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'The politicians and generals are dragging us into the quagmire'

THE FOLLOWING leaflet (translated from Hebrew) against the Olmert government's war plans, was issued by members of Maavak Sozialisti (Socialist Struggle) the Socialist Party's counterpart in Israel.

The current war is not intended to secure the release of the captured soldiers or to bring security to the northern settlements. The generals and politicians cannot endure the damage done to their prestige in the attacks where soldiers were killed and captured in Keren Shalom and in the northern border, and for this reason they are sending ordinary soldiers to fight and telling over a million workers and their families to "absorb the blows quietly".

The brave politicians and generals are prepared to fight till the last drop of blood - not their own blood but the blood of thousands of ordinary people, both Israeli and Lebanese...

The politicians told us that the aerial bombardment would "crush Hezbollah", and that turning hundreds of thousands of Lebanese into refugees will put pressure on the Lebanese government who will force Hezbollah to surrender.

None of these things has happened. The massive bombardment has harmed workers more than it has harmed Hezbollah - which is dragging the [Israeli] army into the trap it has prepared in South Lebanon.

And now, after having promised us that there will be no need for a land invasion and a re-occupation of South Lebanon, the politicians and generals are sending the ordinary soldiers to do exactly these things.

In the meantime, in the North, street cleaners in Nahareeya are being forced to continue working cleaning the empty streets - otherwise they will be sacked and will lose their derisory salary.

The fires which are caused by missile strikes are extinguished by firemen who have not received their wages for two months. Hundreds of thousands of residents of the North understood that the government was incapable of defending them and moved southwards - and the people left behind are those who have no relatives who can put them up in the centre of the country and who have no money for hotel bills, in other words poor workers.

The government does not care about the residents of the north, neither those who left nor those who remained.

The capitalist system which in normal times is incapable of providing us with a decent living, health, decent education and affordable housing, is also incapable of providing security and is leading us into a new quagmire in Gaza, the West Bank and in Lebanon.

The capitalists who profited from the privatisations and the [previous economic] boom, will also be compensated for their war losses, and we will be forced to pay the price, in blood and poverty.

Only we, millions of workers and youth, can put a stop to this - in a mass campaign of demonstrations and strikes.

Bush gives green light to the Israeli onslaught