Once the bustling heart of Christian pilgrimage, Bethlehem now faces shuttered hotels, empty streets and a shrinking Christian community, while Israel’s assault on Gaza and the tightening grip of occupation destroy hopes of peace at the birthplace of Christ, writes Father GEOFF BOTTOMS
Inflation: the working class doesn’t have to pay for it
As organised labour gets more assertive at last, we cannot let rising prices outstrip our wages – inflation is the result of monopoly capitalism and the rich must be the ones that are forced ‘cut back,’ explains ZOLTAN ZIGEDY
FIFTY years ago, global capitalism came to a crossroads. The enormous costs of the US’s long, costly Asian war produced great debt and pressure on the gold-backed US dollar.
The imperialist alliance with Israel brought a disruptive, unprecedented boycott on the part of the oil-producing nations resisting Israel’s occupation of Arab territories.
Intense competition between the dominant US economy and the resurgent Euro-Asian economies was shrinking profit margins.
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In 2024, 19 households grew richer by $1 trillion while 66 million households shared 3 per cent of wealth in the US, validating Marx’s prediction that capitalism ‘establishes an accumulation of misery corresponding with accumulation of capital,’ writes ZOLTAN ZIGEDY
Labour’s fiscal policy is already in trouble. But simply printing money is not a solution, says the Marx Memorial Library and Workers School
ZOLTAN ZIGEDY reflects on the lessons from two books looking at the US labour movement and the recent history of spontaneous mass uprisings – and finds two pernicious ideologies working against the interests of the people
GAWAIN LITTLE argues that the prolonged economic crisis we have been experiencing presents opportunities for a working-class fightback



