Israeli right-winger Benjamin Netanyahu, who stated that Israel did not “go far enough” in its 22-day invasion and massacre of 1400 Palestinians in Gaza earlier this year and who has never accepted even the possibility of an independent state for the Palestinians, is now the new prime minister. He was sworn in on April 1, after being asked in February by President Shimon Peres to form a coalition government.

Fight Back News Service is circulating the following statement from the Campaign to Free Ahmad Sa'adat, which summarizes and contains excerpts from an important letter from the imprisoned leader of the Popular Front for the liberation of Palestine.

Fight Back News Service is circulating the following statement from the Campaign to Free Ahmad Sa'adat

The government of Nepal is in trouble. Nepal is ruled by King Gyanendra, who shared power with an elected legislative assembly until Feb. 1. On that day, King Gyanendra abolished the assembly, banned the legal political parties in the assembly and arrested their leaders and censored the media and Internet.

As of April 24, Nepal's King Gyanendra appears to be nearing his last days in power. Huge mass protests of hundreds of thousands of people are defying a shoot-to-kill curfew after 19 days of a general strike. Massive crowds are gathering on the outskirts of the capital, Katmandu, and attempting to move slowly into the city in the face of the Royal Nepal Army shooting into the crowds. Presumably the protesters are trying to get to the center of Katmandu to the Royal Palace, which was cordoned off a couple days ago with barbed wire and military troops.

A new day had dawned in Nepal. After fighting a decade-long people’s war, which led to a coalition government replacing martial law imposed by the King of Nepal, the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) is leading the Constituent Assembly elections in Nepal. The vote counting is not completely finished, but at the time of this writing the CPN (Maoist) has won a total of 120 seats, with the opposition Nepali Congress Party coming in a distant second at 37 seats. The Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist) won 33 seats, but following the their election defeat their ministers have resigned from the coalition government cabinet.

On June 11, King Gyanendra left Nepal's royal palace for the last time. He was forced out of power by a powerful revolutionary movement. A new Nepali government is now being formed through a Constituent Assembly, led by the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist).

San Salvador, El Salvador – In an historic day here, June 1, Mauricio Funes and Salvador Sanchez Ceren were sworn in as the new president and vice-president of El Salvador. Funes and Sanchez Ceren are members of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN), a leftist political party which was formerly a guerrilla movement that fought against the U.S.-backed right wing dictatorship in El Salvador in the 1980s. Funes and Sanchez Ceren won election on March 15, marking the first time there will be a leftist government in El Salvador’s history.

The revolution in Nepal took another step forward with the election of Pushpa “Prachanda” Dahal voted in as the first Prime Minister on August 15th. He won overwhelmingly with 464 of 577 votes cast in the 601 person National Assembly. The loser from the Congress Party obtained 113 votes. This defeat is important because the Congress Party represents the old landowners and wealthy bosses who are putting up roadblocks as the people march towards a new Nepal. The new Prime Minister, Prachanda, as he is popularly known, is the leader of the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), and the vote reflects both the mandate granted to his party by the people and the unity built with twenty-one other parties. This new phase of the revolution, ruling the country, follows ten years of fighting a people’s war against a corrupt and hated monarchy and the rich elite. The monarchy is history. The people of Nepal are in power. In the nationwide elections, held in April of this year, Prachanda's party was overwhelmingly favored, getting nearly double the next highest tally for any other party. The CPN (M) ran on a platform of creating a democratic republic, national development for the benefit of all, and equal rights for Nepal's neglected minorities

St. Paul, MN – The Salvadoran community and supporters gathered here on the evening of March 15 to watch election results and celebrate a historic victory for the left in El Salvador. On March 15, Mauricio Funes and Salvador Sanchez-Ceren were elected president and vice-president of the small Central American country. Funes and Sanchez-Ceren are from the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN), the leftist political party that led an armed liberation struggle in the 1980s, and became an electoral political party after the Peace Accords ended El Salvador's civil war in 1992.

An Interview with Cherrene Horazuk

In recent months the U.S. Department of Justice has sent threatening letters to the Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES), which works in solidarity with grassroots social justice movements and the left in El Salvador. The government is accusing CISPES of being an 'agent of a foreign power' – specifically of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN), the leftist political party in El Salvador. This echoes the FBI's groundless accusations against CISPES in the 1980s, which led to a seven-year campaign of illegal U.S. government harassment against CISPES that the FBI later had to apologize for.

San Salvador, El Salvador – About 20,000 people marched in San Salvador on Saturday, July 7 protesting against the arrest and detention of 13 political activists in Suchitoto, a town in El Salvador’s rural department of Cuzcatlán.

Israel has added another offense to its long roster of crimes by attacking Lebanon. It is conducting an air war that intentionally targets civilians; even refugees fleeing in their cars are killed. Israel is systematically destroying the infrastructure of southern Lebanon by targeting people's basic needs – apartment buildings, warehouses full of food, gas stations, powers plants, bridges and roads. Almost a million people have been driven from their homes. Now Israeli ground troops have crossed the border into Lebanon.

Caracas, Venezuela – Despite the rain, 500 people demonstrated here, at Plaza Venezuela, Aug. 1, to protest Israel’s attacks on Lebanon and Gaza, and the U.S. support for Israel’s` offensives. Speakers, poets and singers denounced U.S. imperialism and Zionism from the stage.

On the same day that George W. Bush declared, “I have earned political capital in the campaign, and I intend to spend it,” high-ranking administration officials said that Bush’s second term would bring a refocusing of energies on Latin America. In the first year of his second term, Bush hopes to pass the U.S.-Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement, or DR-CAFTA, in an effort to gain passage of the full Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) by 2006.

Washington, DC – People from around the country gathered here on August 12 to demonstrate against Israeli/ U.S. wars in Lebanon and Palestine. The demonstrators, mostly Arab-Americans, demanded an end to US aid to Israel and the end of Israeli occupation in Palestine and Lebanon. Families, with children and grandmothers, joined with students in front of the White House, chanting “No justice! No peace! US out of the middle east!” and “Israel is the terrorist – occupied people have the right to resist!” Organizers stated that about 30,000 people were in attendace.

Less than a week after the U.S. elections, labor leader Gilberto Soto was assassinated in Usulutan, El Salvador. Soto, a Salvadoran who emigrated to the U.S. in 1975, was a Teamster organizer in New Jersey, an activist with CISPES – the Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador – and a long-time member of the FMLN, El Salvador’s left political party. The FMLN has actively opposed the Central American Free Trade Agreement, both in the legislature, where they hold a plurality of the seats, and in the streets, where they have led tens of thousands of people marching against CAFTA and against the war in Iraq.

The Georgian government launched an all out attack on South Ossetia, Aug. 8, to annex the region by force. South Ossetia is a small region that borders southern Russia with a population of 70,000 people. The Georgian regime, led by President Mikhail Saakashvili and backed by the U.S. and NATO, attacked the South Ossetian capital city of Tskhinvali. Many buildings were bombed and damaged with large numbers of South Ossetians reported killed by the Georgian military’s brutal attack. The people of the city were left without running water or electricity. Tens of thousands sought refuge, fleeing in terror north towards Russia. In addition to the savage attacks on civilians, the Georgians comprising part of the peacekeeping force in the region fired on their Russian counterparts, killing at least 15 soldiers and wounding 150.

Athens, Greece -Demanding “No to anti-people politics,” tens of thousands of workers, students and youth rallied across Greece in mid-December to open a 24-hour general strike that virtually shut down the country’s businesses and industry. The strike was called by the All Workers’ Militant Front (PAME) and the General Trade Body of Greece (GSEE) in response to proposals in the 2006 budget that would cut public services including health care and education, abolish the eight-hour work day, decrease pensions and benefits and open up at least eight Sundays a year for work.