A fundamentalist attack on a humoristic and anticlerical journal

On January the 7th, in Paris, an islamist commando assailed the editorial meeting of the weekly Charlie Hebdo, assassinating among its participants cartoonists Cabu, Charb, Honoré, Tignous, Wolinski and the economics professor Bernard Maris (« Uncle Bernard »). They executed also two other collaborators of the journal, Elsa Cayat and Frédéric Boisseau, the corrector Mustapha Ourrad, a visitor, Michel Renaud, and the two policemen who protected the journal, Frank Brinsolaro and Ahmed Merabet.

The fanatics did not attack « France », as so many good souls want to persuade of it youth and workers who reacted immediately, quite rightly so, in the streets in the face of barbarity. They did not attack the Staff of the Army or the seat of a secret service (DGSE, DGSI…), the racialist weekly Minute, TF1 or the Figaro, medias closely linked to capitalists and the French army.

It is a fact, the islamist obscurantists assassinated artists and a teacher. They deliberately chose a vulnerable target, a journal that incarnates antiracism, anticlericalism, antimilitarism for all French-speaking people in the world. This is why our bimonthly bulletin, Révolution communiste, had recently reproduced cartoons by Cabu, Charb and Honoré.

This attack is in line with hitlerian, francoist and islamist autodafés ; with clerical attacks against workers of New York, Paris, Madrid and London ; with the racialist aggression against a Jewish school in Toulouse and the slaughter in the Jewish museum in Belgium ; with reactionary attacks against Pakistani, Afghan or Nigerian girl schools…

Visibly well-trained, these fanatics probably acted in connection with the bourgeois and mafia networks of Al Qaida or Daesh. In the zones that they control, in the Middle East and in Africa, the islamo-fascist gangs kidnap journalists and humanitarian workers, torture and execute them, defend private property, ban strikes and liquidate workers’ organizations, kill more Arabs and Kurds than the soldiers of the imperialist and zionist armies, violently oppress women, youths and homosexuals, ban any artistic activity and persecute other creeds.

Those who wanted to gag Charlie Hebdo : the army and the clergy, UMP and FN

In November 1970, Hebdo Hara-Kiri, the ancestor of Charlie Hebdo (and of Siné Mensuel) is banned by the UNR (now UMP) government of Pompidou. In January 1996, The Defense Minister of the RPR (now UMP) government of Chirac sues Charlie Hebdo and wins the trial.

In September 1995, the FN candidate to membership of parliament for Neuilly, Marie-Caroline Le Pen (eldest daughter of the founder of the FN, a torturer during the Algerian war), sues it in court and wins. In December 1995, the FN mayor of Toulon, Jean-Marie Le Chevallier, sues it and loses the trial. In April 1996, the FN journal National Hebdo sues Charlie, losing the trial. In November 1997, the FN MP Le Chevallier sues it again and loses, because Charlie had denounced his relations with banditism. In February 1998, the FN mayor of Vitrolles, Catherine Maigret, brings four trials, losing all of them.

The catholic fundamentalists (AGRIF) bring it to courts 13 times between March 1994 and June 1998, losing most of the times.

The French Council of Muslim Worship (CFCM), the Grand Mosque of Paris and the UOIF (Union of Islamic Organizations of France, close to the Muslim Brotherhood) sue twice Charlie Hebdo in 2006 (they will be dismissed). In 2011, the journal’s site is attacked, and its offices are burned (the arsonists are not found).

For this only reason, the crocodile tears shed over Charlie Hebdo by those who always wanted to silence it : Sarkozy (UMP) and Le Pen (FN), Ribadeau Dumas (Confederation of bishops of France), Boubakeur (CFCM) and Kotbi (UOIF) provoke disgust.

The greatest terrorists are the imperialist states

Muslim fundamentalism is not a religious creed, it is a reactionary political current. It is not the only one, as witnessed by the affirmation by the president of the Republic Sarkozy that priests are above teachers ; the homophobic demonstrations supported by the Catholic Church, fascist groups, the UMP and UDI ; pressures by fundamentalist Christians against artists and against doctors who practice abortion ; xenophobic campaigns of the UMP and FN…

Djihadism is not the only fascist current as is illustrated by the murder of an antifascist militant by a nazi group in France, the multiple assassinations of Turks by a nazi group in Germany, the slaughter of young socialists by a nazi in Norway, the bludgeoning of immigrants and the assassination of a singer by the Golden Dawn in Greece, etc.

Islamism is a product of the decomposition of capitalism : it was propelled by the American, Pakistani, Turkish and Israeli secret services ; it is financed by the Gulf monarchies allied to the United States ; it is connected to world capitalism by its trafficks in drugs, oil, weapons… It finds an echo in the dominated countries but also in the Arab or Muslims minorities within dominant countries, by taking the fallacious appearance of anti-imperialism and anti-zionism.

This is possible because imperialist states such as France secrete within themselves discrimination against ethnic minorities (Blacks and Latinos in North America ; Arabs, Turks, Pakistanis, Roms, Blacks… in Europe). They support the zionist colonization of Palestine, protect their capitalist groups that exploit beyond their frontiers, intervene diplomatically, politically and militarily in the whole world in order to maintain their domination, by supporting despotic regimes, with coups, military interventions, drones, assassination and torture of those who dare to defy them…

Against national unity with the imperialist government, the xenophobic parties and the obscurantist clergies

National union, whether against the Kaiser in August 1914 or against the djihadists in January 2015, always transforms the proletariat and youth into dupes of the dominant class. In the name of national unity, the president and chief of armies Hollande receives Sarkozy, Bayrou and Le Pen at the Élysée. The patriotic rally extolled by the Hollande-Valls government would only lead to the political reinforcement of the fascistic party and the fascist groups, to the generalized spying of population, to the decrease of democratic freedoms, to the hypertrophy of the repressive state apparatus (secret services, army, national police…) that reveals itself impotent against terrorism but constitutes a threat against strikes, social struggles and social revolution here and elsewhere. The GIPN has already intervened against striking postmen, the GIGN has already intervened against striking sailors.

Journalist and printing trade unions must give all their support to Charlie Hebdo in order to allow it to keep on living. All organizations originating from the working class, parties as unions, must denounce national union, break from the bourgeoisie, all its parties, its State, the government at its service.

Workers in this country, whatever their ethnicity, their religion or lack of it, must unite to defend democratic freedoms, starting with the freedom of the press and the removal of all censorship. They must fight all fascist actions and also the xenophobic and islamophobic campaigns of the « republican » bourgeois parties such as the UMP, or fascistic ones such as the FN, military interventions and anti-immigrant hunts of the PS-PRG government. In order to definitively eradicate fascism under all its forms, one must extirpate capitalism in this country and in the whole world with the help of workers in all countries.

• Honour to Cabu, Charb, Honoré, Tignous, Wolinski !
• Hands off Arabs, mosques !
• No restriction on democratic freedoms !
• Workers’ unity against all racialists and all fascists, against the police State and the imperialist army !