by Assad in Syria is a ‘jihadist’ and that every single fact being reported from a city subject to a bombardment and siege of unprecedented ferocity is ‘jihadist propaganda.’ It doesn’t take much effort to identify the subtext of Cockburn’s article: everyone remaining in East Aleppo is a legitimate target.
‘News organisations,’ he concludes ‘have ended up being spoon-fed by jihadis and their sympathisers.’ If you are a civilian or an activist trapped in what is now the most heavily bombed cities on earth, waiting for forced displacement to a marginally less dangerous area at best or a horrific death at the hands of sectarian-motivated militia at worst, you are by default a jihadi sympathiser and have no right to tell your story to the world. Only Western journalists are capable of telling the truth.
While the people of Aleppo have been literally going through hell this past week, waiting either to be ethnically cleansed from their city or to die horrific deaths, those cited as authoritative sources on the Syrian situation and those claiming to represent a progressive movement working for have been bending over backwards to make sure that their story isn’t told. They have not stopped short of slander and racism in their efforts to obscure the suffering of thousands of innocent people. It doesn’t get much lower than this.
Protesters call for action to save Aleppo and for sanctions against Putin, 17 December.
Protect the Children of Aleppo: Stop the War in Syria
250,000 people live in East Aleppo, including an estimated 100,000 children. These people are not terrorists; they simply don’t want to live under a leader, Assad, who has killed, raped and tortured their kin.
On Wednesday the Syrian military warned these civilians to flee or meet their “inevitable fate.” Russian and Syrian airstrikes are targeting hospitals, schools, bakeries, and underground shelters. This policy of deliberately targeting civilians is a war crime that will cause trauma for generations.
The leaders of Britain, America, Russia, Iran, etc. have done nothing to protect Syria’s civilians; it falls to us who do care to organise and speak out on their behalf.
Please join us to call for an immediate end to the bombing in Aleppo and a properly enforced UN ceasefire.
Syria is the worst war of this decade, even of this bloody century so far.
The fund established to continue the work of slain MP Jo Cox has come under attack from assorted far right forces (and unfortunately someone once associated with the British left) for including in its list of beneficiaries the White Helmets—the volunteer civil defence service that act as first responders to bombing attacks on Syrian opposition communities, digging dead and injured victims out of the rubble.
The White Helmets have been subjected to a vicious slander campaign by a network of Syrian regime supporters, centred around Australian university lecturer Tim Anderson.
These people have long supported Assad’s bloody campaign of repression against anyone who dares to challenge his power, but their attack on the White Helmets carries this to a new level: not only do they cheer on the mass slaughter in Syria, they also seek to deny Assad’s victims the elementary right to rescue their loved ones and to bury their dead. This is akin to the ‘double tap’ attack favoured by both Assad and the Israeli air force: first you bomb a community and then you drop a second bomb to hit those who come out in response to the attack. But in this case the first attack comes in the form of the rhetorical onslaught by Anderson and his supporters, who seek to prevent the very existence of any form of civil defence in Syrian opposition communities—and then the real bombs drop.
This is a regression to medieval standards of warfare—as far as I know not even Lord Haw Haw objected when the British authorities appointed air raid wardens in the Second World War.
Nick Griffin’s tweet smearing Syria Civil Defence and the Jo Cox Fund.
Most of those contributing to this campaign have come from various sections of the far right: Nick Griffin of the BNP, British and US groups associated with the ‘libertarian right,’ climate change deniers, and opponents of the great ‘globalist’ conspiracy to take over the world—which they describe as linked to Jews, to Freemasons, and of course to green lizards from outer space. One vociferous supporter of Anderson can be found on the internet engaged with white supremacists branding Nelson Mandela a ‘terrorist.’
An unexpected, recent denizen of this fetid milieu is erstwhile British leftist Tariq Ali, who has reposted one of the cruder attacks on the memory of Jo Cox and the White Helmets on his Facebook page.
However, while all this chatter is going on the White Helmets are going about their work across large parts of Syria, braving Assad’s bombs to save lives and recover bodies (some 50,000 lives saved in the course of their operations at the cost of over 100 of their own lives), with modest support from some western governments, from public fund raising, and from sympathetic bodies like the London Fire Brigades Union. This gives them an annual budget about one-third the size of the fire service for a small English city, which usually has nothing more serious to deal with than chip fat fires and motor accidents. Clearly the resources that Jo Cox’s fund will provide to them can make an important contribution to saving lives in Syria.
There is a bitter twist to this tale: Assad supporter Tim Anderson, who is intimately associated with this attack on the White Helmets, has been invited to speak at the Crossing Borders conference on the Greek island of Lesvos, where many Syrian refugees have landed after a perilous sea voyage, and where over 60 who died in the attempt are buried.
These are some of the pearls of wisdom he wants to share with the Conference:
“Most civilians in the areas said to have been ‘barrel bombed’ left a very long time ago… Every attack on al Nusra is thus portrayed as an attack on ‘civilians’ and clinics, or on emergency health workers. Much the same applies to Medicin Sans Frontiers (MSF), which funds al Nusra clinics… in several terrorist held areas.”
“The photos of dead and injured women and children in the ghost towns inhabited by the armed groups are simply borrowed from other contexts…”
“The Syrian Army has been brutal with terrorists but, contrary to western propaganda, protective of civilians.”
The spectacle of a supporter of the Assad regime being feted at a conference ostensibly concerned with refugees, just metres from the graves of victims of that same regime, would seem to be something that could only take place in a particularly bad dream. Yet it is due to happen next month, with Tim Anderson speaking under the sponsorship of Stop the War and the People’s Assembly against Austerity, and with Tariq Ali also on the platform. Anderson’s supporters are already crowing at this recognition.
While two scheduled speakers have refused to take part in this absurd farce, repeated attempts by Syrian solidarity activists to persuade Stop the War to take a stand against it have met a stone wall.
The reputation of the British left, of peace activism and of refugee support movements, is being challenged here. Pause and reflect for a moment how Syrian refugees will feel on hearing of this event, of what it says about how much real understanding and concern there is in this country for their suffering and lived histories. Anyone with political understanding should appreciate how callous this act is; anyone with an ounce of moral conscience should feel compelled to speak out in protest to the conference organisers, sponsors, and speakers.
This book should be required reading for every leftist, as an antidote to the growing mountain of ignorant comment on the subject of Syria. The title Khiyana (betrayal) is an accusing cry; the book is a trenchant denunciation of the Western Left for its abandonment of the principles of internationalism and solidarity in favour of an alignment with the ‘anti imperialist’ camp, a hangover from the geo-politics of the Cold War.
Assad An-Nar, like most of the authors, situates himself on the Marxist left, and his prefatory chapter could be considered a direct response to Tariq Ali’s infamous dismissal of the Arab Spring in What is a Revolution? (Guernica, Sept. 2013). He sets his critique in the context of the changing nature of revolution in an age of global neoliberalism, where post colonial states are collapsing because neoliberal policies have slashed the limited social protections they used to offer. In this world, he says, the principles of self emancipation and of collective and democratic struggle are ‘ideas in search of a subject.’ Ideas about democracy, socialism, and anti-imperialism used to run in the same direction, but now they are counterposed.
With the collapse of the progressive moment of secular Arab nationalism, Islamist organisations like the Muslim Brotherhood can rise beyond identity/sectarian politics in resistance to tyranny. Though not necessarily opposed to neoliberalism, they are the voice of those who are excluded from its benefits. Hezbollah’s current role in Syria shows that such movements can swing between revolution and counter revolution without moving in a socialist direction.
The role of socialists is not to counterpose themselves to democratic revolutions, which gave rise (in Egypt) to the first democratic government, and (in Syria) to emancipatory projects such as networks of local councils against the existing state, but to take the democratic side against tyranny. Instead the left has responded by either supporting their favourite dictatorships (the neo Stalinists) or by re-hashing theories of ‘permanent revolution,’ i.e. insisting that revolutions can only end in socialism or defeat (the Trotskyists). Yes, he says, a democratic revolution is possible in these countries, but the outcomes are uncertain; the socialist left, while recognising its marginal role, should not condemn itself to irrelevance by denouncing the struggles for democracy because they are not socialist. Instead he urges the left to make the ‘democratic wager,’ in hope that the outcomes lead to more collective forms of struggle. There is little to lose for socialists, he believes, since neoliberalism has led worldwide to the fatal weakening of working class self-organisation.
In a short review I can refer only to two further articles in the core of the book; but I cannot resist a passing mention of the glorious satirical piece by M Idrees Ahmad, The Anti-Imperialist Guide to Inaction in Syria. Anyone familiar with debate on Syria will recognise the strategies he lists: ‘Don’t defend Assad, attack his opponents; sympathise selectively; functional doubt where straight denial is risky; defend peace and sovereignty; champion the minorities; talk about ISIS, not Assad; talk about refugees but not the cause of flight,’ etc. Most of these strategies are shared with the establishment and the extreme Right.
Mark Boothroyd describes the responses of Stop the War Coalition (STWC) to Syria, in a case study that echoes the critique in the preface. It has consistently viewed developments through its relation to the US and the UK. In a multi polar world system with competing imperialisms, it persists in viewing events through the prism of the Cold War. The agency of Syrians is erased altogether.
In 2013, STWC opposed the proposed intervention of the UK and when this proposal was defeated in Parliament, it claimed victory; but Boothroyd claims that if the West had really wanted to intervene in Syria it would have done so—its actual strategy is to let the country bleed. I think he underestimates the power of popular protest in democratic countries, and the degree to which STWC was able to tap into post Iraq war weariness. But he is right in pointing out that STWC has missed a trick in failing to expose the real cruelties of the Western role.
In its weaker response to the 2015 intervention against ISIS, STWC has consistently refused to allow oppositional Syrians on its platforms—who have opposed the Coalition campaign against ISIS as useless and counter-productive, but have also proposed more positive measures for the protection of Syrian civilians. Once again, its failure to listen to Syrians has weakened its moral stance even in its own terms—in opposing its own Government.
It could have been different, he believes: the anti war movement could have risen beyond its current ethnocentric, isolationist positions to meet the challenge of changing times, and been a movement to build solidarity with the revolutions in the Middle East.
In The Rise of Daesh in Syria, Sam Charles Hamad attacks the myth of Saudi funding and support for Daesh; instead, in a detailed study, he convincingly shows their deadly rivalry despite their similar ideologies. He demonstrates the origins of Daesh in post invasion Iraq, and its nurture by the sectarian regimes in Iraq and Syria. He shows, by tracing its sources of income, how it is self sustaining. Finally he argues that the current tactics of the west, in fighting Daesh from the air but hampering the oppositions in their fight against the sectarian regimes of Assad and Maliki, are counter-productive. And the left’s narrative is complicit in this.
The book, and particularly its opening chapter, is weakened by a failure to examine more closely such terms as ‘democracy’ and ‘emancipation,’ given their ambivalent history among Marxists; and to analyse the demands of the revolution—Freedom Justice and Dignity—in more detail. This is particularly the case since there is little discussion of class, and no accounts of the role of women in the Syrian revolution, nor of the role of Western women’s peace groups or feminists in relation to Syria. My own recent experience of organising solidarity events with Syrian women suggests that the hostility to, and silencing of, Syrian voices is much less prevalent among feminist organisations than in the left as a whole. The ‘democratic wager’ which is urged upon us might be weighted more favourably with the inclusion of women activists, within Syria and in the West.
A personal reflection on engaging with Stop the War, by Hala Alshami.
I was delighted to accept an invitation to attend a public meeting in December organised by Waltham Forest Stop the War and Stand Up to Racism, and an invitation to speak at a Stoke on Trent protest organised by Staffordshire Stop the War. I am anti-war myself and I believe in engaging with people. I wanted to speak to the conscience of the Stop the War members and try to convey the voices of victims of the war in Syria. I met many wonderful people, and I was touched by their compassion and eagerness to campaign against wars. I have so much respect for Stop the War’s protests against the Iraq invasion in 2003. I highly appreciate their recent campaign to welcome refugees.
I also have so much disappointment and disagreement regarding Stop the War’s position on Syria. I am aware that many members of Stop the War are perceiving the Syria war through the same lense as they saw the Iraq invasion in 2003, as ‘an unjust imperial war.’ This is one of the main reasons for the big clash between Stop the War and people supporting the Syrians’ struggle for freedom, dignity, and democracy. I will present my perspective about the Syrian revolution, which might be different to their perspective; it is always helpful to see the other side of the story. Acknowledging our differences can help us to find a common ground and to work together for a just cause. The Syria war is tragic and I am writing to the minds and hearts of peace-loving people to reflect, and to suggest things we can do to help.
Syria Solidarity UK and Stop the War have very different concerns regarding Syria: Syria Solidarity is concerned with ending the suffering of Syrians under the Assad dictatorship; Stop the War with opposing any UK military involvement regardless of consequences for Syrians.
We oppose the British government’s proposal to merely mimic the American ISIS-only counter-terrorism war; not only do we believe it is immoral to fly missions in Syria against ISIS while leaving the even greater killer, Assad, free to bomb civilians en masse, we also believe that any war against ISIS that doesn’t put the needs of the Syrian people first will be a failure that can only prolong their suffering.
Stop the War similarly oppose British government proposals to bomb ISIS, but not because they would leave Assad alone; for Stop the War also oppose any action against Assad. This puts Stop the War against Syrians who are being bombed by Assad: it puts them not just against Syrian revolutionaries but also against Syrian doctors, against Syrian White Helmets rescue volunteers, and against Syrian civil society activists, all of whom call for international action to stop Assad’s bombs.
This is why Stop the War don’t want to listen to Syrians.
That is why we do not support their demonstration today.
If Stop the War’s slogan “Don’t bomb Syria” is to have any meaning, let them demand the end of the regime whose bombs have killed so many.
If Stop the War oppose imperialism let them demonstrate their sincerity outside the Russian Embassy. Let them demonstrate with placards calling for Russia to stop bombing Syrian hospitals.
WHO IS KILLING CIVILIANS IN SYRIA?
The vast majority of violent deaths of civilians documented by the Syrian Network for Human Rights since March 2011 have been attributed to Assad’s forces. The following figures from SNHR’s report, The Main Conflict Parties Who Are Killing Civilians in Syria, are for the period from March 2011 to the end of October 2015.
Civilians killed from March 2011 to Oct. 2015
By Assad forces:
180,879
95.96%
... armed opposition groups:
2,669
1.42%
... unidentified groups:
2,002
1.06%
... ISIS:
1,712
0.91%
... Kurdish self management forces:
379
0.2 %
... al-Nusra Front:
347
0.18%
... Russian forces:
263
0.14%
... International Coalition forces:
251
0.13%
The SNHR also release monthly reports. For October 2015 they documented the following numbers of violent civilian deaths.
Syrian civilians killed in October 2015 alone
By Assad forces:
793
... armed opposition groups:
45
... unidentified groups:
50
... ISIS:
53
... Kurdish self management forces:
10
... al-Nusra Front:
1
... Russian forces:
263
... International Coalition forces:
1
All reports can be found on the Syrian Network for Human Rights website: http://sn4hr.org/
The Syria Solidarity Movement UK was formed to give solidarity to the people of Syria in their struggle for a democratic and free Syria. Our membership is made up of Syrians, and friends of Syrians. Our positions are led by the needs and demands of Syrians suffering brutally at the hands of a criminal regime.
Stop the War Coalition was formed in 2001 to oppose US and UK military action against the Taliban. Its cause is opposition to UK military and foreign policy. Its focus is Western-centric and UK-centric, only actively opposing military action by the UK and its allies, while providing at most lip service to criticising military action by states opposed to the UK. The justification it gives for this is that as a UK organisation it has no influence over these other states.
It follows that Syria Solidarity UK and Stop the War have very different concerns regarding Syria: Syria Solidarity is concerned with ending the suffering of Syrians under the Assad dictatorship; Stop the War with opposing any UK military involvement regardless of consequences for Syrians.
We oppose the British government’s proposal to mimic the American ISIS-only counter-terrorism war; not only do we believe it is immoral to fly missions in Syria against ISIS while leaving the even greater killer, Assad, free to bomb civilians en masse, we also believe that any war against ISIS that doesn’t put the needs of the Syrian people first will be a failure that can only prolong their suffering.
Stop the War similarly oppose British government proposals to bomb ISIS, but not because they would leave Assad alone; for Stop the War also oppose any action against Assad. This puts Stop the War against Syrians who are being bombed by Assad: it puts them not just against Syrian revolutionaries but also against Syrian doctors, against Syrian White Helmets rescue volunteers, and against Syrian civil society activists, all of whom call for international action to stop Assad’s bombs.
This is why Stop the War don’t want to listen to Syrians.
This statement lists three claimed lies about their 2nd November meeting: that Stop the War’s Andrew Murray had called for support for the Assad government to fight ISIS, that Syrians were prevented from speaking at the meeting, and that Police were called to the meeting to control protesters.
THE FIRST
Denying the first, Stop the War say Andrew Murray’s position is that ISIS can only be defeated by strong and credible governments in Syria and Iraq. If Andrew Murray does not mean Assad when he talks of a Syrian government, what does he mean? Elsewhere he makes clear that he is against the fall of Assad, saying that a no-fly zone should be opposed because “regime change is the real agenda.”
Andrew Murray also calls on foreign powers to abandon “all the preconditions laid down for negotiations,” language that echoes the Assad regime and its backers in Moscow. Why? Because there is just one precondition that is contested: the demand that Assad step down. This was not originally a Western demand, but first and foremost a Syrian demand.
So Andrew Murray’s “strong and credible government” is one where there is no change of regime, and no demand for Assad to step down: in other words, a continuation of the Assad regime.
There is no lie here.
THE SECOND
Denying the second, Stop the War say Syrians were not prevented from speaking at the meeting, and claim that a Syrian activist “was given ample time at the meeting to make her case” at Stop the War’s meeting. Not so.
Stop the War did allow the Syria Solidarity activist to speak in the meeting, but only when other members of the audience called for her to be heard. She was the only Syrian allowed to speak, she was interrupted, and for the rest of the meeting all other Syrians were deliberately ignored by the Chair, Diane Abbott, even when other speakers Catherine West MP and Caroline Lucas MP said they wanted to hear from Syrians. Caroline Lucas has since said she wrote to Stop the War about the way the meeting was conducted.
And so the second is no lie either.
THE THIRD
Stop the War deny that Police were called to the meeting to control protesters. This is the most blatant and astonishing falsehood. Police in the Houses of Parliament were called to the meeting. Syrian and Arab audience members were repeatedly told “you are going to get arrested.” One Syria Solidarity activist was prevented from re-entering the meeting by Police who arrived in numbers and were visible to all at the doors of the meeting by its end. One of the Arab attendees denied the opportunity to speak by the Chair was also talked to by Police after the meeting.
So finally, no lie here.
DON’T BOMB SYRIA?
If Stop the War’s slogan “Don’t bomb Syria” is to have any meaning, let them demand the end of the regime whose bombs have killed so many.
If Stop the War oppose imperialism let them demonstrate their sincerity outside the Russian Embassy. Let them demonstrate with placards calling for Russia to stop bombing Syrian hospitals.
Lastly, if Stop the War are against war, let them stop denying war crimes; for this is their latest response, publishing a claim that Assad wasn’t responsible for the Ghouta chemical weapons massacre, “because it was so obviously not in Assad’s political and military interests.”
This latest comes in an article by Matt Carr. He writes that he has “never really doubted the brutality of the Syrian regime” before going on to do just that by claiming Assad’s violence has been deliberately exaggerated. Matt Carr is known as a champion of refugees; he should listen to them, and learn that most Syrian refugees are fleeing Assad’s violence.
His argument as to why he doesn’t believe Assad responsible for the Ghouta massacre crosses the line from naive to wilfully ignorant. Assad repeatedly tested the West’s willingness to act with smaller chemical attacks prior to Ghouta, and confirmed there was little or none. Assad’s forces were the only party with the industrial capacity to produce the amount of Sarin chemical used, the only party to have the kinds of rockets used in the attack, and the only party with a clear motive to kill the civilians in those neighbourhoods.
He asks “what would happen to the Syrians that have supported the regime” if the Free Syrian Army win. The question Matt Carr fails to grasp is what is happening to millions of the dictator’s victims right now? The Free Syrian Army are the people who have defended their homes, freedom and justice against Assad for the last five years and against ISIS for the last three, and who are now being bombed by Assad’s ally Putin. The Free Syrian Army are not the ones levelling neighbourhoods and driving millions from their homes.
Syrian civilians need protection from Assad’s mass murder. Stop the War have nothing to offer Syrians, and so they stop their ears.
The Stop the War Coalition (StWC) have been accused of preventing victims of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad from speaking at an anti-war event.
During a panel event on Monday evening to discuss the case against British military intervention in Syria, StWC included no Syrians on the speaker’s panel and reportedly refused to allow Syrians to speak from the floor.
The meeting was chaired by Labour MP Diane Abbott and featured chair of the Stop the War coalition Andrew Murray, former leader of the Green Party Caroline Lucas, Labour MP Catherine West, Tory MP Crispin Blunt MP and SNP MP Tommy Shephard.
According to human rights activist Peter Tatchell, who attended the event, no Syrians were included on the panel and the Syrian activists who turned up to the event were threatened with arrest.
Speaking to LFF, Tatchell said:
“Some Syrian victims of Assad’s brutalities turned up but were not allowed to speak. They eventually shouted out in frustration, turning the meeting into momentary chaos, as they were jeered by some of the audience and as StWC stewards tried to eject them – allegedly threatening that they’d be arrested. The police turned up soon afterwards.”
Any UK policy on Syria must have the protection of Syrian civilians at its core and be jointly formulated with Syrian civil activists who know the reality on the ground in their country.
As a UK-based Syrian organisation that is part of an international civil society network in contact with Syrian civil activists, medics and rescue workers inside Syria, we urge all UK MPs to base any Syria policy around the urgent humanitarian needs of civilians on the ground.
Unfortunately, the upcoming 2nd November meeting at the House of Commons advocates a policy that is utterly divorced from the horrific reality experienced by civilians currently under attack by Russian and Assad regime aerial bombardments.
We categorically reject any policy proposal, be it for intervention or non-intervention, that is not formulated in consultation with Syrian civic, medical or humanitarian workers.
As it stands, we fully endorse the policy proposal recently put forward by MPs Jo Cox and Andrew Mitchell which is based on a genuine engagement with Syrian civil groups and prioritises the protection of civilians. This policy also echoes that recently put forward by the Syrian advocacy organisation Rethink Rebuild Society, to which Syria Solidarity UK is a signatory. This is where any sustainable UK Syria policy needs to start and we urge all MPs on the panel for the upcoming event to take note.
Syria Solidarity UK.
Links: Facebook event page for Stop the War event, House of Commons Committee Room 12, Monday 2 November at 6:30pm.
Rethink Rebuild Society has had no response to an email it sent to Stop the War on 23 September requesting an opportunity to speak at its Manchester event on Syria on 6 October. The current panel features four speakers, none of whom are Syrian, thereby framing a discussion on Syria without input from the most important party to the issue - the Syrian people themselves. Rethink Rebuild Society will be raising this crucial point at the event on 6 October.
Copy of the email sent:
Dear Stop the War coalition (cc Syria Solidarity Movement and Syrian Association of Yorkshire),
It has come to our attention that you are hosting an event titled “Don’t bomb Syria” on 6 October in the Friend's Meeting House in Manchester to discuss potential UK airstrikes against Syria.
Your event page details that speakers for this event include Lindsey German, Peter Brierley, Richard Burgon MP, and Clive Lewis MP. Notably, you do not have any Syrian speakers that will be presenting at this event, and therefore we are writing to formally request that we, as Rethink Rebuild Society, are given an opportunity to be represented.
We are a Manchester-based Syrian advocacy and community organisation. We work with policy makers and the media to affect decision-making on Syria, and we also have a strong community base that engages with us and communicates with us their views towards issues such as the proposed airstrikes. Additionally, our stance towards the Syrian conflict and the UK's role within it has been formulated alongside Syrian groups across the country, making our joint stances truly representative of the British Syrian voice.
To be clear, we are also not in favour of UK airstrikes in Syria as they are being proposed in Government. But we also find it is over-simplistic to assume that the best course of action is for the UK to stay out of Syria completely. Syria has been ripped apart over the past four years, partly attributable to Western inaction. We do, as Western states, have the power to take action to alleviate at least some of the threats to civilian life. In our view, this constitutes a much better means of 'stopping the war' than not doing anything.
In the ever-growing debate on Syria, it is often the most important voice, namely the Syrian one, that is neglected. As Syrians, we very much have a message to convey and strongly believe that our voices should be consulted first when it comes to decision-making that affects our homeland. We reiterate our request that an activist selected by our organisation - as a community organisation that will speak to the voice of thousands of Syrians across the country - is invited to speak.
Very much looking forward to hearing back from you.
Best regards,
Rethink Rebuild Society
Syria Solidarity Movement
Syrian Association of Yorkshire
Labour conference goers can meet Syrian activists from the Planet Syria campaign, and from Rethink Rebuild Society, voice of the Syrian community in Manchester. Visit United For Syria: Stand No. 28
on the Conference room ground floor.
Syria Solidarity UK spent time on Sunday leafleting Brighton conference goers outside Stop The War’s fringe event, titled ‘Don’t Bomb Syria’ — a fine sentiment if only they would address the party that has been bombing Syria these past four years: the Assad regime.
Reportedly the Stop The War event was poorly attended, with some speakers leaving early. As usual there were no Syrians on the panel, and little appetite for debate amongst the audience. Outside, Syria Solidarity got a warm reception from many conference visitors happy to take leaflets, and a number interested to meet and talk to Syrians.
Tomorrow the Birmingham branch of the Stop The War Coalition are holding a meeting titled ‘Don’t Attack Syria’.
The Birmingham branch “are committed to providing a platform for comrades who support the democratic and progressive opposition to the Assad regime,” and so invited Abdulaziz Almashi, a Syrian and a founder member of Syria Solidarity Movement UK, to speak. However, early this morning Syria Solidarity were told that the invitation was being withdrawn as the Birmingham branch had been informed that Syria Solidarity supported an “imperialist imposed” no-fly zone.
Below is an excerpt from our response:
Syria Solidarity’s view is led primarily by our solidarity with Syrians rather than by a domestic UK political view. In our internal discussions on the possibility of direct UK military intervention, we arrived at the following principles:
Where Syrian doctors, Syrian civil defence, civil society activists call for international action to protect civilians by enforcing a no-fly zone to stop Assad’s air attacks, we support them.
Where Syrian revolution forces call for international support in fighting ISIS, we support them.
We are against any actions which fail to defend civilians, or which act against the Syrian revolution.
We are against actions which aim to realise the objectives of the intervening power at the expense of the aspirations of the Syrian people.
It is important to recognise where the call for a no-fly zone is coming from: not the White House, which has blocked even a partial no-fly zone proposed by Turkey; not the Pentagon which has argued against a no-fly zone by vastly exaggerating the difficulties involved; not the UK government which is primarily concerned with mirroring US policy. Where there has been recent talk of a no-fly zone from the UK government it has been secondary to the anti-ISIS campaign, and is certainly driven more by the xenophobic politics around refugees than by a purely moral view of the crisis.
Syrians have no illusions about Western motives, and any they might have held have been destroyed by over four years of callous disregard by Western governments who have paid lip service to civilian protection while doing nothing to act. But Syrians have an immediate crisis to deal with: the bombs falling on Syria now. Material means are required to stop the bombs, not unenforced UN resolutions, not empty words of Western politicians, and not empty words of Western peace campaigners.
The challenge for the peace movement is to find a way of standing in solidarity with Syrians being bombed today, and avoiding echoing US and UK government excuses for inaction. The way to do that is to listen to Syrians, and for that reason I urge you to urgently reconsider and welcome the offer by Abdulaziz Almashi to speak.
On whether there were alternative means of enforcing a no-fly zone “other than the air forces of the imperialist states either the US, UK or France,” we replied with the following:
… the alternative to enforcement by US, UK, France would be enforcement by supplying Syrian revolution forces with effective anti aircraft weapons. This I believe is the position favoured by Abdulaziz Almashi.
As an organisation we would support a no-fly zone enforced by any party that effectively protected civilians. We would not give blanket support to other actions by such parties in connection with this, as the principles outlined earlier should make clear.
We have been told it is too late for the Birmingham branch to meet and reconsider before tomorrow’s event. We believe it is absolutely necessary that the anti-war movement and peace campaigners listen to Syrians, even if they disagree with them. We hope that they do find time to reconsider and re-invite Abdulaziz Almashi to the meeting.
Having risen up en masse against the brutal Assad regime, the Syrian people have been subjected to mass murder, torture, rape, starvation, and enforced exile.
Now their struggle has again captured the world’s attention as the flight of tens of thousands of Syrians into Europe has finally forced governments to discuss a solution to the crisis.
This is not just a refugee crisis, it is a crisis of Syria, of the whole country experiencing brutal oppression. There can be no solution to the refugee crisis without the removal of the regime responsible.
Some Syrians are fleeing ISIS, but most flee the Assad regime’s violence. The family of Aylan Kurdi’s, whose tragic death caught the world media’s attention, originally fled their home in Damascus after their father Abdullah was detained and tortured by the regime. The same is true for millions of others: this year alone the Assad regime has killed seven times more civilians compared to ISIS.
The only people who can remove the regime and resolve the crisis in Syria are the Syrian people. But they cannot do it alone. They need our support and solidarity.
We call on Stop The War to vocally oppose Assad’s violence, to demand the end of the barrel bombing, the lifting of the starvation sieges, and the end of Russian and Iranian intervention in Syria. It is this intervention which has preserved the regime, and allowed it to keep killing.
Above all we call on Stop The War to listen to Syrians.
Syria Solidarity Movement opposes the bombing of civilians, and opposes extra-judicial killings, be they by the Assad regime, or by ISIS, or by the US or UK. But it is Assad’s bombs which must be stopped if his regime is to be defeated, and Syrians to be allowed to return home.
Anti-war activists have a duty of solidarity to the Syrian people. To automatically oppose US/UK intervention, while remaining silent about the governments of Iran and Russia intervening on the side of Assad, is to abandon the Syrian people. Refusing to support activists on the ground who continue to organise and fight for the the original goals of the revolution is a terrible betrayal.
We are asking that you formally reply to the letter, and that you allow an activist of their choice to speak from the platform at the Stop The War Coalition meeting on 10th September.
Please respond ASAP to this message. We will be attending the meeting and will continue to raise this issue publicly if we do not receive a response from you.
Regards,
Mark Boothroyd
Kellie Strom
Abdulaziz Almashi
Mario Hamad
Clara Connolly
Syria Solidarity Movement UK
Today’s response from Stop The War Coalition:
Dear Syria Solidarity Movement,
Thank you for your letter. The meeting on Thursday is to oppose UK military intervention. Nothing on Planet Syria's website opposes such intervention, therefore an invitation to speak is not appropriate.
The meeting is not a debate between those for and against intervention. Such a debate might be appropriate at some time, but in that case it should be discussed and agreed.
You are of course welcome to attend the meeting but I hope that you will respect the parameters and conduct of the meeting.
Best wishes,
Lindsey German
Stop the War Coalition
It has come to our attention that you are hosting a panel on September 10 titled “Don’t bomb Syria” to discuss why you are against anti-ISIS strikes by the UK in Syria. You say the strikes will only lead to resentment and “more deaths and destruction. [1] The panel will be attended by Diane Abbott MP, Seumas Milne and Andrew Murray. The Stop the War coalition is adamant that the best role the UK can play at this stage is to stay out of Syria completely. We understand why you are wary of getting involved in another war in the Middle East. We are grateful that people in the UK are giving this issue so much consideration. However, given that the Stop the War coalition’s pronouncements on the situation in Syria hold sway among a great deal of the British public we, as nonviolent Syrian activists, urge you to consult us on this grave matter. It is our own lives you’re discussing with such conviction after all and to that end, we believe it is necessary for a Syrian to participate on the panel.
To be clear, we are not taking a position for or against these strikes. The truth of the matter is, whether the UK intervenes to strike ISIS or not, it is not about to start or stop a new war in Syria. A brutal war has already been raging in Syria for the past four years and ISIS is but one of the parties wrecking Syrian lives every day. In fact ISIS has inflicted less casualties than the Syrian government, which has made a daily habit of launching air strikes on defenceless besieged towns. To date, the Syrian government has killed at least seven times more civilians than ISIS according to the Violations Documentation Centre and the Syrian Network for Human Rights, two reputable Syrian organisations. [2]
You claim that anti-ISIS strikes will increase terrorism but as activists working on the ground to build peace, we know very well that there are many factors driving the radicalisation of young hearts and minds in Syria. The main one by far is the crude and unsparing barrel bomb made of scrap metal and high explosives. Barrel bombs, which are cheap and easily manufactured, are dropped by government helicopters on a daily basis. They turn entire neighbourhoods to rubble, destroy schools and hospitals and tear apart families, neighbourhoods and communities. A UN resolution banned these bombs in 2014, yet more than 11,000 of them have been dropped on populated areas since that resolution was passed. [3] This is because the international community has failed to enforce its ban. Many of these bombs are dropped on areas like Ghouta where people have been living under a crippling siege for two years with no access to food, water or much needed medical supplies.
Syrians who have had to hold in their arms the bloodied disfigured bodies of their loved ones really wish they could take part in discussions regarding the fate of their own country, but they’re often not invited. It is regrettable that Syrian speakers who represent these victims and have lived the quintessential painful Syrian experience have not been invited to take part in this panel.
We are nonviolent activists who are part of the Planet Syria network, a group of over a hundred civil society groups in Syria. We work on the ground to shore up nascent civil institutions and to provide basic services to residents in areas outside of government control. Our network has not taken any position vis-a-vis intervention on against ISIS because we consider ISIS a symptom of the problem rather than the crux of it. We are saddened that debates in the UK are centred around ISIS but wilfully ignore the Syrian government’s vicious aerial war on its own people. The government killed hundreds of thousands and displaced millions of Syrians long before ISIS ever materialised in Syria. If it’s human lives the UK public and the Stop the War coalition are concerned about, then shouldn’t people there get a chance to hear the perspective of those who have borne the bulk of the suffering? We believe that inviting a Syrian representative of the Planet Syria network to sit on your panel will enrich the conversation and make it more constructive.
We have been living this nightmare for almost half a decade now and we feel we are entitled to take part in conversations regarding our fate. We are dismayed at the number of anti-war panels and lectures that have taken place in the West which have failed to include Syrians in their impressive lists of participants. We hope you won’t continue to exclude us from these important conversations about the fate of our country because when you do so, you further disempower the very same Syrians who have been disempowered by various perpetrators in this conflict.
All we want is a chance to voice our perspective as Syrians who see potential solutions where others only see challenges. We can add a much needed layer to this debate which has remained stubbornly removed from the reality most Syrians are living. There is the status quo in Syria and there is the ‘Stop The War’ movement in the UK. Until you take that extra step to consider that what we have to say is indispensable to the conversation around Syria, your conversation unfortunately has little bearing on Syrians’ fate.
On the event description, you write that military intervention in Syria could be ‘catastrophic for the whole region.’ There is already a huge catastrophe in the region. Syria is hemorrhaging flows of refugees into neighbouring countries. Syrian migrants are drowning every week as they try to reach European shores on dinghy boats to give their children a shot at a decent life. But they’re fleeing so much more than ISIS, so our biggest hope is to broaden the UK debate to take that glaring fact into account.
We would like you to listen to us because right now, absent Syrian voices, the debate ignores the valuable real-life experiences of nonviolent Syrians who can offer solutions. We would be more than glad to send a representative of Planet Syria to the panel and we patiently await your invitation.
[2] These are the figures for 2015 only from 1 January to 31 July. If you go back to the beginning of the uprising the difference between the government and Isis is much larger, since Isis was born from the conflict and did not exist in 2011. Source: Syria Network for Human Rights and Violations Documentation Center (http://sn4hr.org/ and https://www.vdc-sy.info/index.php/en/ ).
Syria Solidarity activists attended the Stop The War Coalition’s “Confronting a World at War” conference last Saturday to call for solidarity with the Syrian people.
We started leafleting the conference early, and almost immediately came into contact with Stop The War’s less savoury side. Several older activists leafleting the conference for their respective causes asked us if we “support the jihadists” and referred to us as “the pro-ISIS lot”. While not necessarily representative, the fact these comments were heard at all tells you a lot about the milieu that Stop The War has been attracting with its political positions.
Around half those attending took our leaflets, and the start to the conference must have been small as less than 100 entered the doors at the beginning. Several organisers came out to urge people to go inside as the event was starting; a bit of desperation to fill empty seats perhaps.
Several more of us returned at the lunch break to leaflet again. As activists came out we engaged several in discussions. Some quickly descended into arguments with people who were openly pro-regime. However we found lots of people sympathised with the Syrian revolt, and pro-revolution activists were in attendance too and were glad to see us arguing the case for the revolution. One thing to note was the make up of the conference. The conference was overwhelmingly white and middle aged. Absent were the hundreds of young Muslims who were the vanguard of the Stop The War movement in its heyday. Not surprising when Stop The War has effectively turned it back on providing solidarity with the largest democratic revolts in the Muslim world.
With the Syrian revolution in its fifth year, the Stop The War Coalition is failing in its duty of solidarity to the Syrian people.
Having risen up en masse against the brutal Assad regime, the Syrian people have been subjected to mass murder, torture, rape, and starvation. The toll now includes over a quarter of a million killed; another quarter million in regime prisons; over four million Syrian refugees; half the population driven from their homes.
This oppression has fragmented and radicalised the opposition, transforming a popular revolution for freedom and democracy into a military struggle between the regime and Islamic and Free Syrian Army rebel groups. Da’esh (ISIS) has grown in the devastation, cynically aided by the regime in order to destroy the revolution.
And yet the revolution has not been defeated, thanks to the resilience of the Syrian people. Many towns and villages in liberated areas are attempting to rebuild civil administration, despite daily barrel bombs and chlorine gas attacks by the regime.
While there has been massive outpouring of solidarity from Muslim community organisations, the Western Left has, with a few honourable exceptions, failed to show similar solidarity.
Anti-war activists have a duty of solidarity to the Syrian people. It is not enough to oppose US/UK intervention, while remaining silent about the governments of Iran and Russia intervening on the side of Assad. Refusing to support activists on the ground who continue to organise and fight for the the original goals of the revolution is a terrible betrayal. The abandonment of Syrians is a primary reason for the growth of extremist factions like the Al-Qaeda linked Jabhat Al-Nusra.
Syria is complex, but complexity is not a worthy excuse for inaction or silence. Understanding Syria starts with talking to Syrians and Syrian civil society. Saturday’s Stop the War event is yet another anti-war conference without a Syrian activist or speaker talking about the situation in Syria. This shameful stance must be corrected, or Stop The War will be forever known as the organisation which turned its back on Syria.
The Stop The War Coalition has a loud voice in the UK. Why don’t we hear it raised on behalf of the Syrian people in their time of need?
Links:
Read about the Syria Freedom Charter, modelled on South Africa’s Freedom Charter and developed from interviews with over 50,000 Syrians.
Read about practical solidarity efforts with Syria by Bridge of Peace.
Yesterday, Saturday 25 April, Syria Solidarity Movement UK joined with other groups at the Migrant Lives Matter protest to call for action on the Mediterranean crisis. Because of objections by Stop the War Coalition, the representative of Syria Solidarity Movement UK was prevented from saying these words at the demonstration:
The Syrian people are suffering terribly.
They’ve had four years of brutal war by the Assad's regime, armed by Russia, bankrolled by Iran, bombing cities and towns every single day for the last three years.
To give you an idea of the scale of the assault, since the start of April there have been 700 air strikes on Idlib province alone, and Aleppo has now got the dubious honour of being the most bombed city since World War Two.
There are 12 million Syrians in need of urgent aid, 8 million are internally displaced, 4.5 million are refugees overseas.
And Britain has only committed to taking 750 refugees per year.
And only 143 have been taken in in the last 18 months.
This is in comparison to 2,500 in Norway, 30,000 in Germany, and nothing compared to the 1.5 million in Turkey and 1 million in Lebanon.
We're campaigning for an expansion of the vulnerable persons relocation scheme, to restart the rescue missions and create safe routes for Refugees from Southern Europe to Northern Europe. The burden for taking refugees shouldn't fall on Greece and Italy, it should be spread across the whole of Europe.
There are practical things we can do to help Syrians. Citizens UK is campaigning for 50 councils to accept 50 refugees each, there is a draft letter on our website, send it to your council, arrange a meeting with them and lobby them to take 50 refugees. There are 4 councils signed up so far. We want to get 200 councils, not just 50, to take refugees, and rescue Syrian refugees from the terrible conditions they are enduring at the moment.
Thank you, and victory to the Syrian Revolution.
Below: Leaflet distributed by Syria Solidarity Movement UK at the protest. PDF file here.
UPDATE 15 May 2015: We are very pleased to have received the following positive message from Movement Against Xenophobia, organisers of the Migrant Lives Matter demonstration, and we look forward to continuing our support for their vital work.
Apology from MAX re April 25th Migrant Lives Matter demonstration
Dear colleagues at the Syria Solidarity Movement
I am writing on behalf of the MAX’ steering group to offer our sincere apologies for the inappropriate action by a staff from one of the member organisations, which led to excluding your speaker from contributing at the April 25th's Migrant Lives Matter demonstration.
Our meeting in London last night introduced new measures to prevent such unfortunate situation from arising in the future.
MAX has and will continue to support the work of Syria Solidarity Movement.
Nazek Ramadan
Chair at the MAX meeting May 14th (MAX’s meetings are chaired on a rotational basis)
